Hello ALL Trophy Trout Hunters,
We are all very passionate about the
sport of trophy trout fishing. We all set goals every time we go out. Whether our goal for the trip is to catch a 20+ inch fish, or to catch that fish of a lifetime, we give
it our all when we pursue these magnificent fish. Sometimes, the fishing
gods will generously smile upon us and we are rewarded greatly for our efforts. However,
as time passes, sometimes these memories are forgotten or stowed away into the storage boxes in the back of our minds
The Trophy Trout Hunter of the Year was an award that several of us TTH’ers have been talking about
for the last few months. We thought it’d be a lot of fun to give an award
to an angler that has had exceptional results for trophy trout fishing over the past season. As
we deliberated who should be bestowed the honor of trophy trout hunter of the year, several criteria were considered. These included browns over 10 lbs, lake trout over 20 lbs, personal records broken,
etc.
Here’s a fun recap and summary
list of some of the anglers that were considered for the award for the year 2009:
Bret
Martin – C&R’d his personal best and first 10 lb brown in April
Jordan
Whitton – C&R’d his personal best brown trout at 10.5 lbs in April
Jake
Bunio – The Founder of Trophysticks caught a 10 lb brown and won a fishing tournament in California because of it.
Diane
Hammon – Caught a 31.5 inch, 10.5 lb brown trout in April
Mike
Scott (aka Klamanite) – Guided his brother Kendon into
a gorgeous 10 lb brown in July, C&R’d several browns over 7 lbs, and C&R’d a PR best 21 lb laker out of Crescent Lake
Allan
Cole – The Founder of AC Plugs C&R’d his 31st brown over 10 lbs out of Wickiup Reservoir during the summer.
Brandon Lane
- The son of Ron Lane (current Oregon State Record Holder for German Brown), landed an 11 lb brown out of Wickiup during the summertime.
Joe
Moritz (aka Fish-on-Bend) – C&R’d (3) lake trout over 20 lbs, and landed and released several lake trout in the 15 to 20 lb range.
Chuck
Jones – He added to his tally of several browns over the years of 10+ lbs with yet another one to
add to the list out of Wickiup this past summer.
Rande
Orton – The owner of Fishtail Gallery in Bend, C&R’d a 10 lb brown in the early summer.
However, after reviewing all of these
fantastic accomplishments that these anglers produced over this past year, one particular angler stood-out unanimously from
the rest of the group. Many of you have probably already guessed who it is. Dan Stewart.
Dan had an absolutely
incredible season last year with landing FIVE Brown trout over 10 lbs. With the
german brown being considered the wariest of all the trout species, it’s an accomplishment in itself to land one brown
over 10 lbs. This is a benchmark that has eluded some of the savviest of anglers. For Dan to have broken this mark FIVE TIMES all during ONE YEAR can be summed up with
one word. EPIC!
1st Brown of 10+ lbs for Dan:
Dan caught the first of his FIVE 10+ lb browns at Stampede Reservoir
in California in April. The beautiful hookjaw taped out at 30" long and weighed right at the heralded 10 lb mark.
See the photo below. The fish was released immediately after the photo.
