Fish abd Boat comission just stocked a local lake with rainbows (they were supposed to be brookies but I’m not gonna complain).
The fish are quite finicky for hatchery trout and as one of ther guys put it we are catching them but we are not breaking any records.
Anyway all of the fish we caught so far are nearly black in color. I mean they are dark enough that you might have problems seeing the spots on the upper part. The rainbow is dark also but it varies from fish to fish. Compared to the rainbows from this spring which were so silvery bright that you had problems seeing the rainbow stripe this has me wondering…
Is such a big color variation natural? Is it maybe from a diet? - Meat has the normal color.
Any one has any ideas? I will try to snap some pics next Thursday if I manage to land any…
Over the yrs., I have caught rainbows with a lot of different colors. I assumed, that it was due to the food source, but I suppose there can be differences in the blood lines and brood stock. Probably need to ask a fisheries biologist to know for sure
season can have somthing to do with it also, In alaska during the fall the some of the rainbows start to darken up and a few get pretty black for the winter. Dont know why.
When I get little rainbows from the hatchery they are almost completely black. The man from the hatchery told me that it was because they were in a closed tank with no light was why they were black.
I can vouch that this holds true for Atlantic Salmon. We catch brood stock in the fall that are placed in green-bottomed holding tanks. By the time they are released, they are nearly perfectly green! They tend to blend into their surroundings. We actually had a blind salmon one year (we didn’t realize it until after we had it back to the hatchery) and it was nearly all black, beacuse it had no visual cues as to what colour it should be. Just one more reason to marvel at these fish and their adaptive abilities, IMHO.
I fish a very small creek, average width is 18 inches, but it is relatively deep, 3 ft in spots. It is overgrown with grass and houses both brooks and bows. Both species from this creek tend to see little direct sunlight and are very dark in comparison to the more normal colored trout. This tends to support Lunker’s comments.
Tim
PS: Do an advanced Google search, subject: Fish coloration. This might prove helpful.
I’m glad someone mentioned this because once when I was talking to the late Charles K. Fox, I swear he mentioned something about black hatchery trout being blind or something to that effect.
well if they were kept in a dark/black tank in the hatchery, all they would see is black, and they would have a couloration to match it…I’d say wait 2 weeks and you won’t see anymore black ones…they’ll either have been caught by birds, or they’ll have changed to match their new surroundings in your waterway.
While our TU chapter was brown trout tagging at the Wolf Crek Hatchery at Lake Cumberland we came across several beautiful “BLUE” trout. We had a lot of fun showing the non-participants in our TU chapter pictures of the new “Kentucky Blue Trout” strain that we had tagged for release.
In reality they were color mutations of the brown trout used by the hatchery.
I’ve caught some “black” trout in a small mountain creek that was full of black volcanic rocks. I just assumed the trout just adapted to their environment. I caught them on small dry flies so I’m sure their eyesight was perfect.
Finally I got some time to upload and post.
herse are three from last weekend.
My camera seem to brighten them up but still you can see the difference between fish.
Like I said my camera made them brighter. In reality they were much darker.
Those darker fish are usually soft bodied and when I catch them and am in the process of releasing them, they start releasing eggs…(I’m not squeezing the fish). So I think they are pregnant females.
I have also heard that they are that dark because of low oxygen levels in the water when they travel in the plant truck.
MikieFinn,
Those trout in the pictures you posted look like stockers to me. Department of Fish & Game feeds the stockers Purina Fish Chow pellets. These pellets along with growing up in a cement troth make the fish look darker, have disfigured or torn fins, blunted noses, and scars on their sides. At least they do out here in California. I hope this helps explain those dark trout. Take-care.
You confirm what was told to me by a hatchery employee at Bennett Spring state park in Missouri.
We were discussing the non stocked, very colorful, pure strain McLoud river bows in Crane creek. He told me all bows from hatcheries in Mo were McLoud river decendants. If the fish in trout parks ate the same things they did in Crane creek they would be as colorful.
Mikie,
While I’ve never seen “black” rainbow trout in the wild, I have seen them in the fresh fish area of my local supermarket. Until this thread, I never gave it much thought but they ARE in fact very dark.
My thoughts are that these hatchery trout live in a darker environment while being raised. The bottom and sides of the pond might be dark or the sun doesn’t get into their water much.?
Doug
