My it's a small world. I get my browns and rainbows from Seven Pines when I get them. Seven Pine is one of the only disease free trout hatcheries in the midwest (if not the only) that provides browns and meets my states import requirements. They're beautiful browns that will get quite large for you if you feed them. I will get more if one of the excavators get their butt's over here and put in another pond before Seven Pines delivers to a local lake. I have too many Lake Nipigon brooks in the one pond to add more trout right now. I got them from northern Wisconsin too. The Redcliff tribal hatchery in Bayfield.

Your rainbows are fall spawners if you got them from Seven Pines. Your cooler temps are also definitely a factor. I grew browns to almost 12 lbs in two seasons from Seven Pines and my biggest rainbow was 9 lbs. 9 oz. Both pics are on my website. The biggest brown is on the first home page and the big rainbow is on the rainbow page where I am also holding a brown. I fed them to saciation every day.

As far as the flies not working after a few catch and releases, I have found that out growing out several species of fish, and harvesting by hook and line for my niche market. Fish do learn and are not as dumb as me make them out to be. Too get most of the trout harvested last fall we had to resort to wrapping a piece of pantyhose over a large pellet or two, tie it off, and put a salmon egg hook through the hose. This floated and was the only way to consistently get the big browns. You had to "match the hatch." It works great during the evening or morning on a fly rod.

I had no trouble feeding the rainbows and browns from Seven Pines twice a day, however, it had to be morning and evening as they did not come up the rest of the day.

If pigs could fly bacon would be harder to come by and there would be a lot of damaged trees.