Last 2 weeks of April on the S.Branch

[RiverRat77]

Fished mostly the S.Branch for the last two weeks and this is how it went.
I decided at first I would do a bit of walking in hopes to stay away from the stockies and find thmyorke1 and myself a nice looking hole in hopes of hooking some holdovers. We got off to a bit of a late start and we ended up with a nice bow (the only fish pictured being held) before the sun was directly above us and the bite turned off. Good reminder that mid day isn't the best time to go trout fishing. With that in mind I got an early start the day after the S.B was stocked and fished the best spot i could find close to a stocking point,but without being visible. Hooked up with a fighter, immediately shot down river taking drag (must admit I thought I hooked a carp) fought it for a couple of minutes before it came shooting out the river and was obviously a nice trout. Kept it out of a downed tree that was close by and some how got her into my net. Was another nice bow with some decent weight to it. Sorry for the pic she flopped out of my net onto the ground. I took the pic and got her back into moving water right away. She was worked back into shape and darted off in less then a minute.
Next trip I decided I would try to find the stockies. So I moved down river a ways to a hole that had produced many in seasons past at that exact time of year. Fished it with no luck! Being convinced that there were fish laying in there I returned late evening. Same thing no luck. I changed up the way I fished the drift about 40-50 yards walking down stream keeping closer to the bank. Bang! That made all the difference (fishing bait) landed more 18" to 20+" bows.
Still have not seen a stockie??
All fish were pictured, worked back, and released.
I hope May brings a good quality of fish as April did, but I wonder where the stockies are??