been a busy week or so since i got back, but every may i make a trip with friends up to the cold clear waters of central vermont for trout fishing. i look forward to this trip even more now that we are rainbows-only here in NJ. don't get me wrong, i like our rainbows, but variety is the spice of life. they do a "trophy trout" stocking program in VT during the spring where they put 2+ year old brookies, browns and rainbows in to a bunch of waters around the state. same idea as NJ's fall and winter stocked trout, but they put them in during the spring because the trout season up there is mostly closed after 10/31. we make other stops for little wild brookies but the trophy trout are pretty much the fish we bounce around targeting.
got up to the house and unpacked and still had an hour and half of daylight left so hopped back in the truck and headed down to the first lake to try to find some brookies
set up a couple lines and trolled the perimeter got a couple perch before it was my buddy's turn to take the rod that was going off and he pulls in our first "trophy" trout of the trip - a 2yr brookie
quick photo and release in order to keep the fish-karma up for the rest of the trip. pissed off a beaver by entering his sovereign territory, picked away at a couple more assorted fish on the way back to the ramp and got off the water just after dark.
next morning hit a little watershed trout stream to try to find some wild brookies but couldn't find any takers. there were a few sets of fly client/guides that were also goose-egging so i didn't feel too bad. cold front had come through and it had actually snowed the night before we arrived (the mountain was still skiing until yesterday, 5/31), so i think the small fish were just off that day. on the way back to the truck got checked by a VT CO for our licenses.
switched things up that afternoon and hit a different lake that had brookies and rainbows
the next morning we headed down early to the trophy section of the black river. this is always a highlight of the trip, nice sized river, fast moving, lots of holes and they absolutely load it up with 2-3 year and larger trout.
the requisite covered bridge is actually one of the trophy section ends
we were shooting the breeze at the truck and just about to pack it up when 8 carloads of volunteers and the stocking truck roll up on the hole
still had waders on so asked if we could give them a hand and they were happy to have the help. got on the in-the-river end of the bucket brigade and helped get a couple hundred more trout (all rainbows this load) into the water. this was the second time that we've run into the stocking crews on the river and been able to help out... lot of fun to see just how big the fish they put in there. after the truck and volunteers headed downriver we went to see if any of the fresh fish were in an eating mood.
turned out they were hungry so we all C&R a few to help educate them before we called it a day.
