Brookies easiest to catch! Not true.

[pete41]

Just read something on INTERNET that stated they are the easiest of the trout species to catch.They are Char but that aside,I would say based on my experience that Brook trout are the hardest to fool with bait, flies or lures when-
They are in a healthy pond loaded with food source,both insect and small bait fish.
The reason I say that is for 29 years I lived within 200 yards of a spring fed quarry that had a very healthy crop of brook trout but unless you caught them on the few days a year they were spawning you would be very lucky to catch one a month no matter how hard and deviously you tried.Trust me on that.lol
They stocked rainbow in there a couple of times but the locals yanked them right back out.
About four miles to the east in Bozeman Mt.There were 3 ponds they stocked for catch and release fishing.Very healthy food source but the browns and rainbows were relatively easy to catch with fly tackle or spinning if you went light enough.
Anyone else found Brook trout Far harder to fool than their almost barren stream habitat reputation?

 

[Chaz]

In some situations brookies can be very difficult to catch, very fertile limestone streams where there are plenty of bait fish is one such scenerio. Sometimes streams with mixed populations of browns and brookies it can be difficult to catch the brookies. In streams with Land-locked Salmon the salmon likely will be the most caught fish.

 

[pete41]

What made these so tough to catch is there were more than enough scuds,freshwater shrimp and perch fry they didn't need to surface feed.The rainbow were suckers for a size 14 or 16 elk hair caddis pulled over the surface right at dark.
Instead they feed right down in the aquatic growth at the bottom.
Seems to me those Brookies in big springs weren't so easy either.
I tried everything but they were tough fish in that pond so I was convinced they were fished out until the time I caught them spawning.Caught and released maybe two dozen of the most beautiful fish of them all.Averaged 12 or 13 inches.So beautiful in their spawning regalia.

 

[tomgamber]

pete41 wrote:
What made these so tough to catch is there were more than enough scuds,freshwater shrimp and perch fry they didn't need to surface feed.

Sounds like you needed a sinking line to fish "scuds,freshwater shrimp and perch fry" on the bottom...They can be caught... it just may take a really long time to figure it out sometimes..

 

[jayL]

Blanket statements are almost never right.

In my personal experiences, they have been the easiest to catch. This is just true for my sample though. Your experience has clearly dictated otherwise. It's all about the context.

 

[pete41]

I tried sinking lines and every imitation vaguely resembling the naturals but what I could not do is work the fly IN the vegetation where they were feeding.I did catch one from time to time but I gained a tremendous respect for them.I think they have an undeserved rep. for being``not swift''.

 

[Padraic]

I've always thought that trout do exactly what they need to... not what we want them to.

Brookies can be "easy" to catch in infertile headwaters streams because they need to eat every morsel they can catch. So if you don't scare them, you can catch them with any decently presented fly that looks like food. Not scaring them can be tough, of course.

Brookies can be tough to catch in fertile streams where there are lots of scuds and nymphs or when there is a heavy hatch, because they don't have to work so hard at feeding. Instead they need to stay safe. In streams with lots of food, they can be as tough to catch as any other type of trout. IMHO

We'd love for trout to feed off the surface all day long on bugs that look a lot like a royal wulff in a size 12 to 16. Preferably a 14, since that's easy to cast, see and thread on a tippet. Unfortunatley, trout have other ideas (or a lack of them).

 

[FarmerDave]

That is a very good point. I always found Brook trout easiest to catch (of the three), but it probably is because of the location. I remember fishing a small stream in Connecticut that had about equal populations of brook trout and brown, and I probably caught about equal numbers. Actually, I might have even caught more browns than brook trout. another stream that comes to mind has rainbows and brookies. They seemed to be equally easy to catch as well. Rainbows are quite easy to catch in some environments.

I guess I always felt brook trout were easiest because most of my brok trout fishing has been in infertile freestone headwaters.

 

[buckbarrett]

This year I caught more brooks than browns and more browns than rainbows. But the year isnt over!