Wild or stocked fish?

[Mikey2006]

Many scenarios where stocked fish end up looking wild? Like what?

Identifying wild brown and brook trout is stupid easy 99.9% of the time. I'd say 100% but I'll leave that little room for error.

Rainbows are slightly more challenging because 1) wild bows are more common than people realize. 2) my home large limestoner has the nicest looking rainbows I've ever seen and there are lots of them of all sizes. This system is also confirmed to have wild bows by a PFBC biologist and the system gets stocked. But usually stockie bows, like all other stockies, are stupid easy to ID so these nice bows make me question.

I just meant that after they are in the stream for a while some fish start to get more colored up and look/behave more wild. Usually it’s easy for me to tell but I’ve had some (including the fish I originally made this thread about) that I honestly couldn’t tell

 

[hooker-of-men]

I have an OK sense with browns, but I really don't have a sense of the indicators with brook trout, except in the most obvious of cases.

This is my typical expectation for a stocked brook trout. Muted colors, notably stubby gnarled fins

But this also seems pretty clearly stocked, and it's a world of a different fish. Fins are kinda worn, I guess? What am I supposed to be looking at here?

FYI: Top fish is NY in June; bottom fish is NH at end of August.

 

[jifigz]

I just meant that after they are in the stream for a while some fish start to get more colored up and look/behave more wild. Usually it’s easy for me to tell but I’ve had some (including the fish I originally made this thread about) that I honestly couldn’t tell

I know what you meant...... And I was picking because that sounds like one scenario to me. A stocked fish that has been in the real environment of a stream for a long time.

 

[pcray1231]

Hooker, I would guess both of those to be stocked.

Brookies are a less reliable tell than browns for sure, but I think easier than rainbows. My best tell, and no it ain't 100%, is the anal (there's that word again) fin. Specifically the separation of colors from white to black to red. In wild fish it is generally a very sharp, straight line. No bends, or at least very minimal. No muddiness where one color blends into another. No dots of black in the white.

In stocked fish it is often a muddy transition, or even when it's sharp, that line ain't straight or clean.

Color is a very poor tell on brookies. Stockies can color up quickly with the right diet. Wild fish can be very dull on the wrong diet.

I've also had some luck determining which major drainage (Ohio, Susquehanna, or Delaware) drainage a brookie came from by number of red spots and the distribution of them. Top the point where given a bunch of pics of PA wild brookies, I get that right on about 60 or 70%. Which, isn't enough to say it works, really, but if it were totally random, the success rate would be 1 out of 3, so there's something to it. Call that one in the works....

 

[Fish Sticks]

Silverfox has some tells on Potomac vs. susky brookies.


If you see the double halos you know they are either stocked from one unscrupulous western pa trout farm most likely or a genetically harmful/introgressed wild cross between their fish and a wild brook trout.

 

[jifigz]

Hooker, I would guess both of those to be stocked.

Brookies are a less reliable tell than browns for sure, but I think easier than rainbows. My best tell, and no it ain't 100%, is the anal (there's that word again) fin. Specifically the separation of colors from white to black to red. In wild fish it is generally a very sharp, straight line. No bends, or at least very minimal. No muddiness where one color blends into another. No dots of black in the white.

In stocked fish it is often a muddy transition, or even when it's sharp, that line ain't straight or clean.

Color is a very poor tell on brookies. Stockies can color up quickly with the right diet. Wild fish can be very dull on the wrong diet.

I've also had some luck determining which major drainage (Ohio, Susquehanna, or Delaware) drainage a brookie came from by number of red spots and the distribution of them. Top the point where given a bunch of pics of PA wild brookies, I get that right on about 60 or 70%. Which, isn't enough to say it works, really, but if it were totally random, the success rate would be 1 out of 3, so there's something to it. Call that one in the works....

I'd actually be very interested in seeing you identify which drainage brookies come from by their spots/coloration. Now, how can I start a thread and have you NOT identify them by the poster posting the picture and having the tip of knowing the most likely drainage that the poster would be fishing? Case in point. Basically 100% of all of my trout caught are in the Susquehanna drainage and you could probably infer that from knowing where I live.

Methinks this will be an interesting experiment, however. I am gonna have to travel, take notes, collect brookies from other drainages, and test your abilities.

 

[pcray1231]

Fair enough. I'll even reveal where I'm at as far as methodology. And I'm by no means suggesting it's reliable at all, I've had fish in all 3 drainages go away from the standard.

Allegheny - tend to have a high number of randomly placed red spots. I said Ohio in the earlier one, I really don't have enough experience in the Mon drainage to say whether it fits or not, as my brookie experiences in this system are the upper Allegheny. Just a personal observation too, they tend to look darker, with black around the mouth and belly. Dark, not dull. That's probably just a reflection of the physical habitat that's more common there though, and not genetics. I think number and distribution of red spots is more likely to be genetic.

Susquehanna - Still a lot of red spots. Except the red spots tend to line up in lines, parallel to the lateral line. Sometimes 1 is misplaced or so, but you can clearly see a line pattern. The yellow spots also tend to be fewer and very large.

Delaware - Tend to have fewer spots. Sometimes only like 2 or 3 to a side, but 4-7 is common too. And they line up. Seems especially true of the Schuylkill drainage in particular. Still gathering data in the Pocono's.

In all 3 systems fish in bigger, richer water tend to be duller looking, less red and more olive/blues, and sometimes the red spots aren't visible at all. Which totally destroys this... And, I think one of the reasons it's less reliable is genetic influence of stocked fish over the years, which just muddies things up some, and the fact that there's overlap in these categories. I've not made any numeric system or anything.

 

[DomR]

In stocked fish it is often a muddy transition, or even when it's sharp, that line ain't straight or clean.

Stockies are like the failed artists on Inkmaster. lol

 

[Dave_W]

Regarding the OP:
I'd vote wild on that FS brownie. There are wild BTs in FS and freshly stocked PFBC fish usually lack the bright colors seen on this guy. Wild BTs on the larger size, like this one, often have pretty rough fins from spawning. This guy also has the bright blue gill spot.

Ah... the old stocked vs wild threads. They never get old (well sometimes).

 

[rustbeltwilds]

 

[rustbeltwilds]

Heres 3 from last week. Whats the verdict. All 3 from same stream.

 

[PennKev]

Heres 3 from last week. Whats the verdict. All 3 from same stream.

Do you actually have a reason to think these are NOT wild? Or do you just want to show them off?

I'm not trying to be a dick here, those are all fish I'd be happy to catch. I just have the suspicion that many of these wild/stocked photo threads are excuses to show off wild fish. There's nothing wrong with that...

Maybe it's ok to be a little less modest. Maybe we need more "Look what I caught!" posts.

 

[rustbeltwilds]

Sorry for the mis info... this is a class a that feeds into a approved stocked water about 1 mile downstream but i sometimes have doubts on some of them being wild thats all.

 

[pcray1231]

Sorry for the mis info... this is a class a that feeds into a approved stocked water about 1 mile downstream but i sometimes have doubts on some of them being wild thats all.

They're all clearly wild with no doubts at all. And you didn't have to say where they were from for anyone to determine that. Batting 100% on the indicators.

 

[hooker-of-men]

Maybe it's ok to be a little less modest. Maybe we need more "Look what I caught!" posts.

"What Are You Catching Today?"