3 Years: How Big Did Our 3-Inch Rainbow Trout Grow? 

I grew up in Lewistown. Home was upstream from town. Two things I miss every day… my dad, and Montana. Very fun stuff to watch.

A perfect example of why we need to bring back beavers large scale. Beavers slow water from leaving the land, letting it seep into the ground instead and recharging water tables and aquifers. Droughts suck, droughts suck far worse without beavers.

Might what to wet your hand before you touch your fish it will help protect your fish they look good have fun with them

Brilliant, appreciate the effort of documenting it

Nice. My Uncle had some awesome trout ponds when I was a kid. Super cold spring-fed but they never spawned. I never even noticed any fatness from eggs. Maybe they were sterile? Maybe drop a GoPro in the water and row around to get a decent count. When the ice is off, of course. Take those barbs off and your fish won't get beat up.. Oh and if you're going to eat them, don't feed them any commercial feeds like Purina trout chow. It totally changes the flavor.

Old guy here, I once read a story about fish kill from low Oxygen. The snow came early for that year and too much snow covered the lake. So they spread ground up coal on it and it melted enough during the sunny days to give the plants enough sunlight to bring the Oxygen level back up. It was a very big lake so maybe what they did won't make sense on a small pond due to pollution. But I wonder if there are some kind of floating Black plastic balls that you could spread in the winter and reclaim/ recycle when it melts. Just wanted to chime in on the low O2 issue. ben/ michigan

I love these updates. It's sad none of the original fish survived. They'd be huge for sure. Hopefully this next batch sees good conditions and grow huge

Cool nice fish !!

You should tag some fish and then if friends/family come over you could announce bounties/prizes for the tags, like a mini fishing derby for the kids. Maybe even on each tag you can assign a 1-10 number - with larger fish getting higher numbers - and that way you could do a point system where each kid/participant can catch as many as they can within an hour or two and each fish score gets added up to see who gets the grand prize. Maybe put some easy to catch bluegil in and tag them so the smaller kids can catch some tagged fish.

Greetings from the BIG SKY. Nice lookin pond. The fish look great. I'm in Lewistown.

Really a great channel. I'm 70 and have learned a few things. I assume that all your hooks are barbless. The large ice trout in this video was stunning.

They certainly grow fast!

Very cool

Kamloops strain are awesome to catch. You might want to get yourself a throat pump so you can see what the fish are eating. I would put money on the main food source is chironomid nymphs. You should try stocking brook trout they seem to do better over winter. Awesome video!

Lovely video...Like what you're doing there... Trout are finicky fish concerning their conditions...They don't like warm deoxygenated water for long,or too cold ...without getting a higher morbidity rate...unfortunately I think that's nature ... Maybe some added oxygen pumped in throughout the warmer months , and some extra depth for winter,where they stay at a more level temperature... But they'll find a natural stock density on their own whatever ... I'd love the opportunity to have such a beautiful place myself. Good luck and hope it goes well for you ...

Pretty cool

Great pond, great story, fabulous trout (especially for the grandkids to catch!). Have you considered raising the height of the dam on the pond, so as to catch more of the spring runoff and increase the overall water depth? Could help to more easily carry you through those hot dry summers when rain is sparse.

My frind use to let me fish his bass pond one spring he asked me to not fish because he had planted trout and wanted to let them grow, well in the fall he said he could not find any trout, but the bass were bigger, one was about 7 pounds

I've been waiting for an update! Bummer about your original fish! Summer of '22 was real hot and dry here in New Hampshire... 10 straight days of 90+ degrees plus no precipitation for almost three months led to all my large 4-6lb trout dying. We've since installed a windmill aerator and couldn't be happier! I'd recommend for you to get one yourself - especially for the winter.

NICE!

Enjoyed the video, great the fish are doing well, if you put, fish that size in a similar pond here in the UK with cormorants herons etc they wouldn't last long.

Ever consider snorkeling in your pond to see what's going on down there? Seems a little more effective than guessing with a fishing rod. Even an underwater camera might get some useful footage, if you drop it down far enough.

You should have tried canned corn if you wanted to see if there was anything in there. Foolproof on our pond.

Try triploid pasask rainbows & some Fraser valley rainbow strains for your pond you won’t be disappointed! To help your fish through the winter consider a little air aider.

good deal, not long to grow nice size

I cant wait till winter... I need monthly updates please ( gives ya a reason to catch a couple every month) I studied fisheries at Spokane Community College This is a dream to me

Was there a forage base already? Or did you spike it with something for them to feed on?

Must be an abundance of food for them to grow that fast.

I have a deep cold water pond that I stocked with 250 9” rainbows in the Catskill Mts, NY. The last caught trout was over twenty inches with a salmon hook lower jaw. That lasted 5 years. They never propagated, and this summer I intend to introduce small mouth. If anyone can get those trout to reproduce please let me know how it is possible… thanks

Have you considered introducing some crawfish if they aren’t already there 🤔

Obviously they're eating well.

I was surprised that you don't have an aerator on solar to keep the pond oxygenated?

What about Brook Trout . They don't need a creek to spawn in just a cobbly bank on a section of pond , under the water of course . Not sure what state you are in but was wondering if you needed permits . You guy's are living my dream but I am close to buying land . Would love to have a trout pond that I could build .

Kamloops trout? Kamloops? British Columbia? Canada? 🇨🇦? ❤

Thatsa good ah or GREAT

You should wet your hand before touching your fish. A dry hand will remove all the mucus membrane, and leave the fish with no defense against infection and disease

In southern Idaho and northern utah the shrmp help trout grow fast and go from white meat to pink real fast

How was that strain arrived at? Engineered or Natural mutation? I would be interested to know.

Are you feeding them or did they grow that fast naturally?

Sorry that Mr. Owner could not drill a massive deep well to replenish this water. Ground water must be a rarity. May 9 inches of rain come this weekend. Trout are tasty to the bone.

Surprised very many of the fingerlings survived with even having one adult trout in the pond.

Trout ,a salmon in our lake damrascortta lake put them in at 6 inches double in 6 months ,to 12 inches but salmon doubles installs

Do you guys feed these fish? Seems like they wouldn’t have enough to eat otherwise

Were the new fish $770 each? Like salmon?

Put feeder fish in the pond!

Why do you say you stocked 4 inch trout but your title is 3 inch trout?

A strain of trout has been discovered in NZ which has extraordinary growth rates based on the fact that trout grow fastest whilst growing to sexual maturity then slows immensely by comparison. The reason for the greater growth rate is that most trout are sexually mature at three years, this other strain is not sexually mature until four years.

You should always wet your hands when handling fish you're going to release those are some nice trout. I'm currious why you're doing this planting for catch and release, or what? Hopefully you don't have river otters get in there they'll eat every single fish. My nieghbor has a large pond fed by a small stream and otters got in and ate every single fish in a short amount of time

Easy bro just want to help. Fish start to die witch will cause a problem.

Upgrade to fly fishing.

That rod and reel combo is a cheap piece of shat.

Nice, but please remember your hot human hands are like fire on the skin of a trout. Always dip your hands in the water before handling any trout you intend to return to the water.

How deep is the pond? I live lakefront, we have mostly largemouth, some smallies due local bass clubs dropping them in, I only caught one but they say they're catching them. We also have: chain pickerel, black crappie, bluegills, both yellow and white perch, bullheads and channel cats. I catch mostly largemouths and pickerel, maybe that because they are all I really know how to catch anything else is by accident. The lake is approx. 450 acres, springfed dammed up swamp, mostly about 6' deep with the deepest areas about 13'. All the fish are healthy, biggest largemouth caught by me was 24" long and weighed 8 lbs, bass 15"-18" are common as are 20" pickerel. Do you think trout might make it here? I really enjoy a variety. I'm in northern NJ doesn't get too cold but freezes pretty thick some years some years not so much. I don't know whether it would be worth time lobbying the lake assoc to stock trout. What do you think?

I hate snow. 🙂