Trophy Jordanelle Brown caught during netting by DWR for their research project...

[TubeDude]

[cool][#0000ff]I also lived in Utah during the days of the monster browns from Flaming Gorge...and met Ray Johnson a time or two. He was an "interesting" individual. He camped in caves around the lake in the middle of winter, and fished at night...trolling big Rapalas next to rock walls with six pound line and long rods. He developed his own line of lures and promoted them heavily, but he still caught most of his fish on Rapalas.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]The browns got big and fat eating chubs. The Gorge was overrun with them at that time. When you pulled into a marina the water was brown with them. The big browns fed at night, one or two times a week. They would glut on chubs and then they wouldn't hit anything for a couple of days. You had to be in the right place at the right time....kinda like fishing for walleyes. It was really rare for anyone to hook a truly big brown during bright daylight hours.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]The mack population exploded and they kinda mopped up the chubs. As it is everywhere, when you remove a primary forage base (chubs), the predators have to adapt. The macks switched to kokes, the browns just ate what they could find, and no longer grew so big. There are still browns in the lake but they do not have the overwhelming supply of chubs to fatten up on.[/#0000ff]
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