STATE RECORD
BROWN TROUT LANDED BY FLY ANGLER
John D. Ball Jr. landed a new state record 9-pound, 12.8-ounce brown trout Jan. 13 from the lower Mountain Fork River.
“I was fishing in Zone II when they (Army Corps of Engineers) had just stopped releasing water (through the hydro-electric turbines below Broken Bow Lake dam),” said Ball.
“Before the water started going down, I cast out to a deep hole and let my fly sink down for several seconds. At first, I thought I had waited too long and got hung on the bottom, but then my line started moving fast. After the first couple of minutes, I knew I was going to have trouble landing the big fish without breaking my line, so I alerted some hikers nearby to go get help from my fishing partner, Pete Stiles, who was fishing upstream from me about a quarter-mile.
“I guess Pete didn’t exactly know what my problem was and didn’t show up in time to help, but I finally managed to get the fish to the gravel beach after playing him for 30 or 40 minutes,” said Ball. “I can’t really tell you how I got him in without breaking my line. It got tangled up in some tree roots once and I was sure it was going to break my line, but thankfully it got free.”
Ball’s fish topped the previous record of 9 pound, 10.5 ounces set by Jim Horton in 2001. Horton’s fish was also caught in the month of January from the lower Mountain Fork.
Ball’s fish was caught on an olive-colored #10 size “wooly bugger” using a #7-8 sinking flyline with a 6X (4 lb. test strength) tippet. Ball’s fly rod was a G.Loomis model FR1088.
Ball, who is from Bruce, Mississippi, said he didn’t know he had a record until nearly two days after catching the fish.
“I couldn’t revive the fish to release it, so I took it to Womack’s taxidermy in Broken Bow to get it mounted. On the way there we asked someone what the record was from the trout area, and someone said it was 14 pounds. So we didn’t pursue it,” Ball said. “It wasn’t until a local trout fisherman noticed the size of the fish at the taxidermist and then tracked us down the next day on the trout stream, that we realized the record for brown trout was just 9 pounds, 10 ounces and that my fish might be bigger.”
Ball contacted Paul Balkenbush, southeast fisheries supervisor for the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation, who verified the weight on certified scales at K&E Texaco station in Hochatown.
“What an incredible fish, and the fact that he caught it on a fly rod makes it even more special,” said Balkenbush. “In speaking with Mr. Ball, it sounds like he’s caught quite a number of nice-sized trout over the past three years of fishing the lower Mountain Fork, so it’s no fluke that he landed this trophy. Our hats are off to him for landing it without breaking his line.”
Ball said that he and his wife make the seven-hour drive from their Mississippi home to fish the lower Mountain Fork at least twice a year. A lifelong fly fisherman, Ball grew up in Colorado where he began fly-fishing at age nine.
Brown trout, a species native to Europe, have been stocked intensively in streams throughout North America. The first brown trout stocking in Oklahoma occurred in 1991 when 575 were released into the lower Mountain Fork River. Since that time, both the lower Mountain Fork and the lower Illinois rivers have received periodic stockings of brown trout.
According to Balkenbush, anglers wanting to catch a brown trout will have an even better chance in the coming months.
“From time to time, our state fish hatcheries receive brown trout fingerlings from the federal fish hatchery system. This year we have approximately 10,000 that will be released into the lower Mountain Fork once they grow to a catchable size, so it’s never been a better time to try your luck at catching one,” said Balkenbush.
Balkenbush said another project will assist the department’s effort to provide rainbow trout to the Mountain Fork.
“We’re in the process of building a trout-rearing pen located on the Lower Mountain Fork trout area to grow small fingerling rainbow trout into a catchable size. This is going to further assist our efforts to provide more trout to the area.”
For complete information about the state’s eight designated trout areas along with special trout regulations, consult the “2003 Oklahoma Fishing Guide” available from license vendors or log onto: www.wildlifedepartment.com.
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