The Elusive Brown Trout

I think about fly fishing everyday.  I think about bugs everyday.  I think about flies I need to tie in preparation for a trip, river, or time of year, everyday.  That being said, I think about brown trout more than anything else in regard to fly fishing, everyday.

Brown trout are special.  They're stealthy, extremely intelligent, hard fighting, gorgeous, clever, bullish, and downright nasty at times.  I have witnessed brown trout emulate every other type of trout while still staying true to themselves.

Around the onset of fall one September evening several years ago on the main stem of the Delaware River there was a sparse hatch of Ephoron's occurring above the takeout at Buckingham.  Some anglers just refer to them as "white flies", but the best thing about them is they're visible, especially right before dark.  The water temperature was ideal, but at a small inlet my good friend Nixie and I saw a big fish sipping on these flies right at the tail out.  The water from the inlet created a little conveyor belt of food for this opportunistic, yet lazy fish.  

On the Delaware, just the sound of a rise can rapidly increase your heart rate in a matter of seconds.  Big browns there don't just sip, they slurp.  I don't remember how many casts it took me to get this fish to eat, but he took my Ephoron imitation, which may have actually been a light Cahill (tied with a white instead of a light yellow body) and I felt him quickly swim toward the river bottom and then torpedo directly back out of the water like a wild Delaware rainbow.  The splash sounded as if someone had just done a cannonball off a rope swing into an unsuspecting pond.  

It was getting dark so at first I actually thought this fish was a big rainbow, until he swam right to the bottom after his acrobatic attempt to throw my fly and didn't move.  Brown trout do fight a certain way (sometimes) and one of those ways is to hold firm at the bottom of a river and refuse to budge.  This fish was a bully and he stuck himself to the bottom of the river like a suction cup feels when it won't come unstuck.    

Finally (and I do mean finally), I got him off the bottom and he began pulling me downstream with such force that Nixie had to pick up anchor so we wouldn't lose the fish.  I had my waders on and I was able to hop out of the boat with my rod in hand and land this big, beautiful brown trout.  This fish was immaculate, fat, and pissed off.  We measured him at 21 and 3/4".  

It was fairly dark by the time I landed him so the photo I have does little justice.  Sometimes, just remembering a fight and how a fished looked in that moment is enough.

Brown trout are beautiful.  They can have red spots, many black spots, a few sparse spots, or even bright orange spots. 

                                                               

Whether a brown trout measures in at 6" or 25", they are all special.  I'm reminded of another story fishing a spring creek in upstate New York.  I was surrounded by vegetation and casting space was at a premium.  I made what I thought was a perfect cast with a caddis pattern and as it drifted down I expected a take that did not come.  "I imitated the insect," I thought as this fish ate a real fly 10 seconds after mine.  "Why didn't he eat mine?"  

I changed flies and made what I thought was an even better cast, but it was a tad long and my fly landed on a leaf right above the fish.  I thought my line had spooked the fish, but I moved my wrist a millimeter and as soon as the fly fell off the leaf and hit the water, that fish, a brown trout, took my fly.  This fish was only looking for something real, something really real.  Unknowingly, I gave the fish what it wanted and I will never forget that day or that gorgeous fish.

I have lost more brown trout than I can count.  I've had them wrap themselves in moss, rocks, sticks, or underground logs I didn't even know were there.  I've had them jump and spit the fly like a leaping rainbow or just pull and snap my tippet after having them on for only a second.  Recently I was sight fishing to a BIG brown in Chessman Canyon, Colorado.  This fish was eating small midge emergers and as soon as I watched him eat my Foam Wing Emerger and I set the hook, he swam right down under a rock (that was his cover) and it was all over before it happened.  Luckily, I know where that fish lives.

I heard a story once from a friend about a brown trout that lived (and hopefully still lives) at Junction Pool, which is where the west and east branches of the Delaware river meet.  He's a seasoned fisherman and he hooked a fish that took him down (in the manner that brown trout do) into the pool and then he said it was all over.  He still had tension on the end of his rod, but no movement and no fish.

The water was low and he was able to wade out only to find line wrapped around a cinder block.  That brown trout swam through the cinder block and wrapped his line around it in order to free itself from being hooked; the elusive brown trout.

Brown trout are very picky.  I have seen them bump a dry fly imitation with their nose to see if the fly moved like a natural would.  I have seem them deny a fly with hackle and then after snipping off said hackle, eat the same fly on the next cast.  

Brown trout are lazy.  When I went fly fishing with my friend and guide in Spain he pointed out four 20+ inch fish side by side sipping spinners in a foot of water.  I hooked one of them, but I don't want to talk about what happened...

Brown trout can live up to 20 years and there are multiple reasons they reside on this planet for such an extended period of time.  For one thing, they're aggressive.  Even as fry they attack and eat whatever they can whenever they can unless they are themselves eaten by...you guessed it, a brown trout.  They are voracious and vivacious.  They're carnivores.

The German brown trout is in itself a huge reason (amongst others) brook trout populations in the east drastically declined for years.  When I used to live in New York I would sometimes keep and clean stocked brown trout.  I have seen little sticks, rocks, crayfish, large minnows, a 7" salamander, Caddis larva casings (not the larva themselves), little voles, little moles, and pretty much anything you can or can't think of in the stomach of a 15" inch brown trout. 

They way they attack a streamer can be downright violent.  A good friend of mine told me a story about streamer fishing on the Delaware and having a huge brown follow his streamer right into the boat.  He didn't take, but he just swirled around after the follow so my buddy just flipped his streamer back out and the fish engulfed it.

I have also seen them stalk a streamer into shore and then grab it a foot or or two from the bank.  Needless to say, that's a startling thing to experience.  

If you haven't watched Live the Stream: The Story of Joe Humphreys on Amazon Prime Video I would highly recommend it.  Joe recently turned 92 years old and he is still catching big brown trout, especially at night.  I have done very little night fishing, but this year it's on my list because many huge brown trout are nocturnal.  Joe's record PA Brown Trout caught at night in 1977 is impressive to say the least and I would love to experience that feeling in the dark.

Brown trout are elusive though.  The bigger they get, they smarter they get.  They are survivors.  Can you imagine what a 15 year old brown trout has seen in its life?  By that point they've probably eaten everything, including a fly or two.  The hunt for them has led me to some different places using different tactics and a goal of 2021 is to catch a 23" brown trout that is not from a lake or reservoir, just a river fish.  

I've you've made it this far in the blog post you are probably thinking about brown trout that you've lost as well.  Last summer I was fishing a two nymph rig with a small Pat's Rubber Legs trailed by a Peeping Caddis Larva.  When you fish a Pat's you get hung up and lose some throughout the day because they are heavy and seem to be attracted to debris.  I had caught a pile of fish already that day, but I was fishing faster water with some deep pockets.  As I was working my way across the river I kept casting into those pockets and I thought I was hung up on a stick again so right as I pulled to release the flies I felt a huge headshake...

I know where that brown trout lives and I'm going back for him this year.  As Joe Humphrey's says in his film, "Those fish are not gonna beat me."

I'll leave you with a few more photos of brown trout I have caught and released.  Don't forget to check out my website www.mayflymusings.com and follow me on Instagram @mayflymusings.

Best of luck to you all this year in your search for the elusive brown trout.  Thanks for reading and until next time, stay safe and tight lines.

I caught this fish in the same river where I lost that monster brown last summer.

This is the largest brown trout I have ever caught.  It ate a Hendrickson dry fly on the Conhocton River in New York State.  After landing this fish I bought a bigger net.