Nice mount and awesome growth rates.Our Rome strain brookies usually grow a half inch at month at 47 degrees.
That is a very fine brook trout mountI've read somewhere ideal temperature for brook trout growth is around 55*F
Wow that's cold water! I'm sure if the water temp was in the upper 50's like mine, they would grow faster? But then fast growth isn't always wanted or needed. I believe my fast growing fish don't have the life spans of slower growing fish. With my last group of male brooks of 5 to 6 pounds (had six over 6 pounds), they started croaking at spawning time at 3 years of age. Not all of course, but wasn't sure if I should take the chance of keeping some another year so I harvested them all. On really hot days in the middle to upper 90's air temps, the water temps in the pond can reach 62 F. from top to bottom, but usually it's in the upper 50's in the summer. My well water coming into the pond @ 45 gpm is 51.6 F. I mix the water column 24/7 with a diffuser so temp is the same from top to bottom and there is no anoxic layer. Pond is about 100,000 gallons and 55 by 89 feet. Max depth 11 or 12 feet in the center. Very steep sides to keep the water temps down. The above fish was a Lake Nipigon X Eastern Brook Trout strain from Michigan. The strain of brook trout I have now are some eastern brook trout from NY orignially but not sure which. Could be Rome strain? Got the recent eggs from this hatchery in Utah:https://coldspringstroutfarm.com/activities/live-trout-egg-sales/(Just noticed the site seems to be having problems with pictures.)
There are a couple of less domestic strains of brookie in NY that they use as well as a lot of different browns. Rome Hatchery is currently playing with a back crossed Rome brown with a feral(wild) Orisakany River brown. They are calling them "Romiskanys".Our Rome brookies don't last long in the hatchery and it seems the wild as well. I never hear of many huge holdover brookies in Vermont. Our male brookies are done by the third year, either fungus, parasites or kidney failure takes them out. The females can last to the spring to be stocked out.The 47 degree well water can be a blessing or a curse, we are one of the few who can raise lake trout broodstock and incubate eggs at those cool temps. We've loaded up federal hatcheries in Vermont and Pennsylvania with our laker eggs destined for the Great Lakes restoration programs.
interesting reading. amazing how they grow like that. are you guys feeding them protein shake dough balls or something. lol very cool jobs you guys have.
Ive ready 70 percent of a wild trouts diet is forage fish!
We raise in raceways, but do have one settling pond, never put much in there anymore since the osprey train their young on the pond. We would loose about 1,000 2 yr rainbows over a summer, so we only put a few in there for the visitors to feed.
When we dumped our 4+ yr browns in the pond they would last for a few years. I believe some were approaching 15 lbs.
I think maturity plays a big part, since our males die much sooner than the females. We lighthouse our broodstock, so we are collecting eggs from brookies right now. They will be 1 year next summer, the males could be mature next fall. We spawn them in the fall the following year(2 yr+) and then spawn them again the following summer at 3 years. So the males have three spawn cycles on them and the females only 2.
We haven't had an IPN positive test here since the 70's. We only test positive for bacterial furunculosis and that is usually on a couple of samples. We haven't had major outbreaks of furunculosis since we got rid of the OWHI strain of brook trout about 20 years ago.