I’d say that’s the same fish. I hope it didn’t fall for the same fly at least. It’s pretty lucky it keeps getting caught by someone not looking to eat it.
No entirely different fly and I was ready to give up when he hit. I hope no one catches him ever again. I won’t fish this hole again this year.
I dare say he’s not a trout but rather a sucker…
The state F&W regional fisheries bio gave a presentation at the local FFI club I belong to; Alpine Fly Fishers meeting a couple of days ago about results of recent research on the Coastal Cutthroat/Sea Run Cutthroat population in the Puget Sound. They are tagging fish with Floy (colored) and more recently PIT (transponder) tags to assess the timing, location, and abundance of spawning CC. They are finding individual fish are frequenting and being caught multiple times at the same saltwater beach locations. He mentioned that they are now also using facial recognition software to match the spots on the heads of fish to identify multiple pictures of individual fish.
This photo recognition works with Steelhead (Rainbow) and Coastal Cutthroat. I don’t know if it works with Brown Trout but on a whim, I decided to waste some time and merged your photos to take a look.
The lighting, color, and perspective are different, and the size and XY placement are slightly off (I’m a hack). They look virtually identical and are probably the same fish. It looks like there might possibly be one small area that didn’t look like a match at the top of the red circles between 12 and 1 o’clock.
Whaddyall think?
That is fantastic, thanks for the effort.
That’s pretty great, thanks for sharing Brian.
While on the one hand, I see your observation about the area in the circles; I also think the other factors that you mention influence that as well.
Nice work!