Winter Trout Stocking, 1
Tuesday, December 30th, 2008Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Sport Fish Restoration Program
The annual arrival of colorful, fun-to-catch rainbow trout gets underway this month and continues through March.
They’re a good fish to catch and a good fish to eat.
Carl Kittle oversees the Texas Parks and Wildlife trout-stocking program.
Each winter we try to create an opportunity for fishermen. Right now we’re doing over a hundred and twenty sites, with about two hundred seventy to two hundred and seventy five thousand rainbow trout being stocked almost all over the state.
It gets too hot in Texas to support a natural population of rainbow trout, so anglers have to get ’em while it’s cold.
You can catch them with live bait. You can catch them with corn or some other bait; and certainly, they’re great on spinners and even fly-fishing.
What about a cane pole?
A cane pole and a worm is one of the best ways to catch trout.
Kittle says although relatively easy to catch, rainbow trout can offer a challenge to anglers.
In that they are aware of people above the water, and they can see out of the water if the water is clear. So, sometimes you have to be a little bit cautious about letting the fish see you from above while you’re fishing.
Having to hide from prying fish eyes below the water’s surface is just plain creepy. [Water bubble sound]
They’re nice eyes. They’re nice little fish—no reason to worry about them.
Find the trout-stocking schedule at passporttotexas.org. That’s our show…with support from the Sport Fish Restoration Program… helping to fund fish hatchery management and operations in Texas.
For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.
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