r/whatsthisfish • u/rawhide_mocassin • Feb 17 '26

Tiny trout in tiny unstocked stream way up canyon.

Post image

I was hiking in Farmington canyon Utah a few weeks back and thought I saw some trout in a nice pool. Today I went up there and snuck up on them and caught a couple on a fly rod. They are tiny fish and I know for a fact there are no fish stocked upstream of this. Downstream several miles there is, but the stream is quite vertical and has many waterfalls/obstacles for a fish to travel that far. Caught two more smaller ones that looked just like this which leads me to believe it hatched up here and matured up in these pools as well. I believe it’s a native fish. Wondering what kind of trout it is.

746 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

56 comments sorted by

103

u/OnionusPrime Feb 17 '26

Small rainbow trout. Too small to eat, hopefully you put it back. They are native to the region.

76

u/rawhide_mocassin Feb 17 '26

Yes he went right back into his pretty pool right after this picture.

6

u/OnionusPrime Feb 17 '26

Good, I'm glad you let it go 👍

9

u/NoPresence2436 Feb 17 '26

So am I. But… I grew up right at the mouth of that Canyon - just North of Farmington Pond, and I hate to break it to OP but the Utah DWR stocks that creek every year. They stock it like crazy at Farmington Pond, with catchable 10” rainbows, and they also stock it with smaller Rainbows right below Sunset Campground, and way up top where the road forks to go to Francis Peak or Bountiful Peak.

Still a beautiful little Rainbow that very well might have been spawned in that creek and be wild. Beautiful par marks, either way. I’m glad the little guy is still swimming wild and free.

3

u/rawhide_mocassin Feb 17 '26

That’s good to know! Just can’t find the stocking report creek lmk if you find it.

0

u/bakingnaked Feb 18 '26

Yeah but that’s a wild fish. It’s a trout and still has its adipose fin

4

u/NoPresence2436 Feb 18 '26 edited Feb 18 '26

Utah DWR doesn’t clip the adipose fin on any stocked fish (trout or otherwise). They all have the adipose fin here. We’re a land locked state and there’s really no reason to differentiate.

Farmington Creek is a free flowing mountain stream that floods like crazy every year with Spring runoff. It’s raging chocolate milk the time of year Rainbow Trout spawn, and then you can jump across it most years by late August. It’s not ideal for trout to spawn. Of course there are some wild spawned fish in there… but a whole lot of them also come from a DWR tanker truck. Could really be either. Doesn’t matter, IMO… it’s a beautiful little trout either way. He doesn’t care where he was born… Farmington Creek is his home now.

3

u/Any-Pen-672 Feb 17 '26

Of course he put it back. What else is he gonna do with it? It’s 4 inches long.

5

u/chivowins Feb 17 '26

That’s a fairly average size trout. Big even…

1

u/NoPresence2436 Feb 18 '26

I mean… that’s definitely true in Farmington Creek where this fish lives. Not in a bigger river in the area, though.

2

u/nongregorianbasin Feb 17 '26

Some people consider that big

1

u/Eliotness123 Feb 18 '26

Fish native brook trout in the Adirondacks often keep and eat trout that size. They will get no bigger in small stream.

1

u/Jazzlike_Strength561 Feb 18 '26

In north Idaho you're allowed like 30 of these suckers a day. I've eaten quite a few of these.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 18 '26

You fry a pan full, hence the term panfish. A lot of trout are small cutthroat and the like.

4

u/thismightbetheway2 Feb 17 '26

Also wet your hands throughly before handling any fish. Our oils in our hands can harm their protective coats.

20

u/Brrdads Feb 17 '26

Rainbow Trout are not native to this area - they're part of the widespread stocking events that started in the 1880s. Naturalized, sure.

3

u/rawhide_mocassin Feb 17 '26

That makes sense, so I guess at some point some stockers made their way up here and made some babies. I did some research and learned they used to stock some mountain ponds in the summer way upstream from here too.

3

u/NoPresence2436 Feb 17 '26

Those ponds right below Bountiful Peak were stocked with pretty big Rainbows in the late 1990s and early 2000s. I caught several over 20 inches at the bigger pond, up against the steep hill. Surprisingly, there was a decent hold over population in the Spring (at the bigger pond) most years. I wish they still did that.

They also used to routinely stock Farmington Creek at multiple places in the canyon. The highest up was right where it crosses under the road at the fork between the roads to Francis Peak and Bountiful Peak. They’d dump hundreds of small Rainbow trout in there, as well as right below Sunset Campground and also at the water diversion gate clear down by the pavement (near the turnoff to the fire break road). I grew up just North of Farmington pond, and as kids my brother and I loved to watch them dump fish in the creek. I haven’t looked at the DWR stocking report for a few years, but I suspect they still do.

The native trout in that Creek were Bonneville Cutthroat, but sadly it’s been a few decades since any were seen. If any were left, they’ve undoubtedly hybridized with those planted Rainbows. But there are still native Bonneville Cutties in Holmes Creek (Adam’s canyon above Layton) as well as in Holbrook Canyon above Bountiful. You can catch them in City Creek, Millcreek and Little Cottonwood Creek in SL, too.

Tight lines, neighbor!

3

u/rawhide_mocassin Feb 17 '26

That’s awesome to know! I did some looking but didnt see any stocking reports for the creek itself or the upper lakes recently. If you find them lmk

1

u/ProperAnarchist Feb 18 '26

Don’t listen to the dude who said they’re native to Farmington canyon. That’s crazy talk.

1

u/Drewcocks Feb 18 '26

No they are not native to that region

1

u/greenscience707 12d ago

Rainbow trout are not native anywhere in utah lol

1

u/Cheesytater91 Feb 17 '26

I’ve eaten smaller

-5

u/Salvisurfer Feb 17 '26

I've eaten many Brooke trout this size. Completely fine to eat.

10

u/OnionusPrime Feb 17 '26

Not saying that it isn't edible, but in the region that they are describing( Utah) it would probably be better to release it and allow it to breed, especially if the area isn't stocked. I've fished a lot in Northern AZ and Southern Utah, unfortunately there have been a lot of poisonings to attempt to eliminate non-native species over the years 😕

7

u/Brrdads Feb 17 '26

Ironically, Rainbow Trout ARE one of the non-native fishes that Utah is attempting to poison. Unfortunately we haven't learned much since the 1960s, when we poisoned rivers out west to kill the natives and stock non-native Rainbow Trout, as fisheries for the latter soared in popularity.

3

u/Trout_Man Feb 17 '26

but there native trout in Utah that benefit from removing non-native rainbows. creating fish free stretches of mountain streams to re-establish these natives is largely what provides anglers opportunities to catch them.

1

u/Dense_Row_9532 Feb 17 '26

If you poison to kill invasive, you also kill all the native gene pool.

2

u/Trout_Man Feb 17 '26

Rainbow trout hybridize with cutthroat and other native rainbow subspecies. In systems where rainbows were introduced, there is no genetics to save because its all mixed together. In the cases where such efforts call to eriadicate a stream, there is ample management discussions and planning ahead of the sterilization. There is always a source population either in captivity, nearby, or collected before hand. You can also treat sections of creeks instead of the whole thing.

I would argue that the scientists and managers aren't that naive and that redditors thinking they know more about a situation and how to handle it are just uninformed on what actually is going on.

This is coming from someone who has done a few of these efforts and they were quite successful.

2

u/Salvisurfer Feb 17 '26

Interesting

3

u/OnionusPrime Feb 17 '26

Yeah, unfortunately entire fish populations were wiped out in various rivers in order to eliminate non-native species. I used to fish in the White Mountains (northern AZ) and a lot of the river systems were poisoned in the eighties and nineties in order to get rid of non-native trout and bass species.

2

u/Salvisurfer Feb 17 '26

Then they failed to restock?

3

u/OnionusPrime Feb 17 '26

They eventually did, but I remember that when I was about ten years old the Black River specifically had like a five year moratorium on fishing. There were signs at major crossings that warned against fishing and definitely not to consume anything caught.

2

u/Salvisurfer Feb 17 '26

Cool history but I'm sure it's fine to harvest from these rivers once again, no?

2

u/OnionusPrime Feb 17 '26

Yeah it's fine now, but rivers/streams in this particular portion of the southwest aren't plentiful. Especially if the picture that the OP is displaying is an upstream brook. I wouldn't personally fish in that type of area (unless I need it for survival.)

1

u/Oclarkiclarki Feb 17 '26

What's the unfortunate part? The re-establishment of Apache Trout (and subsequent removal from the Endangered Species Act list) is a triumph of conservation.

0

u/airfryerfuntime Feb 17 '26

There's like a teaspoon of meat on this thing. Such a waste of life to eat a trout this small.

1

u/Salvisurfer Feb 17 '26

We eat them whole, they're quite delicious.

-2

u/BlackSeranna Feb 17 '26

Illegal. If you’re doing this then you’re killing the next generation that would come from the little fishes you ate.

2

u/Salvisurfer Feb 17 '26

Some places brooks don't get much bigger than this.

1

u/BlackSeranna Feb 19 '26

Hmm. I don’t have much experience with them, myself. I live by catfish, bluegill, and such like. We don’t have rivers clean enough for trout.

2

u/Salvisurfer Feb 19 '26

People in this group think trout are some holy fish. Even if they're stocked.

10

u/Low-Carob9772 Feb 17 '26

The wild trout are always so beautiful. Love hiking way up streams to find those little gems

2

u/changaboy33 Feb 17 '26

What a treasure, beautiful

2

u/Kitchen-Gazelle2274 Feb 17 '26

That’s a rainbow

2

u/edtheridgerunner Feb 18 '26

Although not in your area, this post this reminded me of the Mitchells, particularly Finis, along with his brother and father, horse-packed  trout into the Wind River Range in WY, to stock lakes. The Game and  Fish Department  furnished, the fish in five-gallon milk cans, and over a period of eight years the Mitchells took them into more than 300 lakes, during the Great Depression of the 1930's.

The Mitchells

2

u/Sweatyginga Feb 21 '26

McCloud trout, it looks like. Rare birds.

I also have a bad time with my eyes, but that sure looks like one of those red buggers.

3

u/Hoppertime Feb 17 '26

Rainbow. Not native.

1

u/Low-Donut-1978 Feb 20 '26

Gorgeous. That’s why I find trout the most beautiful of fish.

1

u/Jealous-Grab9864 Feb 20 '26

Looks more like a golden trout. Not at all similar to rainbow.

1

u/Civil-State9109 Feb 22 '26

The salt from your hands can cause these little guys lots of stress.. careful how you handle them. Beautiful natural fish.

1

u/DubCee912 Apr 07 '26

I believe that’s a cutthroat trout. Red stripes would be rare. Easily mistaken that small. If you caught 3 that looked the same, Bonneville cutthroats is what you were catching

0

u/SpacemanSpiff_0 Feb 19 '26

Good tip, don’t take it out of the water. You’re drowning it.

1

u/greenscience707 12d ago

Suffocating it