I apologize if this is not actually fishing but some of you have said you found my small hatchery growing out various species of fish to trophy size interesting. The following is my biggest brown of my last three year cycle, which is surprisingly a female. With the other strains I have raised in the past, the males have always been the biggest. Most of the biggest browns with this strain, which is cross between browns from a pubic hatchery in Wyoming and Seeforellens -- are females. Anybody have an ideas why?One month shy of 3 years old (I know because I hatched it in my basement). 24 inches on the nose and 7.23 pounds.
Are they viable females....do they produce eggs? Do they produce eggs later than other strains therefore grow additional years before sexual maturity? It seems when we have "mules" in our Rome strain browns they do grow bigger. The males definately are bigger than the females, even when they can mature at age 2 when the females mature at age 3. I've always heard it is more costly to be female..eggs require more energy than gonads. For us the Romes struggle to grow for 3 years, but at age 4 they can get huge. Perhaps these can put the pounds on early and spawn at 4 years.
Good stuff Cecil.
Do you do any breeding of your own trout? Or are you pulling the females as they look like they’re ripe since they will get egg bound by the next season?
so why couldn't you catch our planters and strip/milk them? using eggs isn't the same as selling caught fish is it? im sure it would be a timing nightmare too though. or maybe they don't mature enough?
Well talking about crossing... Brown trout and Atlantic salmon can make hybrids hehe.
It could work but what would be the point if they already look a lot alike? I've seen some sea run browns that look almost identical to Atlantics. Additionally their already is a dilution of salmon stocks in parts of New Foundland due to the introduction of brown trout. Not a good idea to screw up native stocks that have adapted to the local conditions over thousands of years. https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Atlantic-salmon-Atlantic-salmon-x-brown-trout-hybrids-and-brown-trout-photographs-Note_fig2_234839037