Going Shocking Today

[ozark trout fisher]

The average rainbow is a lot faster and jumps more and higher than either the average brown or cutthroat. Cutthroats on average jump the least and do the most rolling and bulldogging, seldom making any kind of real run. But that's "average". Depending upon water temps, how long the fish has been in the river in the case of stocked fish, or just individual fish, you run into rainbows that just splash around and roll on the surface, and browns that leap all over the river. Having caught native cuts in several different streams, I will say that I've never had one leap much, certainly not those wild, 3-4 ft. high leaps of hot rainbows, nor have I ever had one make a long run, and I've caught them up to 21 inches.

Well, all I can say is that the most exciting fight a 15 inch fish of any species has ever given me was a Colorado River Cutthroat this summer on Trapper's Lake. I thought for sure that I was into a 20" plus fish, I have caught much larger stocked bows and browns here in Missouri that didn't fight so hard. Cutties do not jump much but they tend to go deep when they are hooked if they have a chance, and it can be a real battle to get the bigger ones back up again. It's a different kind of fight but they can be scrappy little devils all the same.

[Nortrad]

I would agree Justin, rainbows are rambunctious, and they seem much bigger because of their fighting tendencies. I have had brown jump once or twice, then drop and hold. Any word on the population sample from yesterday?

[stlfisher]

The reason I love fising for trout and bass is the potential they have to get some air. There is nothing better than watching it IMO. I have only had one brown jump and that is the big one in my avatar.... that i am convinced was trying to tangle me in some overhanging brances...an awesome sight to see. I always remember those fish that jump more so than the others and If given the choice I will take the jumpers all day long.

[Justin Spencer]

Any word on the population sample from yesterday?

Today should be the last day of sampling and then I'm sure it will take several weeks for them to make their reports. The fishermen we had here this week all have caught fish some newbies to the river did fair, and some others reported good fishing with even a dry bite upstream of the falls. So I guess the shocking hasn't ruined the fishing.

I can tell you from what I saw that last years spawn wasn't good so we will be more or less missing a year class of rainbows which we will see next year in the numbers of 10 inch trout.

[Outside Bend]

I'll chime in, and this may have been answered sometime on a post somewhere. What's the reasoning behind not stocking cutthroats in more streams? Are MO streams not suited? Will the cutties clean up on juvenile rainbows? Not familiar enough with this, any input?

Cutthroat are tougher to raise in hatchery conditions- more prone to disease, less resilient to crowding, stuff like that. For whatever reason, a 20" broodstock Yellowstone Cutthroat just won't produce as many eggs as a 20" broodstock rainbow in a hatchery- they just haven't been domesticated to the degree rainbows have. The joke out west is that a cutthroat does just fine in a torrential mountain stream or muddy irrigation ditch, but put them in a hatchery with all the food they could eat and no predators, and they go belly up

Another probable reason is that different rainbow strains spawn at different times of years- some in early winter, some in spring, meaning you have a year-round supply of catchable fish. To my knowledge they haven't worked that out with cutthroats- you only have spring spawners.

[Nortrad]

Interesting, they only do well in their natural waters. Thanks for the info.

[Oldschoolcane]

Justin, I am not comparing the North Fork to the trout parks, for what its worth I was fishing the North Fork when you was just a baby......what I am saying is that compared to trout fishing on the North Fork in the 70's and 80's there are fewer and smaller fish in the river which seems to mean to me that the fishing is declining? Maybe the survey numbers will tell us otherwise? Someone needs to pay attention to whats happening with the Rainbows in this river, not just how its fishing today.

[Gavin]

Think the fish counts were allot higher back in the 1980's & 1990's....But it seems to be coming back...It was absolutely miserable fishing during the drought 10 years ago but its allot better now. A.J. Pratt is the biologist down there, and MDC will provide historical sampling data if you care to ask for it.

[Justin Spencer]

Following the drought in the late 90's early 2000's the trout count got down to something like 15 fish per mile, which is basically non-existant populations. Now I think they are back up to somewhere around 500 fish per mile. Pretty amazing a few good years of spawns can bring them back relatively quickly. I think it all depends on water conditions during the spawn. In the early 70's the numbers were probably still up from stockings done in the mid-60's. I'll take our lower numbers of wild fish over tons of stockers, and we still get around 6000 browns stocked every fall from Blair to James.

[dgames]

Didn't the reintroduction of otters reduce the population in the late 90s early 00s?