I caught this lake trout in NH this weekend and it had red tipped fins. I’ve caught a handful of lakers from this lake and across the northeast, but I’ve never seen bright red fins (I have seen faint orange and yellow tips). Is it from its diet or something else? Could be nothing, I’m just curious because it looked strange to me.
Posted by finng13
6 Comments
Splake?
I’ve seen this in some parts in Canada where they have a high crustacean diet, not sure if that’s the case here
Can’t say I know much about lakers, but it might be spawning season colors
It’s a well-documented part of the color variation for lakers. You’ll here people talking about “redfins” in Canada, but as far as I know it’s not linked to any specific habitat or diet. Seems to be more prevalent in the northern populations. Example from the Yukon: [https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/256340535](https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/256340535)
The white bands on the fins as well as the orange lead me to thinking it may be a splake, you should be able to check if that body of water gets stocked with them online somewhere.
At first glance I was like “well that’s because you caught an absolute giant of a brook trout” 🤣 nice fish either way. Tight lines! 🎣🤘