Brown Trout

Brown trout have a light brown or yellow cast with black spots and usually some orange or red spots. The spots often have whitish to bluish halos. The tail generally lacks spots, but may have a few. Brown trout are long, narrow and moderately compressed. The color varies from an olive-green to a dark-brown back, silver-yellowish sides and yellow-whitish belly. The dorsal fin in front of the tail has a reddish hue. There are numerous red and dark brown spots scattered on the head, body and gill cover. The tail is slightly forked in young fish and square in older trout. Depending on the environment, their average weights range between 2.5 and 10 pounds, with an average length between 14 and 24 inches. They tend to live in cool rivers and lakes with temperatures between 55 and 65 F. They hide in undercut banks, in stream debris, surface turbulence, and under rocks. Adults live in pools while the young tend to live in pools and rocky shoals or sandbars.

Brown trout are carnivorous, bottom feeders and prefer to eat at dusk or night. The young feed on aquatic insects. Food is carried to them by the river or stream current. From a small area, possibly only three yards long and one yard wide, they are able to obtain all the food they require. As they grow in size their diet changes. Adult brown trout are voracious and eat food items such as worms, crustaceans, crayfish, mollusks, and salamanders. Brown trout grow rapidly, but are not particularly long-lived. Few survive beyond age 8. Lake dwelling browns grow much faster than stream browns; males faster than females.

Fishing for Brown trout is most successful in the fall through late spring, or during early and late hours during the summer. Brown trout are usually pursued with fly fishing equipment, with patterns that match local hatches or nymphs, caddisfly, stonefly or mayfly. Fly patterns of ants, crickets, grasshoppers, and "wooly buggers" also produce nice catches. Live bait such as night crawlers, leeches, crayfish, minnows, and maggots can also be productive.

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