# Smartest Trout (including the Char Brookie)



## HighNDry (Dec 26, 2007)

Which trout species seems to be the smartest?
Brown
Rainbow
Cutthroat
Brook

I know browns seem to be the hardest to fool most days, but in our overpopulated waters with hungry stunted browns, I'm not so sure.

Rainbows of the planted hatchery variety seem easy. I've had the same fish come after a fly several times like it wants to be hooked. Then you have the heavily pressured variety on places like the Henry's Fork which seem smarter.

Cutthroat are pretty susceptible. The ones fished over a lot seem to smarten up. Wild stream bred cutts seem to be pretty skittish.

Brook are easy at times especially in the fall. Skittish in creeks.

What is your experience with these trout?

Do all trout get smarter with age and size?


----------



## one4fishing (Jul 2, 2015)

Cutthroat for sure. Natives in small streams are tough to fool.


----------



## one4fishing (Jul 2, 2015)

I had to belly crawl to get this Yellowstone to bite.


----------



## Vanilla (Dec 11, 2009)

The smartest trout seems to be the one I’m trying to catch at that moment, since I can’t catch anything! ;-)


----------



## Catherder (Aug 2, 2008)

If the definition of smart is hardest to fool on an offering, then there are some objective studies that have looked at the question. 

There have been studies in AFL/heavy C&R waters that sustain significant fishing pressure and have both bows or cutts and browns in the population. They have compared catch statistics from the anglers to the population ratio as determined by electroshocking. What they found was that the rainbows would be caught 3-4 times for every time a brown is caught. So, I would say the answer is browns. That seems to correlate with what I see in my fishing places like the LoPro. 

I've always thought cutts were kind of easy. Even I can catch them on dries occasionally. 

Brookies also seem really easy, but with a caveat. If a stream or lake is stunted, then they seem to bite almost anything and are pretty easy. If the brookies are well fed, then they can be a genuine challenge.


----------



## TPrawitt91 (Sep 1, 2015)

Yeah the small streams with natives seem to be hardest to fool into eating a fly. Makes me excited for spring!


----------



## PBH (Nov 7, 2007)

hmmm....

Seems to me you all have been fooled by the greatest mastermind in anthropomorphism of all time.

Next question is going to be which one feels the most "pain" when hooked.

smart = intelligence. I will not concede that fish are intelligent. Their brains are far too simple to be able to acquire and apply knowledge. Their actions are basic responses to stimuli. That cannot be attributed to intelligence, or "smarts".



Catherder said:


> ... the definition of smart is hardest to fool on an offering...
> 
> ...I've always thought cutts were kind of easy. Even I can catch them on dries occasionally.


The comments above should not be credited to the intelligence (or, rather the lack of intelligence) of the fish being caught. If the angler is throwing something that imitates what the fish is actively feeding on -- how can you say the fish is "smart" or "not smart" by taking that bait?

The same could be said for any of the other examples.

Wouldn't a better test be to see if you can trick a fish into taking a bait that it _doesn't want to take_?

Walt Disney has fooled you all.


----------



## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

PBH said:


> Walt Disney has fooled you all.


WAIT! WHAT ARE YOU SAYING???!??!?!?!?!?!?

-DallanC


----------



## BPturkeys (Sep 13, 2007)

Fish are certainly capable of learning, this you can not deny. Learned responses are common of all fauna on earth. You see this in fish for example when they come to the surface and start a feeding frenzy at the very sight(before food is introduced) of the feeder in fish hatcheries. I know many reactions like taking cover when a shadow covers the water or there is noise may be instinct based, but there is no doubt in my mind that fish learn...may I even say smarten up, after certain encounters with man and other predators. No doubt that the rainbows in the middle Provo are "smarter" than rainbows in some isolated stream in a remote area. Certain waters have "smarter" fish than other waters due to their exposure to predators(including man), regardless of the species.


----------



## PBH (Nov 7, 2007)

BP -- you are giving them cognitive thinking characteristics - that's where Walt Disney got you. 
I think those fish simply react to stimuli.

Those fish are not hitting the surface and starting a feeding frenzy because "hey, last time that guy walked by with a bucket he was tossing food!", but rather because of a reaction to stimuli -- the vibrations of someone walking the raceway triggering that computer program in their head to go into feed mode.


Walt Disney gave fish eyelids and makes them blink. God gave fish a lateralis system.


----------



## Catherder (Aug 2, 2008)

PBH said:


> Wouldn't a better test be to see if you can trick a fish into taking a bait that it _*doesn't want to take*_?


Doesn't the term "want" connote a higher reasoning level than what you are seemingly attributing to fish? Sounds like you were a Bambi fan as well. :shock:

Anyway, it remains my opinion that it is more difficult to generate an instinctive neural pathway response in a brown for it to open its anterior opening and envelop a fly than it is for a rainbow or cutt. 8)

TOTP


----------



## bowgy (Oct 10, 2007)

The smartest fish?

The incredible Mr Limpet.


----------



## Critter (Mar 20, 2010)

You can tell he is smart by the way that he wears his glasses


----------



## GaryFish (Sep 7, 2007)

My thought is that what we might interpret as "smart" is a function of what I would call "conditioning based on environmental conditions." When we say smart, we would probably be more accurate to say selective. Which would lean to my assertion that the selectivity in taking a fly or lure or bait is more a function of what food resources are available in a given water, and are more specific to conditions than species. 

For example, small mountain free-flowing streams have little food base for fish, and they survive by being opportunistic. So any size 14 dry fly that looks the least bit buggy can catch fish on a hot August day - and species doesn't matter. Since cutties and rainbows like the cooler water more than browns, then we might suggest that browns are smarter. But really, it isn't smarts - it is a function of available food base. 

One stream here in Idaho I love to fish each year is Birch Creek, as it comes out of the Lost River Range. It is small, quick flowing pocket water, with very little natural food base in the stream. So the fish really hit hoppers that drop on the water, and therefore are easy to catch. They happen to be mostly cuts and rainbows. Then I can go to another backyard river and fish the Railroad Ranch on the Henry's Fork, and the river moves slow, has miles of perfect gravel bottom with food that the fish can eat slowly and all day. So they can sit all day eating bugs as they come off the bottom, and don't have to eat the 2-3 bugs that happen to land on the water because the fish literally will sit on the bottom as tens of thousands of bugs float by. So these Henry's Fork rainbows we like to think of as "smart" because they are more difficult to entice with a fly. But it has nothing to do with smart - it has everything to do with them not being that hungry.

On rivers like the South Fork, where there are cuts, rainbows, hybrids, and browns, sure they may be in the same river, but they are in different parts because of water temperature. Very few browns below Palisade, but when you get past Heise, then browns are far more frequent. But on top of that, the river also slows down, nutrient loading changes, and food base in the river changes from very little food base below the dam because the dam settles out so much and the bottom draw puts pretty cold water in the river, so the fish in that section are more cuts and rainbows, but also more aggressive. Where downstream with more nutrient loading, the bugs become thicker, and the trout can be much less aggressive. 

As for brookies - most brookie waters I've fished are fast flowing, with little nutrient loading. Which is why they get stunted so easily. And in those streams, the fish have less food and thus become more opportunistic, which makes them easier to catch. But I'm not convinced it is because of their smarts - but more because they are hungry and will hit anything that remotely resembles food.

So after all that, I think it has much more to do with the individual stream characteristics and available food base than it does the species.


----------



## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

golden trout


----------



## bowgy (Oct 10, 2007)

Koi,

They know the when I am just feeding them by hand or trying to catch one in the back yard pond.


----------



## MuscleWhitefish (Jan 13, 2015)

HighNDry said:


> Which trout species seems to be the smartest?
> Brown
> Rainbow
> Cutthroat
> ...


It depends on the time of year and the body of water.

In the fall, you can catch browns in most rivers on streamers.

In the spring, you can swing flies in most rivers for rainbows.

In the summer, you can get brookies and cuts on dries and wets in most rivers.

If you are fishing a body of water with light to no pressure, then you will have no problem fooling a trout.

If you are fishing a body of water with heavy pressure, then you will have problems fooling trout.

It all depends.


----------



## johnnycake (Jul 19, 2011)

All's I know it's that you should never trust any trout. 


They're all pretty fishy


----------



## Critter (Mar 20, 2010)

Something smells here

:fish2:>>O


----------



## StillAboveGround (Aug 20, 2011)

Little brains can learn...


----------

