Fishing Quintessential Adirondack Brook Trout Ponds: A Baker’s Dozen (It’s not what you think)

Picture two relatively remote Adirondack ponds located within a wild forest designated track of land. Both require about a two mile carry. One was recently reclaimed by the DEC after the anthropogenic introduction of non-native fish through stocking and use of bait fish depleted the naturally reproducing brook trout populations. After extinguishing all fish from the pond, the DEC successfully reintroduced native brook trout and established special fishing regulations, including prohibiting the use of bait fish. For the past couple of years, this has resulted in memorable fishing trips: We’ve packed all our gear in and out, including our boat, and caught numerous trout—enough to eat a couple at camp and bring a couple home, as well as plenty to release back into the pond.

That seemed to have changed over the last couple of visits. The first day of the trip, I was skunked on the larger pond, so the second day I bushwhacked over to the smaller pond for the first time to try my luck. As I shouldered my canoe out of the spruce swamp thicket and neared the shore, my excitement about exploring a new fishing hole was high, but immediately deflated when I caught glimpse of a stashed row boat near shore. I persisted, but after three hours the only thing I caught was sight of two more stashed boats. I ended back on the larger pond that afternoon, and counted ten more boats stashed on it, bringing the total to a baker’s dozen. I know there may be a lot of different reasons why I didn’t catch any fish however; The DEC might want to cull the stashed boats from these two Adirondack wild forest special waters brook trout ponds, as a threat of depleting the brook trout from overfishing is blatantly evident. Sadly, I won’t be returning to fish either of these ponds.