Dead Browns

[laker67]

I can include myself as one of the old timers, but we, the old timers, would always break a fish off that was not hooked in the mouth. No hesitattion, dont worry about what fly is attached, break it off immediately. some try to say well they dont know if it is fair or foul. that is bs, you know.

[John W Kelly]

Why only brown trout?

[Jason R.]

Last time I was up there during the spawn me and my buddy were disgusted with the way some of those guys "fished". I talked to one guy who made fun of me for breaking off a fish on another guys boots using 6x. He said "you gotta use 10 lb" and he had about 6 huge- maybe size 10 flies- none of which looked like something one of those fish would actually take. I watched that dude and a few other guys snag fish after fish with their fly-rod snagging rigs- mostly in the belly and tail. Made me not want to fish there during the spawn ever again. Same goes for the Little Red in Arkansas- only it isn't as blatant. I don't know why anyone thinks that is even fun- why not just bring a spear or a net? I wish i had called the mdc on those guys- don't know if it would have helped. To me, the spawning shoals should be off limits during the spawn- at least at the Little Red. They sort of are at the white and it obviously works.

[Fly_Guy]

Would a big sign or two make a difference, or will idiots be idiots? I have broken off smaller, less "valuable" fish than the brown in the above pic because of a tail snag.

[Seth]

Would a big sign or two make a difference, or will idiots be idiots? I have broken off smaller, less "valuable" fish than the brown in the above pic because of a tail snag.

No matter what you do, idiots will be idiots regardless if it's fishing, hunting, or pretty well anything in life.

[Wayne SW/MO]

Old plug the rule wouldn't necessarily be state wide all fish. In the state I was familiar with it affected certain waters. In the case of Missouri it could be part of the trout regulations. They seem to be the most vulnerable, especially large ones. It would be easy to apply it too trophy areas and certain blue and red areas.

[jpb2187]

Isn't a lot of this mortality due to the nature of the spawn? Don't a lot of browns die naturally after spawning similar to the Atlantic Salmon.

Don't get me wrong I'm sure some of these fatalities could be due to humans but is it not also part of the lifecycle as well?

[Wayne SW/MO]

No they don't automatically die like salmon. They do get a heavy dose of stress and I'm sure that magnifies the effect poor handling practices. Whether you play a fish soft or hard they still fight. Once these fish come to hand they don't have a lot left to overcome a lack of O2, only available while submerged.

[SpoonDog]

You know what every movement needs?

A mascot.

There's no shortage of talent in Branson, and I'm sure there's folks looking for gigs in the off season. You get a a few together, call them Foul Hook, and have them set up shop in the parking lot below the hatchery. They sing songs like Fake Egg Blues and Reddwrecker- you know, real educational. They can wear brown trout costumes, they can be painted up like rainbows, they can be blinged out with the latest articulated streamers- but please, let's keep it classy.

Or folks could just be an advocate for the resource. License vendors could hand out C&R literature, provided by FFF/TU/MDC/Chamber of Commerce, to tourists. MDC could probably be persuaded to put up a video on their webiste, an article in Conservationist, maybe even print it on their online licenses. And individual anglers could take the time to teach others, to explain the value of the resource and the ways it can be impacted by snagging and mishandling of fish.

[Jerry Rapp]

heck, MDC will just stock more non native fish(brown trout, rainbow trout, hybrid stripers, stripers, muskies, etc). Don't worry. But yet most of you will gripe for ever about other non native species being introduced by accident.