Big trout

For a number of years, starting back in 1953, Barb and I would spend our vacation fishing in the vicinity of Malone, New York, up on the northern fringe of the Adirondacks. Though we had been fishing together since 1946, neither one of us had ever caught a really big trout. In our desire to catch a big one we had occasionally, tinged with a feeling of guilt, fished with live minnows, seined from the trout streams we frequented. Now, don’t go calling the Game Warden. In those days, seining minnows from a trout stream was legal. About the late 50s the law was changed, banning the seining of minnows from a trout stream.

Fishing in this manner, I did manage to take two brown trout which each measured 15 inches. Nice fish, but they certainly could not be classified as big.

All of this changed on the morning of June 19, 1956 while fishing the Salmon River below the town of Malone. Barbara finally found a really big one. On that day, we had decided to fish the area between the Flat Rock Falls and the Flat Rock Bridge. Barb elected to fish downstream from the Falls because the near bank consisted of a long, wide, flat, rocky ledge, a perfect place where our four-year-old daughter, Barbara Lee, could play safely while Barbara Ann fished.

I took our nine-year-old son, Robert, down about 200 yards to the bridge, planning to fish back up towards the Falls. The section I intended to fish was pocket water, which had a number of large boulders in it whose tops were high and dry above the flow. By using the “fireman’s carry,” I was able to move Bobby from rock to rock. I would then fish the water I could reach before moving Bob up to the next exposed rock. If I hooked a fish, I planned to let him have the fun of trying to play the fish to the net. Unfortunately, I could find no willing takers. After half an hour or so, Robert suddenly pointed upstream and yelled, “Mommy has one, Mommy has one.” Looking upstream, I could see that Barb’s rod was bent in a tight arc as she played a heavy fish. As we watched, she backed out of the water, and began running along the rocky ledge, following the fish as it ran downstream.

Of course, Bobby and I wanted to be in on the excitement. As quickly as possible, with him on my back, arms wrapped around my neck, we crossed through the swift currents to the bank. Once there, we ran and stumbled up to the pool where Barb was still trying to subdue the large trout. Just as we arrived, she bent down and managed to slip her net under the fish. This fellow was so heavy, she was barely able to lift him from the water. Once up on the rocky ledge, she fell to her knees, while exclaiming, “I can’t believe the size of him.” Son, daughter and husband stared in awe at her catch. All butter yellow along his sides, thick as a brick, with black spots nearly the size of dimes. A real whopper.

After killing the trout, I took out my ruler and measured the length of this large brown trout. It was exactly 18 1/4 inches from the slightly indented tail to the end of his jaws. Barbara Ann had become the champion trout fisher in our family. I was delighted at her success. No one ever took more pleasure in this trout fishing game or fished with more intensity. Now, when talking to other fishers about fish I had caught, it was necessary to point out that my fishing partner was the all-time record holder. Records, after all, are only made to be broken. After searching for my Moby Dick for 45 long years, I finally found him on the Delaware, in June of 2001, in the form of a 19 1/2 inch rainbow trout. So now in the twilight years I am the champion rainbow trout fisherman in the family. However, Barbara Ann is still the undisputed champion brown trout catcher. It’s pretty neat, having two champion trout fishers under the same roof.