"The health crisis has proven the importance of public access to nature...."

D & R Greenway 

Barnegat Light Net Fisherman Caught a Great White

Asbury Park Press 

Hunterdon County NJ Trout Fishing

 Nishisakawick Creek near Frenchtown

The article originally found its place in The Federated Sportsmen's News. 

Hunterdon Hills Trout Streams

By Bruce Edward Litton

 

 

          Stocked streams in New Jersey offer a wide array of qualities. They range from urban settings like that of the Rahway River in Essex County, to obscure rural and mountain streams in Warren and Sussex counties like Pohandusing Brook and Jacksonburg Creek, as well as scenic rivers like the Musconetcong and Pequest. The very high quality water of Dunnfield Creek in Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area was stocked at least as late as the 1980’s, but the trend in more recent years is to protect wild and native trout streams against stocked intruders. Many of New Jersey’s highest quality waters no longer receive as much fishing pressure.

         Judging from experience fishing some of these lesser known wild and native trout streams, I can vouch for a series of streams in Hunterdon County differently. Not for water quality sufficient for trout reproduction except for two of them, but for their beauty and productiveness as Trout Maintenance Water. They range south to north from Alexauken Creek near Lambertville, to Hakihokake Creek in the Milford area, all of them flowing into the Delaware River or Delaware and Raritan Canal. Hakihokake Creek is actually a complex system of little tributaries. You can find a map online at Wild Trout Streams.com and run your cursor over it to see how many little cricks fall under this single name Hakihokake. They host wild brown trout. Well to the south of this watershed a single finger is marked on the map near Frenchtown for wild trout: Warford Creek.

          The other streams named in order from south to north—Alexauken, Wickecheoke, Lockatong, Nishisakawick creeks—flow through farmlands and wooded hills. Plenty of this hilly woodland protects them from too much exposure to farm contaminants, sun, and the relatively low quality of slow water. Healthy stream flow and rocky habitat make the trout fishing interesting. Just enough springs exist for small percentages of the trout to holdover. The hilly settings featuring fast rocky riffles and flows, holes, and pools are, in my opinion, especially conducive to use of salmon eggs, the method depending on drifting eggs in a life-like way through currents. The water looks so good you might forget you’re fishing a stream with no wild trout present.

          Decades ago, I was first introduced to Wickecheoke Creek in February to fish for holdovers. We caught none, but on earlier occasions without me, my friend had caught one or two rainbows on worms fished on bottom in holes once and a while in January and February, while fishing the Lockatong, too. We fished a few holes of the Wickecheoke, and I distinctly remember considerable ice formations surrounding them, temperatures in the teens. I wouldn’t remember this escapade as clearly as I do, unless it were fully worthwhile despite no action with fish.

          That same year, 1975, I began fishing the Hunterdon Hills on Opening Day and on occasion otherwise during the spring season. I’ve also fished them during the ‘80’s, ‘90’s and both decades of the new millennium, drawn to their nourishment as if by homing instinct. On my most recent foray with my son in 2014, water was high and off-color, but we still caught a lot of trout on salmon eggs. The water wasn’t all that muddy.

           Public access is pretty good on all of these streams. Hakihokake Creek gets stocked from County Road 519 downstream to Javes Road and Miller Park Road, pull-offs evident along the way. Warford Creek doesn’t get stocked. The Nishisakawick near it does, and there’s pullover access along CR 519 downstream to Creek Road. The Lockatong Creek is situated considerably further south in Kingwood and is stocked from Union Road on downstream to State Highway 29. Wickecheoke Creek flows near Stockton with pull-off access at CR 519 and along Lower Creek Road. Alexauken Creek offers access along Alexauken Creek Road in the Lambertville area.

           All of the streams are close enough together to car hop from one to another. It all depends on how much you want to do, but the charm of driving at length among the hills to explore new waters is worth at least the thought. The prettiest stretch of stream and roadway is from CR 519 to State Highway 29 by way of Federal Twist Road. It doesn’t actually shoulder the Lockatong, but several side roads—Milltown Road, Strimple’s Mill Road, Raven-Rock Rosemont Road—provide access along a fairly steep way down from CR 519 to the Delaware River. Another spot worth mention is the Frenchtown Cliffs on the Nishisakawick, a short drive upstream on Creek Road from town. Why the state quit stocking this spot about a decade ago, I have little idea, but the view of a 60-foot cliff above a nice hole of clear water is marvelous. Wickecheoke Creek features a covered bridge at Sergeantsville, a spot worth a stop, and on down along Lower Creek Road the views are beautiful and the flow is rocky and pretty quick with pockets and holes holding trout.

          Stocking continues into late April for most of these streams, mid-May for the Lockatong judging by the 2018 information available as I write. Late in May, fly fishing with dry patterns becomes productive as the rainbows acclimate to the streams and begin behaving more like wild fish. Summer shuts the trout fishing down. The few surviving holdovers find scarce springs, and then they come out of hiding again in fall. None of these streams receive fall stockings.

         For sheer numbers of fish, April is the month to come here, using the lightest ultra-light you own, the reel spool filled with two-pound test. You’ll probably never need a split shot. At least most of the deep flows don’t have current strong enough to warrant the use, but it’s a good idea to buy size 14 snap swivels and clip off the swivels, placing a baby pin through the line loops, and then pinning this arrangement to your vest. A couple or a few clipped swivels added to a snap is all the weight you’ll need in some situations. In others, nothing but a size 14 baitholder hook and a size 14 snap is necessary. The heaviest weight you cast is a single Mike’s salmon egg. You want it to ride the current as life-like as possible, not necessarily dragging bottom but getting down there and making some contact. The streams are fairly small, and they invite you to walk and wade up or downstream of stocking points. You usually don’t have to cast very far, and any stretch you fish will remind you that stocking makes a real difference for quality fishing.

Salmon Eggs for Trout

Lenny, is it Still the WH?

 Lenny, wondering if it's still called the WH. Hope you don't give away what that stands for. Eric was calling it the WH in 2015. I think one of the higher ups named it. 

New Jersey Trout Fishing

 

Fred Matero with Rainbow from North Branch Raritan (Photo care of Fred Matero.)

I've already written a post on wild trout in New Jersey (you can click the link below), so I will focus mostly on the stocking program but very little at that. I'm keeping this post very short, compared to what might be written. By clicking on such labels on this blog as "trout" and "rivers," you can find numerous articles on trout fishing here. Some of them are pertinent to trout fishing nationwide. 

Prior to the furunculosis disease at the Pequest Hatchery during fall 2013, brown trout and brook trout also got stocked; recently only rainbows got stocked by the state, although private organizations, such as South Branch Outfitters in Califon, Round Valley Trout Association of Lebanon, and the Knee Deep Club of Lake Hopatcong have stocked brown trout and perhaps some tigers and brookies.

The state has also recently been stocking landlocked salmon at Tilcon, Wawayanda, and Aeroflex lakes, as well as Merrill Creek Reservoir. 

Traditionally, the state stocks trout in every New Jersey county. Drawing for a moment on my own experience, I recall catching trout in Ocean County's Metedeconk River, from its small stream headwaters in the pines, while fishing during my teens with my mentor, Joe. As a quick aside, I don't recall if I noted in my article on wild trout that information is available online about native brook trout existing in a remote Pinelands region where cold spring water is released. Many other sources indicate that about 50% of native brook habitat produces this species from Somerset County northward. 

What lies ahead regarding stocking anywhere in the state is a guess, but an educated guess is that the state will return to normal after the COVID pandemic. I have found no information online about fall and winter trout stocking yet to come in New Jersey during 2020, and this past spring was not a normal season. 

From tiny streams to the largest lake in the state--Hopatcong--trout stocking in New Jersey has historically supported a major recreational enterprise paid for at least in part by trout stamps. It has a history as an intricate and excellently executed program involving many dozens of waterways--from streams and ponds where trout don't survive the summer to streams and reservoirs where they reproduce. (Don't forget that lake trout were originally stocked in Round Valley Reservoir; they now reproduce there, the southernmost reproduction of this species besides a lake in Arizona, from what I've heard.) 

Thus far, only 2020 has seen such a major disruption of the state's stocking program. The furunculosis outbreak might not seem to compare, because although the spring stocking schedule of 2014 was shortened to four weeks, none of the feeling of uncertainty ensued like that we felt when trout season was arbitrarily opened in March before Opening Day April 11, 2020. A large number of brown and brook trout infected by the disease had to be destroyed during spring 2014, but there was not quite the disruption of the schedule to stock streams, rivers, ponds, lakes, and reservoirs, as there was during spring 2020 due to COVID-19. (Rainbow trout were not affected by furunculosis, and to avoid any future infection of furunculosis at the hatchery, the state now stocks only rainbows.)

Note 10/1/2020: The good news is that information is online about fall trout stocking in New Jersey 2020. I wish I had checked again sooner.

Rainbow from Round Valley

Nineteen- and some-inch brown trout from Round Valley.

Stocker brown from North Branch Raritan.

Stocker Rainbow from Pequest River

Round Valley Reservoir Brown

Stocker Brook Trout Lockatong Creek

Tiger Trout from South Branch Raritan (Care of Oliver Round)

I'll mention that the brook trout is the state fish under a recent photo of a native. (Care of Oliver Round)

Mike Petrole with Round Valley Lake Trout

Native and Wild Trout of New Jersey

How's the AC Holding Up, Lenny?

What I really remember were those frigid mornings down around 10 degrees, but the heat worked fine. I also remember a member or someone coming in, asking if I had either heat or AC. Imagine that.

I was over at Round Valley today, shooting photos, but I didn't take that route...you work the morning shift anyway. Been a long time. You're not forgotten, obviously. 

Looks like I retire five years from October 23rd. We both know Fred's done counting. Amazing.

It was four years on July 17th since I worked there.  When no members or other entries were coming in, I was trying to figure out what book to write, but for the time being, I was more into essays for literary magazines. (Looks like finally one of these will be published very soon.) I remember--very distinctly--when once I was preparing to go to the kitchen to get lunch, and the trout book crossed my mind. I actually conceived it in 2006. I just never got to work on it until after March 2017. After four a.m. on March 17, 2017, suffering from insomnia, I dragged out all of the articles I still possess that I got published during my teens, and I read one on fishing salmon eggs. That's when I knew I had to write this book. I got started on it within weeks of that night. I did take some long periods of hiatus, busy on other projects, but in the main, it took three years to write.  

Hope all's well and knowing you, it probably is.  

The Trout Book is Off to Readers

The three years writing my book on trout fishing felt grand. I had an alternative to come home to every night after a day spent at my working-class life. (Thanks to my wife, we do better than that, and I mustn't fail to thank the publishers that pay me, either.) The book is off to various readers. One of them has read it completely and says, "It's very interesting. It's like no other book on trout fishing. I wouldn't change a word." 

My son is into chapter 2 and tells me I need a better title and that I shouldn't describe myself as "conservative with regard to the outdoors and intellectual values" because I'm very forward-thinking about the environment. What else is the outdoors? I don't know what I will do about the sentence as yet. I am also very backward-looking with regard to the outdoors...well aware the practices predate civilization.

The book takes especially microlight method, a way of fishing salmon eggs on three-and-a-half-foot spinning rods, but other methods also--there's even mention of fly fishing here and there--as a portal to go through to the big picture. Microlight method is explained in every detail I can produce for a 156-page book, which will be longer if photos are accepted. I loved writing about how to do it, and yet, as I say, there's more to the fishing than the grab of a hook.

The big picture ultimately amounts to a philosophical view, so I go into mine. It's been no less than thrilling to write about. The book comes to a climax--as if it is a single story with a narrative arc--when I discuss what I believe is the central issue of Western Civilization. I didn't frame it. Aristotle framed it almost 2500 years ago. I merely walked into the picture.  

Report on Division's Study of Delaware River

Fish & Wildlife 

DEP Water Quality Funding Includes Efforts to Reduce Harmful Algae

DEP Effort

Some Nice Fish Caught at LH This Week

 Laurie's Report:

Although we are in  the dog days of summer, we still had some noteworthy catches make their way to the scale. Dariusz Wysocki had a Largemouth Bass weighing in at  5 pounds. Several Hybrids were caught while drifting herring thru Great Cove, Nolans Point, with Dave Coppola’s largest weighing 6 lb 7 oz. Xavier Ferreiro, while fishing with his dad, landed his walleye that weighed in at 5 lbs 8 oz.  Remember that  the Knee Deep Club’s  Catfish contest is this weekend, starting at 6 PM on Saturday. We have shiners, fatheads, herring, worms & chicken livers in stock along with some dough bait for catfish.  Please call the shop @ (973) 663 3826 if you need more information. Have a great week ...