Re-Trouting the Waters NMCCC helped wrap up trout-stocking season last week, by placing 800 two-year brown trout from Onondaga County's Carpenters Brook Hatchery in a four mile section of Nine mile, via canoe float box. Scout troop 100 helped load and stock, and troop 66 helped prep the route. This is our 26th year stocking by float box! Additionally, one of our members, Scott, helps the Hatchery stock other sections through-out the stocking season (starting in March!). In his words: Usually, my Wednesday mornings are reserved for volunteering with the A-Team at Baltimore Woods Nature Center. However, an even better opportunity came up that I just could not pass on. Yesterday morning, I met up with the team at Carpenters Brook Fish Hatchery for some Nine Mile Creek trout stocking fun. When I got there at 8:30 the team was getting ready to load up the fish tanks on the trucks. Once Eric waded into the rectangular tank to push the fish to one end, we used dip nets to capture them and pass up to the guys on the trucks. They were 2-yr old beauties, mostly browns. Then we moved to the round tank and loaded 1-yr old Brookies. Brook Trout are my all-time favorite, as they are native to New York and absolutely the most beautiful. But, if it is a trout, I am a big fan. Ok, truth be told, I like all fish equally. Just some are more equal than others. Once the fish were safely secured in the tanks on the trucks, we loaded up and hit the road. I was on the head-water team with three tanks, working from Sevier Road to the Lower Crown Mill site (now Curtin’s Crossing) across from the Marcellus High School. The hatcheries rule of thumb is that if the property is posted, no stocking, so we didn’t stock just below the Otisco Lake dam, as was done in prior years. The other team with the single tank, took the downstream section. I don’t know where they started or ended their run. Next month I hope to do this stocking again and perhaps be assigned to that team so I get the whole tour. It was a cold day and working with fish tends to get the worker wet. I was happy I brought rubber boots; I wished I had thought of rubber gloves. If you have never volunteered to help the county stock a creek with trout, it goes like this: We drove to a bridge, parked the truck, fished out the trout into 5-gallon buckets, carried buckets to the creek and dumped them in. Pretty simple process. I had the high skill job of caring a bucket. Carrying 5 gallons of fish and water in one hand is a bit unbalancing, so the more challenging terrain had to be approached with caution. Some of the stocking spots had very steep banks, so the truck guys just scooped and dumped the fish in from the truck off the bridge. Toward the end of our tour, it really started to snow! As far as I could see, there were no casualties (that floated, anyway). With the oxygen tank aerators on the truck, the fish were happy and healthy. Also, there were no casualties of the stockers either. But this was not my first fish rodeo. Back twenty or so years ago, I was talking to some work buddies / outdoorsmen who claimed that the hatchery just parked on the bridge and opened the tank and dumped in the fish. I could not believe this to be true, as I may have mentioned to my friends. So, I decided to do an experiment by volunteering and find out the facts for myself. Since it is in my back yard, I wanted to stock 9-mile, but my work schedule only allowed me to help with Limestone Creek. As so often happens, my vocation got in the way of my advocations. Similarly, that day we met at hatchery, loaded fish and hit the road. On this trip there was about 6 older retired guys with us. This is where it got interesting. We started the trip with about 9 volunteers, one-by-one these guys dropped out of the caravan. At the time I attributed it to them being older and easily tired out, etc. When we returned to the hatchery I asked the driver about it. He said, “Oh, those guys? They went home to get their rods (if they didn’t have them in their trunk) to fish the holes we had just stocked.” I was amazed at the audacity of these guys. They did not even help finish the stocking. Anyway, I was able to confirm my suspicion that the stockers did the right thing and bucketed 80% of the fish into the creek. Some of the spots were a long slog through the mud with a 5-gal bucket of fishy water. Not an easy hike, but worth every step. So, all this stocking talk has got me wondering why I don’t take up trout fishing? When I was a kid, I learnt and got quite adept at fly tying and even caught Cut-Throat Trout on them in Yellowstone. I guess when I got all grown up, the responsibilities of family life kinda pushed the fly-fishing hobby off the table. I still have my old split bamboo rod, reel, net and creel, perhaps I should dust it all off and reacquaint myself as to what all the excitement is about. I hear that I live on a premier New York State trout fishing river after all! (fb)

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