Identifying Wild and Stocked Fish

chemdoc · Senior Member

Identifying Wild and Stocked Fish

lightfoot · Senior Member

To the best of my knowledge it is the adipose fin that gets clipped in hatchery fish.

TangleFree · Member

I overheard several people (one is a guide for the McCloud/USac area) talking about how the adipose fin was not being clipped anymore; now whether that relates to a specific hatchery and/or area, I do not know. Has anyone else heard anything different? I have landed wild and also stocked fish in Bear Creek and the a. fin had not been clipped on the stocker.

bono · Master Fly Fishing Guide

To my knowlege only some hatchery fish get they're adipose clipped but alot including the one's I've seen in Putah have not.Now on the other hand adipose clipping for steelhead is a sure way to tell hatchery from wild.As far a planted fish in Putah its the rounded brushed off fins and especially the lack of or almost lack of I should say of the pectoral fins(the ones 2 ea near the gill plates ) these fins get rubbed off in the concrete holding tanks.

NickVA · Newbie

Hatchery trout do not have their adapose fin clipped. There are just far too many for them to do so. All steelhead hatchery fish will have their A fins clipped and a percentage of king salmon will too. There is no real way of telling hatchery trout from wild trout. The only rubbing off of other fins would be apparent in newly placed fish, which are in the 7"-10" size range. If you keep your fish and the meat is white, instead of salmon pink, its hatchery. If you're catch and release does it really matter?