nice wild NJ brown trout

[AndyS]

How do you discern wild from stocked ??

[Pondhopper8]

Beautiful brown Luke!

[thmyorke1]

at least in this creek there's a dam separating the rest of the creek from the river system, so no escapees from the clubs i know in the river system.
I can only assume this is a wild born trout still, nothing is stopping someone from just dumping a 20 inch brown trout from a hatchery into their backyard creek lol?
When i catch a large brown from the lower river system however, i normally assume it's from a club. Usually there's good evidence of the fins being roughed up but sometimes club trout look pretty healthy.

[FASTEDDIE29]

Beautiful Brown buddy buddy! Hopefully more come out to play after the rains.

[Sako1]

Fins look perfect and pretty colors on that fish, nice catch!

[Jerzguy2]

Congratulations on a beautiful wild Brown. Sure wish we could see more of these.