Monster Rogue Brown Trout

 Trout wander. Some go upstream, some down. Some wander down a tributary, up the river it flows into, then into another tributary. This is how fish spread and proliferate, it's a necessary function of their evolution and survival. Sometimes this results in trout, be they stocked or wild, finding their way into water that isn't looked at by most fly anglers as trout water. I'm talking about the trout that go way down, as far as they can. Some go to big, slow, lower river channels, some end up in lakes or ponds, and some end up in estuarine waters and become sea run trout. These trout often get big on a greater abundance of bait fish, or they already are big and that's how they survive- usually the sort of places these fish end up have larger predators that happily chow down on small trout. Encountering these fish takes a lot of skill and even more luck if you intentionally try to catch one. Most of the time though these trout get caught by people casting lures for bass, stripers, walleye, and other species that are well known to inhabit the water they're fishing. 

I still remember my first encounter with a rogue trout. It was a wild brook trout caught out of my home lake, a place nobody would ever rightly expect to catch such a fish. I did not catch it, my friend Dalton did... on a wacky rigged senko of all things. The fish was near the mouth of the tributary it had undoubtedly come out of, feeding on corn that had been thrown into the lake to attract carp. It remains the most impressive wild brook trout I've personally seen caught in CT. 

My own history with actually catching these rogue trout in Connecticut, be they sea run, lake runs, or what I call "river runs" that drop from tributaries into large slow rivers, is filled mostly with disappointment. I've caught only one definitive sea run brown trout, a small but stunning wild fish that I landed back in 2014. River run and lake run fish have been just as scarce for me, though I've had my encounters. Then, just a couple weeks ago, Lady Luck smiled and I happened into a monster. 

I'd been putting a fair bit more effort into trout in general but particularly big, rogue trout this fall and early winter. With a summer of exceptional rainfall allowing- and in some cases forcing- trout to move around, I figured there'd be a better chance of running into big ones in what some might consider unlikely places. After a bunch of trips without the sort of success I was really hoping for, I set out one morning under cloudy skies and cold conditions to cover a piece of water that could hold some large trout. I fished thoroughly, starting at the uppermost point I thought I might encounter a trout and working down towards the mouth of the river. Not everywhere was reachable or fishable, some of it was too deep and swift and chunks of the bank were private or just too treacherous, but I felt I would be able to cover enough. 

The fish came at the tailout of a large pool, in slick gliding water like I'd expect an Atlantic salmon to roll in. In fact, the fish rolled my fly, a big white Drunk & Disorderly, very much like a salmon. The squared off tail that began slapping the water, though, said monster brown trout. That's exactly what it was, a huge rogue brown trout. The fish gave a pretty good fight on my 6wt, running a bit, thrashing on the surface, and dogging deep. Soon she was in the shallows and I had her. The still-worn fins signified that the fish was of hatchery origin, but proportionally she was shaped like she'd been around a while. She was miles from anywhere such trout are stocked, and had the wounds to show that she'd been around the block. Scars on one side of here head were clearly left when an angler removed the trebles of a large striper plug. This is a brown trout that has been cruising around striped bass and maybe even bluefish haunts. 

At the time, since I knew it wasn't a wild fish, I wasn't as excited as I probably could have been. It was an exceptional and in many ways unlikely fish. Considering how long I've known that catching these rogue fish was possible, I'm really glad it came to fruition. Now I just want to do it better. I want more, I want bigger, and I want wild. 

I'm obsessed. I probably need help. I'm in the salmonid mood again and I'm hell-bent on catching the biggest trout I've ever seen.

Until next time, 

Fish for the love of fish.

Fish for the love of places fish live.

Fish for you.

And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, C, Franky, Geof, Luke, Streamer Swinger, and Noah for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version.

Edited by Cheyenne Terrien