Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Raising Forage and Bait Forage to Give Trout Red Meat and Natural Flavor?

Hi Folks,

Since it will only be fished by one family and not given too much pressure, my wife and I are not going to offer out trout in the two BOWs we intend to have dedicated to them any prepared food, so we can get the most natural, "wild trout" taste possible. Although even hatchery-raised, pellet-fed trout with white meat still taste amazingly good (I challenge anyone to tell me Cracker Barrel's lemon butter trout is not out of this world), there is something special about the pink or red wild trout we've caught in more remote places.

We do plan to feed the trout by supplementing their natural pond diet with live food items that are part of their desired natural food that we raise in forage ponds and tanks. So far my research has turned up three organisms that are important for trout in the wild that give them their best flavor and red meat (as opposed to mollusks, grasshoppers, etc.). These are crawfish, freshwater shrimp (Gammarus fasciatus), and freshwater scuds (Hyalella azteca).

The most important thing is not to raise these in forage tanks and ponds, but to get them established in the pond before we add trout. I want to see what other species of forage I am missing that are best to give trout their best flavor. Are Mississippi grass shrimp a good option as well? I like to dissect the stomachs of the trout I catch, and the ones in the wild areas had a fair number of insects and mollusks, as well as a good number of small macroinvertebrates.

Ciecil would be great for most of your questions.

I for get the chemical, but it's found in shell fish. Crayfish, snails and scudds. Scudds would be your best safest bet, then crayfish, see what is local.? I don't know or think grass shrimp would have it. There are fish foid that have it added to them also.

Astaxanthin is the chemical, if I spelled it right.

Good call, thanks! What species of forage animals contain this substance?

Scudds are what I try and target

We have a TON of scuds at our place. Stocked trout seem to have pink meat in about two weeks.

Good call, that is awesome to hear! Did you introduce scuds, or did they just naturally make their way there? Also, how do you maintain such a great, abundant population?

Can you tell whether they are Hyalella or Gammarus scuds? If you're not sure you could catch a few and put their photos up here for our identification.

They have just always been there. Tons of them. The lake has struggled with fish kills over the years before I took the reins. Maybe a lack of predation, I don't know. Not sure what kind they are. I posted a video of them somewhere on here one time. I can try to get some close up pics of them this summer while we are out there. Right now there is still 4-5' of snow up there! Strange thing is I never find large amounts of them in the fish stomachs. We have a crazy amount of leeches too and I have NEVER found a single leech in a stomach. I wish they would eat the damn leeches. A couple thousand Northern Crayfish were introduced in the last two years. We will see how they do.

Here you go wbuffetjr and AR:

scuds

Oh cool, thank you Canyon! You can't see much to identify them, but anywhere you look along the entire shoreline of the lake is like that with scuds.

Here is a pic from walking around the lake with a flashlight. About anywhere you shine you can see this. That is no bait in the water, I mean nothing, just leeches having a party.

Do trout eat leeches?

Only the sweet ones, not the sour ones, hehe

Haha!

I keep hearing they do, but I have never seen any evidence of it at my place. I am hoping the crayfish like leeches!

Perch like leaches right? White suckers live in the same habbitat you would think they would eat leaches and the sucker offspring could feed the trout. Just a thought.

Ever try a leach for bait?

All I know about perch and suckers is the little bit I have read on PB. As of now, there is so much forage in our lake it is crazy. The trout we stocked have grown tremendously. They dwarf the trout stocked, from the same fish truck on the same day, in the lake below ours. Now I just need to see if I can keep them alive thru a winter. I will know here in a week or two if we succeeded or failed. I am like a kid at Christmas!

EDIT: I have never tried a leech as bait. Meant to last summer and forgot.

Sorry AR, not trying to hijack your thread!!!

I am very interested in what you find on trout. I have plans for a reproducing population of wild caught Brookies in the lake I am talking about. I am also in negotiations to buy an adjoining 40 acres that has a spring/runoff fed 3.5 acre pond on it. If it works out, I have the crazy idea of Greenback Cutthroats in it.

This looks like a good wiki website on the subject:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astaxanthin

I've always heard that brine shrimp are responsible for the red meat of some WY trout.

Brine shrimp are the reason we have Pink Flamingos. Otherwise they are white flamingos. Same bird. Eating the brine shrimp gives them their pink feather coloration.

a colleague of mine told me yesterday that he went to Canada to some remote lakes, deep, clear water, rocky bottom that only had "lake trout (his words)" in them. He said he did not know of any other fish in those lakes (BG, Bass, walleye) and that the trout were there natively, not stocked. Not sure about that....

Anyway, he fished 3 lakes situated near to each other. He said in two of these remote lakes the trout flesh was pink, similar to salmon. But in one of the lakes he said the trout flesh was white like a walleye. Hmm.. Interesting...