Steelhead caught in Lake Mendocino

This is the honest to god truth. I was fishing throwing a slugo for bass and stripers the other day when i had a strange looking fish follow my slugo right in and take it about 3 feet from me.
A jump and damn its a steelhead!! A 23" chromer at that. Showed it to a couple of other locals and one of them said that 4 steelheads got trapped at the base of the damn when the water flow went down and where put into the lake.
There are three more out there!

pics or it didn't happen.



just kidding!  great catch!  a photo would be awesome if you had it though!

How will the other "three" do when the water temps increase?  Will they head up river?  That water gets mighty toasty during the summer.

Michael

What's a lucky catch!  Thanks for the report.  I would buy a Lotto ticket this week if I were you 

 nice job!  gots to love sluggos.  I remember a few times fishing the back part of lake sonoma in the shallows and catching the accidental land locked steelie!  they are quite beautiful! 

Will they head up river?

Doesn't the river dry up?

-Brian G

Will they head up river?

Doesn't the river dry up?

It may, I just thought that there was always at least a little trickle.

Michael

Its not a steelhead.  It is one of the many trout the stock above the lake in Potter Valley..that IS a heck of a nice catch.

Its not a steelhead.  It is one of the many trout the stock above the lake in Potter Valley..that IS a heck of a nice catch.

Thanks but it was a steelhead from the hatchery. The adipose fin was clipped and healed, so its been to the ocean and back. The fish was a male loaded with sperm long and slender, not a fat trout that has been in the lake for a few years. Unless the hatchery put some steelhead fingerlings in cold creek, this fish was an ocean run fish. This fish was not a DFG put and take planter, those are sterile specially bred fish that look completely different.

I dont know if the other three wil surive the summer but it they do i think they will hang out in the deepest water they can find.

Every trout planted in CA is clipped.  They do not have the permits to move steelhead above the dam.  Surplus fish at the hatchery go either to Kominsky Station  or Valley tribs.   A trout could easily get that size in Potter Valley and be ready to spawn...not a steelhead.

At CSBA last year I had one about the same size follow my lure only to veer off when it saw the yak underneath the Hwy 20 Bridge.

Cool catch and discussion - I'm thinkin' Studly Biologist Dude has it right.   

either way it is one nice catch

Well not to argue but i have dive the entire cold creek river picking up crawdads during the summer and no trout over winter. they all get caught and what doesnt gets eaten by the stripers that come up that river. the only overwinter trout i have ever seen is above the last place they stock, in the next two pools. But those are only13 to 15 inches long and dont last two seasons.
The few cold creek trout that get washed down during a wet may month get hammered by the stripers. I have seen a few trout get chased by stripers jumping for their lives over the years, but the stripers dont stop chasing them until they catch them.  Besidse the planter trout are bred to be sterile.
i have caught hunderds of hatchery and wild steelhead, I am 100% sure that this was a steelhead. And the old timer that i met on the lake is involved with the rod and gun club hatchery and would know if they put any in the lake.

Besidse the planter trout are bred to be sterile.

Not really.  Where do you get that?

So ... what is this fish.  Steelhead or planter?

Nice catch BTW.  I love a fish mystery.

-Allen