Spent the morning and early afternoon trying to catch fish on the Stanislaw River in Oakdale, California. I say trying because I was not catching many. The fish were hitting, but for one reason or another … well, here’s the story.
The river is beautiful, cold and running strong.
I caught several of these fish, I don’t know what they are. I think they are fall fish, or some other type of chub. Sorry for the quality … I took these pictures, other’s got away before I could snap the shot.
So then comes the “trying” part. I also caught two trout. Since I am not sure of the smaller one (6"), I think it was a brook trout (bright red coloring down the side?). The larger one (10"), was definitely a rainbow. I hate using barbless hooks, but it’s the law on this stretch of the river. I managed to get both of these fish to hand, but while fumbling with the camera, both manage to slip the hook.
On the plastic worm pictured above, I hooked a beautiful brown trout (I know that one because I caught a couple of them years ago in Wyoming) that took off for one more run when I reached for it. It found a submerged branch and wrapped the line around it not once, not twice, but three times. I tried to get it off, but it slipped the hook also.
So, pretty river, pretty fish … Hate my first experience with barbless fishing … Although true, nothing but fish stories about the trout.