[kenton6]

I did a story over at the Daily Bag Limit http://mainefishingtoday.com/blog/?p=101 about Pennsylvania Fish and Game officials tracking where stocked trout go once they are dumped at there perspective stocking grounds.
To be honest, I never thought too darn hard about it but reading the reports makes you stop and think some. One rainbow trout was found over 123 miles from where it was dumped 16 days later.

 

[Cap'n Jack Duggins]

stocked trout will travel right up until they get eaten by a bigger fish, usually a Bass!
Stocked fish are inferior. They are raised in a pen with a cover to keep them safe from predators, therefore they have no "learned response" to an osprey overhead or a larger fish approaching!

I often follow the trout stocking truck to score on a Bass feeding frendzy!

 

[Lil John]

It depends on how far the ride back to camp or home is. :wink:

 

[stweedie]

The river that my camp sits next to has a great native brooktrout population. I know that they stock brookies upstream every year. I've even caught trout with clipped fins as far as 10 miles from the stocking location. Always in the same hole, and never below that set of rapids. I know that they don't get stocked there because I just don't see a stocking truck making the 10 mile drive down the logging road and 1/2 mile walk through the woods to dump them there. Maine boasts a much higher success rate of stocked fish survival than other states, saying that the fish reproduce and can survive several years after stocking. In Mass they stock a lot of fish but just for example there is no size or bag limit on fish while ice-fishing. It seems that they expect these fish to be caught out and it happens pretty quick. I've tried one of these freshly stocked fish and needless to say I don't keep them any more. If I wanted to eat liver pellets I'd buy them.

 

[kenton6]

The only fish that get stocked for the purpose of breeding are the big brood stockers. Other than that, the stocking of fish is done only for the purpose of allowing anglers to catch them. This is why they stock in the fall so ice fishermen can catch them. Sells licenses.
Mad Jack has some interesting ideas about improving the fishing in Maine. Maybe we can have a cou and remove Martin and set up a puppet regime run by MJ?

 

[Cap'n Jack Duggins]

Tom, I do have some ideas on that...

Dump search and rescue! Let the State Police go find the stupid people who wander off. State Police have the general fund to tap into and MOST of the folks who get lost in Maine are not paying into the IF&W system. Why should paying sportsman pay to find an idiot that says "Dude, I'm lost somewhere in Baxter!"

Turn Maine's stocking program over to private businesses. Maine did a study a few years back and found that private business can produce twice the fish, ( and larger fish) at 1/4 the cost. Then make trout fishing catch & release only for two years. After that, have a one fish per day limit until it is proven that the fishery can handle the take. It works for bass fishing!

I can go on but I might tweak someone!!!

 

[stweedie]

MJ
I think you might have some pretty upset fisherman if you were to make trout fishing catch and release only. It works for bass because most guys don't eat bass anyway. Sad to say but Maine is one of the few places where you can actually have a fairly liberal bag limit. I know if I had to go two years without a good fish fry I'd get pretty upset.

 

[Cap'n Jack Duggins]

Steve, I am afraid you are part of the majority. That's OK though, when you have to fish for pike and bass because you have eaten all the trout, you understand.

A guy once told me a long time ago, "If you change nothing, nothing will change."
I think Carlton Sheets is now using that line, but it's still true.

Used to be a time where you could keep 10 brook trout per day in Maine. That's 70 fish per week, times 20 weeks (legal season).... That's 1400 brook trout per season, PER PERSON/LICENSE!
How many fishing licenses were sold in, ...1986? Let's use 25,000 for kicks. that's 35, 000,000 brokk trout that could legally be caught in one season.

Think about it while you snack on brookies!
Just ask the guides on grand lake stream why they have to drive they're bass clients down to Lincoln to get them on fish??? Too many "shore lunches"

 

[stweedie]

MJ
I fully understand what you are saying, but in my own defense I'm not fishing "popular" places, these are small brooks and parts of a river that you need a 4x4 to get into with a decent hike through the woods. I'm a fly fisherman and although I wish I could fish 7 days a week, I'm usually limited to 10-12 days of spring trout fishing. I do have to say that most every trip I'll keep 2, 12-14" brookies for supper. Most of the Belgrade Lakes (in your neck of the woods) are in trouble because of the idiots that introduced pike there in the first place. I suppose if imposed I would absolutely do my part if it meant recovering some of Maine's trout fisheries, but I still have to say that illegal stocking has caused more damage than restocking alone can solve. As you said earlier the pike and bass get a free meal every time the lunch truck dumps stocked fish into lakes.

 

[Cap'n Jack Duggins]

Dang it, I just remembered all of the ugly cormerants and the purdy friggin LOONS everyone wants to save! Them guys got to eat 'round a hunard million trout per year!

Steve, I'm not blaming you, me or folks like us. It's the ones who keep 3 & 4" trout, and piles of them. If the fines went to $1000 PER FISH (short or over) and allowed the Warden Service a chance to catch the low-life thieves, we might save the species!

I fish for brookies ONCE per year, dunkin worms, cause I like to. I think my buddy and I average 200 brookies Memorial weekend (3 days). Some are only 3" and some are 17". Don't even think of asking where, cause I'll take it to the grave! God I hate worms the rest of the year.

 

[stweedie]

That reminds me of a couple years ago when these Canadians got busted up North. Good thing they weren't real smart because one of them told the warden he'd left his license back at their camp. When the warden arrived at their camp site out in the woods he must have wondered why they had a generator hooked up to a portable freezer. They found like 200 trout in the freezer and most of them were short. Good thing the guy didn't just say he didn't have a license and take the fine for that! Oh and the place where I catch all my brookies is called backwards brook. It just past inverted ridge and you take the first right after no-name bridge. lol.

 

[kenton6]

I was just reading a piece but I can't remember from where. They are trying to figure out how to get rid of commerants

 

[Cap'n Jack Duggins]

They can't Tom! Our Government signed a "treaty" with MexiCanadia, something about food, trade and something completely unrelated. Then the eco-warriors slipped in some crap about these birds with funny Latin names and our geniuses said OK, we'll sign it!

DUH! Crows now have to have a split/closed season and cormerants got so close to "endangered" that they are protected like loons! Heck this happened a long time ago.

I have a friend who has one of only 10 or 12 permits (in the country) to kill them to protect his private fish ponds. You ever try to hit a submarines perriscope at 100 yards with a .22 rifle?

Sorry foir the rant, Tom...

 

[stweedie]

Funny story regarding your discussion on Loons and Comerants. I dated this girl in High School whose grandfather owned some sporting camps in Patten (the girl was a nightmare but the grandfather made things more bearable). The pond the camps were on was full of brooktrout. The grandfather used to shoot a .22 close to the loons to try to scare them away. One of the guests was sitting on the watching them and figured he wasn't a very good shot so he grabbed his rifle and shot the loon. He was a little embarrassed when they told them that loons were protected and that they were just trying to scare the thing away and not kill it.

 

[kenton6]

I ran a facility in Jackson N.H. hampshire for a while that had a trout pond on it filled with nice rainbow trout. By the second year the commorants discovered it....... that's all I'll say about that. You fill in the blanks.

Your story is funny Steve. There's one about the two guys wanted to go hunting on the old farmers land. One guy stopped at the farm to talk with the farmer while the other guy sat in the truck.

The farmer thought for a minute and told the guy he could go hunting on his land on one condition. He had to shoot the old nag out in the pasture. The farmer wanted her put down but he didn't have the nerve.

The guy gets in his truck and pretends to drive away mad telling his passenger the SOB farmer wouldn't let him hunt there.

He stopped his truck in a hurry, got out and shot the old horse. Before he could say much to his partner, he got out, loaded his gun and shot a couple of the old farmer's cows.