Trout in lakes?

[devil-man]

Another difference is we have no trout rivers to speak off, only small lakes which are entirely naturaly devoid of gamefish and roughfish (suckers etc).

We may not have large trout rivers here, but there are some small ones. 
I have caught trout on some of our lakes.
On what? Minnows!

[vancouvercanuck]

In the central interior where I am, the trout, no matter what the size, eat bugs.....dragons...damsels......leeches....shrimp ......chronnys.....mayflies...etc. I've seen 8 pound plus rainbows consistently taken on size 12 chronomids.
It's crazy how the techniques differ
KRIS

Fished around Vernon, and Kelowna lot's and I'll have to tell ya that I have caught lot's of Rainbows on Rainbow Rapalas. Trout in my mind are definetly not just "bug eaters"

[bigredfishing]

In this area, once stream trout get to be about 15 inches or better, they definetly starting eating more minnows.  I have found tons of minnows, sticklebacks, sculpins, crayfish and leeches in the trout around here, especially those over 15 inches.  Minnow imitations are really killer 'round here for the big'uns...just ask slipbob

[Pasquatch]

Very true, our trout over about 14" turn to a very meat oriented diet. They eat almost anything, and their diet often reminds me of smallmouth bass. I've even seen some salamanders in browns stomachs! Like Lance said, our trout eat alot of minnows, especially our lakers!

[TroutFishingBear]

Trout in my mind are definetly not just "bug eaters"

They definitely aren't, although groups like TU want you to think that.
I do agree with whoever said the scuds thing though. There are some high mountain lakes here that have a bunch of mysis shrimp, and you see 3-5 lb. cutthroats swimming around, just grabbing mouthfulls of shrimp. Do these trout eat anything else, at all? No. Trout eat whatever, in some lakes around here the forage is crayfish, so they eat crayfish. In others it is suckers so they eat suckers. In some its shrimp so they eat shrimp. No in the colorado river there are good numbers of crayfish, roundtail chubs, 3 different kinds of suckers, sculpins, and some freshwater shrimp. There are also great bug hatches and let me tell you the trout in that river eat anything and everything they can get to. I've seen them caught on 4" sucker steaks and I've seen a decent number caught on nymphs. Trout eat anything IMO, which makes them the easiest fish to catch.

[TroutFishingBear]

Oh yeah, some of you may think I'm nuts but trout eat plankton too.

My advice for trout: match the hatch, weather the hatch be anything from a green drake fly to an 8" sucker.

Good fishing

[Kodiak Commando]

They definitely aren't, although groups like TU want you to think that

While i can't say if your CDOW comments are true or not i think some of your TU statements, especially the one above are a little misguided. First and foremost TU does not want you to think that trout are just bug eaters if you want proof just read their magazine. They currently have published 2 of a 3 part series on imitating different types of fish like sticklebacks, sculpins and shad. In fact a while back they published an article about how big trout feed more of fish than bugs and you should target them with fish patterns. Overall TU is not an fly fishing elitist organization. Sure there are some bad apples but most members of TU like me respect lure fisherman just like most all fly fisherman. I Have met some jerks who poached ducks and were members of DU, that doesn't mean all members of DU poach. Also TU has put more money into conserving trout than anyone else, which i can back up with hard evidence. Something you can't back up with hard evidence in conspiracy theorys about TU trying to stop all lure fishing or convincing everyone trout are bug eaters.

[devil-man]

Overall TU is not an fly fishing elitist organization...
Also TU has put more money into conserving trout than anyone else, which i can back up with hard evidence.

Trout Unlimited is a worthy organization whose members really do care about their favorite species and the environment.
I'm not a member, but I have seen their work personally. Bank restoration, dam removals, etc.
It's groups like this that keep sportsmen united.
JMO

[PGKris]

Mysis are an introduced species too eh..... Mention the word mysis shrimp with favor in your tone south of here in Kelowna BC and you might just get shot. D@mn near killed off about 100,000 Kokanee. I'm not sure of the biology of the ordeal but man those shrimp are bad news. I'm talking gammarus shrimp when I talk about the shrimp rainbows eat here. The smaller ones.

I don't know anything about your "Trout Unlimited" organization but I'll go out on a limb here and say that I fly and spin fish equally with a leaning toward fly fishing. Anyone that says gear chucking is wrong or unethical needs to pull his head out of his a$$. Purists like that really get under my skin cause they're the kind of people that cause rifts in the sportsmen community. Some guys thinking they're better than others. We're all in this together so who cares whether you pick up a spin rod or a fly rod?

And TFB, I don't think an 8" sucker is considered a "hatch" lol     I invite you all to come up here and try to fish a minnow pattern with any kind of success. If you can out fish me with a minnow pattern on any lake up here, I'll pay for your trip.
From what I've heard about brown trout you guys are probably right, they are meat eaters and a lot more agressive than rainbows. I've never fished brown trout so I've got no experience there. You won't catch a rainbow here with minnows in it unless its been eating salmon fry. I'm basing my posts on rainbows and not browns. As far as I know browns will eat anything and are more agressive.
Someone said something about lakers......I think it was pasquatch......not trout stick to topic lol yeah lakers eat kokanee, peamouth, rainbows, squawfish, chubs, ducks, anything they can fit in their mouths. Thats why they get big.

Fished around Vernon, and Kelowna lot's and I'll have to tell ya that I have caught lot's of Rainbows on Rainbow Rapalas.

I find this weird. Down south in some lakes like Shushwap and such I encountered the same thing. I think it's because these trout are also chasing salmon at parts of the year. In the bigger lakes that do have salmon migrations through them, these fish key in on baitfish patterns. I found the same thing in Takla lake up north. Baitfish patterns do produce well but I find these fish to be mostly agressive and you can catch them even without bait, they just smack spoons with random abandon.

I think I covered it
KRIS

[TroutFishingBear]

Mysis are an introduced species too eh..... Mention the word mysis shrimp with favor in your tone south of here in Kelowna BC and you might just get shot. D@mn near killed off about 100,000 Kokanee. I'm not sure of the biology of the ordeal but man those shrimp are bad news. I'm talking gammarus shrimp when I talk about the shrimp rainbows eat here. The smaller ones.

Mysis shrimp eat the same plankton base that kokanee salmon feed off of. Our CDOW did not understand that 20 years ago though, and they put mysis in at the time the best big rainbows fishery in colorado. The rainbows got big off of eating kokanee salmon. The kokanee salmon were big and prosperous. When the shrimp came in (introduced by CDOW) the lake's food chain was destroyed...

I can see why some people like trout unlimited, its just the agendas and members that I have met around here are very fly fishing elitist. I don't know about everywhere though.

[PGKris]

Riiight ok I remember now. It was the mysis eating all the zooplankton and then the kokes had nothing to feed on and the pops crashed. Again with the rainbows, they were safe eating bugs......they don't rely on kokanee for a food source and there was no impact on the rainbow population.
In that lake they've now gotten rid of almost all the mysis shrimp and the populations of kokanee are going back to where the were.
They've actually determined that there are 2 different types of kokanee spawners.....shore and stream although the shore spawners represnt a small percentage of all the kokes.
The thing with info like that is they also know that the stream spawners attain larger sizes and are more targeted by anglers so they need to figure out what size limits they might need to put into effect. It's been a great project I suppose. It's been an on-going study of mysis/kokanee interaction for d**n near 20 years in two different lakes here that I know of.
KRIS

[Kodiak Commando]

I can see why some people like trout unlimited, its just the agendas and members that I have met around here are very fly fishing elitist. I don't know about everywhere though.

My point exactly, your last sentence hit it right on. You have only met a fraction of TU members not only nationwide but probalby in Colarado. Can't judge a organization on a few bad apples.