Thanksgiving Trout Fishing

   I spent 3 days of my Thanksgiving break chasing trout in Southwest Virginia with my two little brothers, and my dad. We fished a couple 12" minimum sections, a 16" minimum section, a few normal stocked sections, and a "Catch And Release Only, Trophy Trout" section of a creek. I'm not going to broadcast the locations, but if you can figure them out yourself from photos or context clues, have fun with the trout!

   The main baits used were Berkley Power Eggs drifted on bottom with a couple small split shot (I caught most of my fish doing this), spawn bags tied by yours truly, various 2" minnow colored plastics on 1/32oz jigheads, and the old standby, the trout magnet.

   I landed roughly 60-70 trout in the 3 day period. 75% of these fish were wild rainbows in the 6-13" range, I also landed a few stocked rainbows, a few wild browns, one stocked brown, and a huge holdover rainbow in the C&R stream.

The weather went from pouring snow and 35 degrees on the first day, to 29 degrees and clear skies all day for day two (frozen guides ALL DAY), and a beautiful day in the mid 50s to wrap it up on day 3.

                             ^Clue

Remember guys, they don't even work...not worth your time, just give them to me.

A 14" wild brown I caught on day 1

Another Brown

 This was my biggest wild rainbow of the trip, 13"

 11" Wild Brown

 Little Wild Brown

 Stocked Brown

 Another Wild Rainbow

 A 14" stocked rainbow that fell for one of the spawn bags I tied.

 The biggest fish of the trip, a 20.5" rainbow I landed that was absolutely gorgeous!

I need everyone to pray for this fish's jaw! Not a good example of proper handling of a trout. My brother caught and released this 18"er