Donegal creek wild rainbow?

[HopBack]

I just started fly fishing in the beginning of July and I have been fishing the local trout stream to me, Donegal creek". It's definitely not the best stream to try to learn to fly fish but I have been lucky enough to catch a few bows. The first 1 I caught could not have been more then 3 inches long and the adipose fin was not clipped so I know its not a fingerling. I heard there were some egg boxes dropped but does anyone know what time of year they dropped. Could this be one that survived or a stream bred rainbow?


FYI the few times I have gone fishing there I made sure the temperature was below 68 degrees as to not stress the fish. Also one other note for you Donegal aficionados, I just went down there Sunday evening to some of my favorite spots and didn't see a single trout or see anything rising. I wonder how much the PFBC messed with the trout by electroshocking them in the middle of the summer?

 

[Maurice]

Its likely that the adult stocking from 2012 produced this fingerling. It is unlikely that a wild rainbow fishery will endure. It isn't uncommon to find fingerling rainbows were adult rainbows are stocked regularly and summer temperatures are reasonable for survival and fall spawning. However sustaining these progeny are the real test.

Not surprising but good find and thanks for the report.

 

[TimRobinsin]

that right there sir, is pretty effing cool!

It might make it but browns definitely have the home team advantage in the D-gal.

hit me up if you ever want to fish. I live not far from you (the pete)

 

[Squaretail]

I just posted in the photos section before I saw this.
Is it me or does that not look like a golden?

 

[ryguyfi]

The more I look at it, the more you look right Squaretail. I've heard recent stories of people seeing the goldens specifically spawning in the spring.

 

[The_Sasquatch]

By "golden", do you mean lightening trout?

 

[sandfly]

SHAA----ZAMMmmm
Lightin Trout !!!

 

[Swattie87]

My vote would be regular wild Rainbow. I fished a stream that had a small co-op hatchery that flooded in the floods of 2011. There were some Golden fingerlings in there that made it in to the stream at a size only slightly bigger than the fish pictured...maybe 5-6". They had much more obvious banana-like features than this fish.

I agree with Maurice on the fish's origins, and I've noticed the same thing on streams that are stocked with Rainbows but are capable of holding fish over. Many of these are actually viable wild Brown Trout streams (as is Donegal). Some smallish wild Rainbows will show up for a year or two, usually immediately following a year with good Summer flows and temps. Then they disappear and you don't see any for a few years. Get a year with conditions conducive to holding stockers over, and they show up again. Rainbows just seem to struggle to sustain a wild population in our streams in comparison to Brooks and Browns (thankfully in most cases).

 

[evw659]

i think squaretail is right, ive never seen a wild bow with a goldish color like that before.

 

[The_Sasquatch]

The body color doesn't throw me off, but the fins are unusual. The wild bows I've caught have had that zebra type of pattern on them, similar to the wild brookies (oops..native) that we catch.

Swattie, do you still have that picture of the bow Foxgap caught in northern Lanc. last October?

 

[Swattie87]

The_Sasquatch wrote:
Swattie, do you still have that picture of the bow Foxgap caught in northern Lanc. last October?

I think so. I've caught a few smallish seemingly wild Bows from wild Brown, (but Rainbow stocked) ATW's that looked similar to this fish. I know one in particular had a lot of color in the fins. I'll see what I can dig up tonight.

Another possibility is that this fish is the result of a Golden and a traditionally colored Bow spawning too. Not really a hybrid since Goldens are just a color variation of Rainbows, but kinda in a way I guess. The resulting fry would be somewhere in between the coloration of the parents.

 

[The_Sasquatch]

Here's a wild bow I caught on the Upper Tully. Here you can kind of see what I mean.

By comparison, here's a wild bow I caught on Big Spring. Here you can see the bottom fins are quite different than the ones on the OP's original post.

The body colors on these two bows are quite different, but the fins have similar colors and patterns. The fins on the OP are nothing like these two.

 

[dc410]

Cool looking fish! The lack of any dark spots on the dorsal, caudal and adipose fin (as well as the entire body) is very unique for a rainbow. It had to pick up that gentetic trait from somewhere.

 

[attackone]

that tail sure does look more like a goldie then a rainbow

 

[ryguyfi]

Well a "golden rainbow" is technically a palomino bred with a rainbow. With the few amount of goldens in a stream the odds are if this were the result of reproduction that a golden bred with a regular rainbow, so if that's the case then it would make sense that it has less of the golden color.

 

[Swattie87]

Ok...so here's the pics I dug up...

First one is Foxgap's from a Lancaster County limestone ATW. Wild Brookies/Browns and probably Bows? Stocked with Bows.

Second one is one I caught from a SC freestone ATW stocked with Bows. It is on the nat repro list as a wild Brown stream. This was the young fish I mentioned earlier in the thread as having similar fin coloration to the OP fish. I am rather certain this fish is wild.

Third one is a Banana I caught from a stream with a co-op hatchery on it that flooded during the floods of 2011. I caught some smaller than this one, but this apparently is the only one I took a picture of.

After seeing these pics again, I'm now less certain about the OP fish being a regular Bow than I was before. The absence of spots in the dorsal fin is interesting, and does potentially suggest Golden. That said, its overall color isn't like the young Banana pictured or any of the other ones I remember catching...they were much more obviously yellow. If pressed I'd still say regular Bow I guess, but regular Bow x Banana is very possible too.

Cool stuff.

 

[HopBack]

Thanks for all the input guys. I never thought about the fish being a golden but I have never fished the Donegal when they stocked adult trout. I just assumed that they didn't stock it with goldens. The last time they stocked it was 2012.....Interesting to say the least!

 

[salmonoid]

HopBack wrote:
Thanks for all the input guys. I never thought about the fish being a golden but I have never fished the Donegal when they stocked adult trout. I just assumed that they didn't stock it with goldens. The last time they stocked it was 2012.....Interesting to say the least!

There were club-stocked golden rainbows in the stream about 10-15 years ago, although I'm doubtful this is a progeny of those fish 🙂 They were smallish (8-12") but I suppose some of them could have spawned at one point, and their spawn begat other spawn, etc. Its also possible that there have been more recent club stockings of golden rainbows. And its also possible this is just a very light colored wild rainbow.

My observation has been that very few golden rainbows end up in special regs sections. I've always told myself that this is because the PFBC doesn't need to put the Lightnin' Trout in the special regs areas to attract fisherpeople, like they do in open ATW sections, but I could be completely off base.

Regardless of what it's parents were, it's a neat little fish.

 

[caveman]

Earlier this spring there was a golden in the stream below the Horse barn parking area. Was there for quite a while and I could never interest it in anything. It was the only one I had ever seen in there for many years.

 

[pcray1231]

Swattie,

Ryguy has it backwards I believe. A golden bow - regular bow cross would be a palomino, which is what the PFBC used to stock. Golden rainbow is the "purebred" strain.

They kept golden rainbows as brood stock, selectively breeding them with each other, so that they could keep strengthening the banana traits. But they crossed them with regular bows to make the mass quantities of palominos that would go in our streams.

Somewhere along the line, I suppose they must have considered the golden strain "finished", and started mass producing those, and that's what they now stock.

Personally, I believe the OP fish is a regular wild rainbow, not a golden or palomino.