Spring brown questions

[baetisman]

I have some questions about something fairly amazing that I saw and experienced and hope somebody can enlighten me. First, the set up.

I decided to fish a river that I haven't fished for a few years. Gas prices have kept me fishing closer to home, but I headed to a river a couple hours away. I was hoping to see some midges or blue wings and get some dry action. I worked a quarter mile stretch of river and didn't see a single fish. The river is shallow and clear enough that you usually see a few fish as you splash upstream. I was getting concerned and was going to find another stretch, but worked up to a large log that had fallen across the river. Thinking there was a deeper section with some sippers working, I went over. There had been deeper water, caused by beavers, but the dam had been breached and there was no longer a pond. However, as I looked close at the water, I started to see fish. Big fish. Hundreds of fish. Browns stacked up like logs on top of each other. I couldn't believe the numbers and size of the fish I was seeing. I have never seen anything like it in a stream this size. At one point, I sat and counted as many fish as I could and I counted well over 200 fish in about a 35 yard stretch. The fish were all between about 16 and 23 inches long (I got to measure a few).

So there are two main questions: First, why were all the big fish stacked up there? Did they head down stream to spawn, did they head down to find warmer or cooler water? Were they attracted to the pond that was once there? (Once they hit that dam they couldn't go any more downstream.) Second, will they disperse and go back stream, and if so, when?

It was very cool to see, and even though most of the fish were not feeding, but were just hugging the bottom, I found plenty of takers to provide me with me best fishing day in many years.
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[HFT]

Browns generally spawn in the fall and head up stream to do so. Because of stocking some do spawn other times of the year but they will also head up stream. I may be wrong but Golden trout are the only trout to go down stream to spawn. The browns may be there for a feeding purpose such as eating the spawn of rainbows or Cutthroat if they happen to be there. They may be stuck having swam up river to spawn in the fall before the beaver dam was built too big for them to pass and can't get through to return post spawn. If there is nothing blocking them they will probably disperse as the food supply changes and bug life is more active.
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[hookngrinin]

I have experienced the same thing this spring. If you were fishing in the North Eastern part of the state we may have been fishing the same stream. Stream flows are very low and clear right now. I have been fishing a stretch of stream that contains a couple of holes that I have counted over 200 browns ranging from 16 - 22+ inches. I was also able to measure some. They are easily spooked and have only had luck catching them by starting my drift well above the hole. It has been a lot of fun. It is awesome to see that many good sized fish in one location. You would think the fishing would be faster, but they are so wary. As for why they are there, I'm not sure. My guess is that it is water temperature related. []
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[riverdog]

If I understand correctly about the beaver dam impeding their passage back down stream I would think that the swam up to spawn and then the damn went up and the can't get back down with the low flows as HFT suggested. That reminds me of a similar circumstance I encountered 3 or 4 years ago in the spring during a drought year. I was fishing a small trib to a big reservoir and not catching much when I fished a large hole below a 6 ft tall beaver damn that blocked their migration up stream to spawn Very little water was coming thru the damn and none spilling over. I ended up hooking into 6 or 7 cutts 17 to 26 inches long (this probably gives away which reservoir the stream drained into, and no the stream wasn't closed to fishing yet). The fishing was slow only 1-2/hr but I just couldn't leave with all those big fish. The water wasn't very clear so you could only see the fish when the rarely fed on the surface. I don't know how many fish where in there but it must have been a ton because when I tried to net one fish that didn't run down stream but stayed in the hole I ended up netting another fish than the one I had hooked. I quickly dumped it out of the net when I realized it wasn't my hooked fish. Then when I went to net it again I landed another fish than the one I hooked. I was just as shocked the 2nd time thinking it was just a total fluke thing the first time. Anyway the third try I did actually land my hooked fish. HFT, I do believe the Bonneville cutts over in the Salt Creek (Thomas Fork) actually do swim down stream upto 25 miles before swimming up stream to the Coaltang and Hobble Creek (if I recall correctly) to spawn. I ran into a few TU people there catching and recording their unusually migration patterns a few years back.
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