Area net pens breed Troutzilla for fishermen

California anglers are just catching on to the fever generated by trout the size of swine —a form of fishery-management pork that Washington anglers have enjoyed for a decade on the Columbia River.

The Orange County Register reports “legendary” fishing tales emanating from Santa Ana River Lakes, where anglers are catching giant pen-raised genetically sterile (triploid) rainbow trout.

Sound familiar?

The Mount Lassen Trout Farm is creating what some have dubbed the Legend of ‘Loid, with triploid trout that bypass the spawning process so they can expend all their energy into quickly growing big.

The California state-record hatchery rainbow is a 27.5-pound ‘Loid landed on Christmas Eve 2003.

Nice fish. But it’s still a bag of Big Macs short of the Washington state record – a 29.6-pound triploid rainbow caught in Lake Rufus Woods downstream from Grand Coulee Dam in November 2002 by Norm Butler of Okanogan.

Maybe reading about California’s euphoria over its newest big-fish craze will serve as a gentle reminder: We have forgotten about more opportunities in our backyard than many anglers can find within a day’s drive.

The Rufus Woods rainbow phenomenon sprouted in the early 1990s with the buildup of net pens for Columbia River Fish Farms. The company is producing 500,000 rainbows a year. The fish are raised in 33 net pens at two different sites on the section of Columbia River backed up behind Chief Joseph Dam.

The fish farms, which hold about 4 million pounds of trout, are roughly 16 miles downstream from Grand Coulee Dam on the Colville Indian Reservation side of the river.

Chief Joseph Fish Farm, run by another operator, has a smaller facility 26 miles downstream from Grand Coulee near Benson Spring.

The quick-growing virtues of triploid trout enable the fish farms to raise the fish to 5-6 pounds in less than a year before trucking them to Seattle for processing. The fillets are sold to supermarkets and restaurants across the country.

A decade ago, a few anglers quickly caught on to the tendency of trout, including some triploid escapees from the pens, to congregate and pig out on the feed that drifts through the nets.

The fishery got a heavy dose of exposure in 1998, when Robert Halverson of Republic caught a grotesquely fat 25.45-pound Washington rainbow record near the pens. Several more record rainbows were caught in that area in subsequent years.

These trout are so fat they require extra care in cooking. One angler told me he nearly burned down his house when he put a 10-pounder on the barbecue and the grease flooding off the meat exploded in flames six feet high.

In recent winters, this being no exception, anglers have spread rumors that swarms of fish escaped the nets, providing a fishing bonanza.

These rumors are only half true.

Yes, there’s a spike in the number of trout. No, the net pens didn’t fail.

“We’d go out of business if we lost big numbers of fish all the time,” said Ed Schallenberger, Columbia River Fish Farms manager.

The fish come from farms after being sold to the Colville Tribe, which releases the fish into the river to enhance the fishery. Anglers launching or fishing from the reservation side of the river are required to have a tribal fishing permit.

“We’ve been stocking the fish every year for years, but everybody still thinks the fish are escaping the pens,” said Joe Peone, tribal fish and wildlife manager.

“We spend $10,000 to $40,000 a year to release 2,000 to 10,000 triploid trout ranging up to 5 or more pounds. We try to mix up the sizes, but if they get around the pens they put on weight fast.”

This year the tribe bought 80,000 fish less than a pound apiece and released most of them into the river in December, Schallenberger said.

These rainbows tend to be short, so when they put on weight, they get round.

The fish farms enhance Rufus Woods’ trout-producing potential. Otherwise the waters tend to lack nutrients because water flushes through the reservoir many times faster than it goes through Lake Roosevelt, Peone said.

“So often we hear the rumors of net pens failing and it’s total bull,” Schallenberger said. “Fishermen have the tribe to thank for this one.”

TV growing pains: “The Angler’s Experience” TV fishing show, produced by Spokane anglers Seth Burrill and Mickey Hough, got off to a rocky debut in the Northwest market on Sunday.

Many readers who found out about the show in last Thursday’s column missed the first episode because of the ever-evolving pro football playoffs, which changed the scheduled 4:30 p.m. show time on Fox 28 to earlier in the day.

Viewers who saw the time change notice we published in the Friday Hunting and Fishing Report might have been a little disappointed in the quality of the first program featuring spring crappie fishing near Spokane.

But nobody was more disappointed than Burrill, the program’s host and angling guru.

Production trouble after the program was sent to the network resulted in poor color and out-of-synch sound, he said.

“That was a joke,” he lamented after the program debuted. “That’s not an indication of what the show is like.”

Displaying the mettle that makes him a good angler, he said, “We’ll keep after them until they get it right.”