The Brook Trout Quest

The date was Sunday, June 26 - my dad's birthday. The whole family had decided to go on a whitewater rafting trip in the Poconos, something we had never done before despite the relative proximity. 

We left on Saturday morning to hopefully do some hiking, since we had never seen the Poconos in any season other than winter. I was planning to get in some fishing as well. The Roughfish June Species contest was almost at an end, and I had a goal in mind for this trip. A true native brook trout was on my to-do list for quite a while, yet down south, there aren't many wild trout streams at all, let alone native brookie streams. 

In the morning we went on several hikes, the most notably being Dingman's falls. It really was spectacular, but even more interesting were the dozens of large trout sitting right under the falls. I had assumed they were brook trout, but I guess I'll never know because fishing was prohibited. However, a kind park ranger pointed me to a spot were she said there were plenty of trout. I decided to go there while the rest of my family went to another set of falls. 

Upon arrival, I could see many trout swimming in a shallow pool under the bridge. I quickly hooked a large stocker brown trout that got off the hook and swam off. Even though these were stocked trout, they were quite wary, possibly because of fishing pressure and the super low and clear waters. I was fishing a freelined mealworm and they were not having anything to do with it.

A small rainbow eventually made a mistake and I landed it, although stepping in a batch of poison ivy. Whatever. It seems as if I've almost developed a resistance now.

The rainbow was something I knew was possible, but wasn't really expecting. Nonetheless, I'll take a new contest entry.

As I was reeling the mealworm in, I got a hit from a minuscule, striped fish. I stopped to let the fish fit the whole bait in its mouth before setting the hook. I pulled it up and found a teeny yellow perch on the end of my line. I laughed. Kyle, while I was in MN, caught a yellow perch from a slow moving trout stream, but I had just caught one in a freestone mountain creek! Another unexpected entry.

You may be able to understand the hilarity if you take a look at the creek below.

After a while, some bums came and tried to literally spear the trout I was fishing for with sharpened branches. After I told them that was in fact illegal, they came back with heavy fishing rods with bass lures and started tossing them around with reckless abandon. They also jumped into the water, which had a max depth of around two feet in that tiny pool. That was the tipping point. I headed upstream, and got a hit from a small trout that came off. It might have been a brookie, I'll never know. 

I had one spot that I really wanted to fish from the start, a tiny run that apparently had a very abundant population of native brook trout. The stream was so small, it wasn't even on Google Maps! The day was getting late, and we didn't have much time left, since we had rafting early the next morning. I convinced my parents to go, so they went on another hike while I checked out the trickle of water. There was only one "pool", about 5 feet wide and 1.5 feet deep. I glanced into the amazingly clear and cold water and saw brook trout. Real brook trout, ranging from an inch to a bit larger. This is what I had come looking for. 

I hid myself in the tall grass and freelined a mealworm. At first, the fish spooked, so I crouched down and sent a cast between two large rocks in the middle of the pool. The only problem was, my ultralight, although being ultra light, was not built to cast a basically weightless mealworm by itself. It took me several tries to get it in the right spot, and as soon as I did, a dark shape rushed out and I tightened up. 

I brought to shore a small brookie, almost black. But it radiated a bright orange belly and beautiful fins and spots. Success!

I had several hookups, but it was tough keeping them pinned with my rather large hook. Finally, I connected and brought up a bluish specimen that lacked a red belly, but had gorgeous red and blue spots.

Look at em spots!!!

I tried heading upstream, but fishing was tough and the fish were few, mainly because the first hundred yards looked like this:

That water is MAX 6 inches deep. 

I returned to the little pool and had several juvenile specimens chasing my mealworm as it slowly drifted along. They would just nip the tail end, however, so hookups were scarce. But eventually, I brought one in, a silvery little guy, beautiful in its own way. Brook trout are just so amazing. 

I had only an hour to fish, and my parents had just finished a short hike, so when my mom came to pick me up, I declared that this was my last cast. I cast perfectly, and let the mealworm sink slowly to the bottom in the current break behind the rock. There was a little bit of sunken wood and leaves there as well, and suddenly a larger shape darted out from under the cover and grabbed the motionless bait. This was a fish I had gotten to bit  before, but failed to hook. This time, however, the hook stuck, and I found a feisty brookie at the end of my line. This fish was by far the best brookie, maybe not the most colorful, but definitely the largest and most pristine specimen. I can nott wait to fish for him again in the fall when he's all colored up!

I watched that prime fish swim off and called it a day. I had finally found the native brookies. The next day was full of exhilarating adventure, and I could rest easy knowing that I had accomplished and exceeded my goal.

The Final Battle: The Common Carp and His Little Brother

Now there's a fish I had a grudge against. The common carp, despite supposedly being everywhere, had eluded me thus far. From New Jersey to the 20 lbers that broke me off in Minnesota, the entirety of the species had declared outright war with me. 

So began my quest to catch a common carp. I had failed on my second trip to Minnesota, surely I was to fail near home, right? But research paid off, and I found a spot that I was fairly certain held carp. The only problem was: I had no way to land the carp if one was hooked, and I wasn't even sure if I was allowed to fish there!

Nonetheless, I headed over, and found crowds of people there, not fishing, but just walking along in the busy town. I set up shop on a sidewalk on a bridge and looked into the water. Holy mother of carp. There were dozens, the biggest probably pushing 15 lbs. In addition to the carp, there were plenty of sunfish and some dark fish I couldn't identify, which I thought might have been gizzard shad at the time. 

Having heard that these fish are accustomed to being fed bread, I brought a couple slices of bread along with a bag of corn and oatmeal. I tossed out some bread pieces as chum, and a carp took notice, but only after approximately a million sunfish dashed over to snatch them. Not deterred, I tied on a larger piece and dropped it directly down. It was a bit too large for most of the sunfish, and when the carp saw it raced over and grabbed it, pushing the sunfish aside. 

I set the hook and the fight was on. Carp are tremendously powerful, and this one was no exception. I could feel the line rubbing against the bridge, and I prayed that the braid didn't snap. Luckily, it held, and soon enough I had a carp tired out and ready to land. Then arose the problem of landing the fish. It was a decent size, and I definitely could not pull the fish up. I had a net, but it wasn't long enough. So I devised a way of landing it, but I needed another person, of which I had not. However, there were plenty of tourists around, and I had them hold the rod while I raced to the bank on the other side. Then they would throw the rod to me, I would catch it, and land the fish. 

The system played out perfectly; I was able to sweep the net under my first carp! And just like that, I got over my grudge, since species #66 was in hand. 

Not too big, but a real nice specimen. He even fanned out all his fins!

In the net

Having caught my first on bread, I immediately threw another piece out, but no carp took notice, probably spooked by the commotion of the other fish. Instead, I hooked into an incredibly large and fat green sunfish that looked as if it had been caught before. At 9.25 inches and so insanely fat, it was a new personal best for sure.

By no no carp were responding to the bread, so out went the corn and oatmeal as chum. My hookbait consisted of a couple whole corn kernels. As the chum slowly drifted down, the suspected shad immediately raved over and tentatively ate some oatmeal and corn. I didn't think too much about it at the time, since I was focused on catching more carp!

It didn't take long before my rod was bent over. A smaller fish, landed in the same fashion rather quickly. The carp in this spot don't run too large, but the numbers make up for the size.

Carp continued to consistent action from the smaller specimens.

During a lull in carp action, I turned my attention to the "shad." With my light combo, I tied on a sabiki rig, but garnered no interest other than a few dumb sunnies. Remembering that the fish were eating the corn and oatmeal, I tied a size 12 hook on with half a corn kernel under a float. Upon hitting the water, the sunfish immediately took notice, but the unidentified fish got there first. It sucked it in and spat it out, nibbled a bit, then finally took the bait with confidence and I set the hook. I saw a gold flash and I was a bit perplexed. Then the thought that this may be a wild goldfish crossed my mind. As I lifted it up, my suspicions were confirmed and I was ecstatic. And there it was, species #67, the goldfish.

I experimented with the goldfish for a bit, tried different baits and the like. They are fond of bread, but the sunfish attack to quickly. Don't even get me started about worms. But the secret weapon was oatmeal flakes. They love it, but it has a tendency to fall off the hook even when I spent at least a couple minutes getting it on, haha. I caught plenty more goldfish before turning my attention to their big brothers.

You may be wondering why these goldfish aren't orange, or brightly colored like their domestic counterparts. It is very likely that that was how they were introduced, but once a population lives long enough in the wild, their coloration eventually returns to its natural state, which is a bronze-gold. It has a crazy metallic sheen.

After catching plenty of spectacular goldfish, I again started to fish for carp. The action was hot, and i brought many small specimens to the bank, but no real bruisers. It's quite funny when I think of it, I spent so much time trying to catch carp, and here was a spot close to home loaded with carp. 

This feller had a tail injury. 

A very pale carp, almost entirely milky. 

Look at his mouth!

And a bruiser bluegill to finish the day off.

It was a spectacular outing, comfortable weather and 2 new lifers in a matter of hours! That's hard to beat, especially less than 20 minutes from home.

In Search of Fallfish and Stripers

At this point, the RoughFish Spring Species Contest was well underway, and I had two more nearby species I was fairly sure I could secure: The Fallfish and the Striped Bass. 

It was a beautiful day on the Big D, with bluebird skies and a real comfortable temperature. The only problem was, the winds were gusting at 20 mph. Luckily for me though, they were blowing southeast, which didn't affect me too much other than my stuff flying all over the place occasionally. 

I had just got a new killer ultralight that I wanted to test out on these little fish. I started with a simple mealworm and split shot that I drifted along the current. First cast, a strike while I was reeling the bait in. Fallfish, like the gamefish they are, prefer to chase their prey. Second cast secured my species for the contest, a beautiful fallfish from the Delaware river. 

Striped bass were my next target, and not wanting to switch rigs, I continued to use my plain mealworm, knowing that the baby stripers would hit. After a couple fruitless casts, a fish took my bait and fought pretty viciously on the ultralight. I looked into the clear water and saw a broader shape... Striper? Nope, a pretty redbreast sunfish. These fish plague small creeks and rivers, but this was my first one from the very large Delaware River.

A couple more fallfish graced my line soon after.

Including this one, which is the smallest fallfish I've ever caught.

Seeing that no striped bass were willing to play, I decided to switch things up and tie on a 1/32 oz white hair jig tipped with a mealworm. Hopefully this would attract the attention of the stripers more.

The fallfish, however, were still more than happy to slam a hair jig and I landed several beautiful specimens in quick succession.

Another cast, another fish. I brought up what I thought was another small fallfish: It looked silvery and thin. I lifted it out of the water, and lo and behold, I saw stripes.

Mission accomplished.

A teeny tiny striped bass.

I discovered that baby stripers have light blue par marks - isn't that interesting?

I continued to nail striped bass as the day wore on, with the odd fallfish here and there.

My smallest striper ever. This was a day for PLs (personal least)!

The light was gold as the sun was getting low. 

One of the larger bass.

Green head?

This was one tubby chub. 

My biggest fallfish of the day absolutely demolished my jig and fought like a demon on the ultralight. It was also my last fish.

Overall, a great outing, having caught tons of fish and completed my goals.