Big Striper CANDLEWOOD

Just saw the post from valley angler. fish was also released. apparently a video was taken and will be posted later today. for now here is the picture. so crazy i would have thought my eyes were playing a trick on me.

haha I don't think so

really? that's crazy

It's not Aprils fools day....

Will see if it's true or not. Bank looks like cwood. The rods in the boat aren't going for stripers in the housy and why wouldn't it be possible for someone to release one in the big lake.

Not impossible. someone could easily transport one into the lake. even a schoolie and it could grow....

If its true the guy is a moron for releasing. I fish they a lot and will release everyone one I catch after cutting its gills to #*&!

there's no reason that it couldn't survive it there.
many landlocked lakes out west have been stocked with them

Hah! Imagine reeling that in thinking you had the new state record largemouth?!

Totally doctored or that guy is the strongest 70 year old I have ever seen holding a 30lb+ fish.

I fish with quite a few guys over 70 years old, and none of them have any problem within 30 pound fish....

hes not even straining to lift it... Photoshop?

Where is Den.. hes the photoshop pro...

lol this has got to be fake, I've been dreaming of them being able to put some hybrids in there without messing up the fishery though for years.

fingers do look a little hinky, but its totally possible

Larger shot.

If Photoshopped they did a good job , right down to the fish slime on his pants .

I emailed David from the Valley Angler. He said he's waiting on a video that is supposed to be coming.

I say shenanigans

#oneless

I'm not sure if I recognize that shoreline or not.

The foliage should be a giveaway if the timing of the photo is right. Kind of hard to tell there, as well.

That's good size striper I'd guess at around 40" and would have no problem eating 1.5 lb bass. How on earth as a real bass angler would you let the fish go knowing it will feed on the fish you really are there for. Should killed it or released it in zoar or some other toilet. Not our best lake in the state.

people saying it looks fake with the hold is just weird.. he is using two hands with arms close to the body not extended... totally normal for someone to hold a fish that size that way. the video will show its not photoshop. the question is where. i believe it is totally possible for someone to put one in the lake and have it grow really big.

Where is CWOOD? He knows all the docks on that lake////

theres LOTS of lakes in Arkansas (er wherever) that hold HUGE striped bass, along with largemouths.... could easily be any of them

but why say its not possible to be candlewood without getting more info.. CT has stripers. all it would take is some dude dropping a schoolie into the lake. is that sooo crazy to think thats possible? and funny buck call is worried about one striper in the lake when the tournament guys will fish beds and drop them off at a launch 6 miles away. that will do more damage than one big striper ever could.

heres a better question, does anyone actually recognize this guy?

true dat...


This thread has legs!

Plenty to eat in Candlewood for a striper that size with all of the herring, trout, bluegills, etc. They have been caught that size in Lake Housatonic due to guys catching them below the dam and dumping up in the lake. Plenty of deep water to hold over in the winter similar to what they do in the lower Housatonic and Hudson rivers.
That said, from the picture it looks like the foliage on the brush in the background is too far along to be a Candlewood shoreline. The two rivers may be that far along in the lower sections.
Virtually all of the big reservoirs in Virginia, N.C., and S.C. have both land-locked regular stripers that size and the swipers (white bass - striper hybrids). The spring has sprung down there so an earlier picture from even March would show the same background.
I would also think a striper that size would have shown itself on the surface at some point chasing herring or trout around, anyone hear any rumors like that on Candlewood?

Pretty sure he was at the swap meet. Bought some beer steins and cast nets....

tough to say the amount of huge carp that breach in that lake you probably would just assume it was a carp. striper would be your last thought. doesnt make it impossible. cant wait to see the video and get more detail.

Jon Pski's brother from another mother?

You have no proof it is not the same mother.....

totally feasible,and im ust about 100 percent sure I fished that spot last weekend,looks like the left point just out of lattins cove before you enter Danbury bay to the left.

Here's the video:
link

Quality is like a sasquatch sighting video.

Foliage is way to far along. I will also check the shoreline Mark but doesn't look like that area at all coming out of latins, I was there yesterday as well. I am calling BS, but I guess you never know. We have caught Pike and Walleye but never a striper.

One might not be a threat but if they start to get established and reproduce, i think it will have an adverse effect on the fishing. Landlocked stripers are usually found in huge impoundments with with extremely large populations of shad/herring to munch on. Cwood would definitely change for the worse imo.

I don't think it is,there were leaves and buds popping there last wknd.i believe it to be true,the shore looks like cwood.why not?they have been caught in the housy just as big.

Works for me. Verified indeed.

The Valley Angler has a video up on their Facebook Page....

yeah, another species in candlewood that I cant catch.. yeah me.....

that video is pretty solid. fishing a tourament and hook that thing. i think its legit. and if there is only one you would have to worry about breeding.

The only place that could be on the Video in the Danbury arm is at the edge of the sand bar looking down to the causeway. I am not buying it but you never know. Let's get the IT guys to clear up that video.

They are saying the right things though. Also never met an older tourney guy that takes a video but again never know.

The background looks about right to me as far as the foliage goes. No trees in bud yet, and the only thing green appears to be Hemlocks and yews.

But stripers do not do well in livewells, and my guess is that it would have to have been transported as a schoolie. Probably sub-20 inches. Which would mean it's been in there a good long while.

Lots of big fish are seen surfacing in C'wood. A lone fish of that size taking a herring off the top? Would most likely be written off as a carp.

I don't see anything about that image that looks shopped. His hands are right -- left one with a death grip on the jaw, right one with the fingers into the V of the gill plates, and it looks like his thumb has just lost its grip on the lower lip.

As far as buckcall's concern that a striper or two would in some way damage the bass population n C'wood, it's both narrow minded and baseless. Yeah, it's big enough to eat a bass. But its lot in life is to eat herring. That's what they do, whenever possible. They tend to feed in open water, so it might take a trout or two as well. But any bass it ate in its lifetime would be negligible.

Good point on the carp, they make a lot of noise on the surface in the spring while spawning.
I don't think stripers could spawn in Candlewood, they usually require a river system so the eggs can remain buoyant and not touch anything like the freshwater sections of a tidal river. The freshwater tidal sections of the Hudson River is the best example of a spawning area in our area.

i think c.wood man is transporting schoolies

hmm, I do recall flushing a pet 20lb'r recently

Explains the skinny smallmouths....

That would be a hoot on a jigging stick.

Good call Rich,just read about studies in freshwater impoundments that were stocked with striped bass.Threadfin shad,alewives,herring diet.

You sold a cast net? Wait, you sold a beer stein? Holy crap call Ripleys!

I did! I sold both.

I have since sold every damn one of those cast nets!

Pretty cool. I caught a 40'inch pike out of a smaller northwest pond last year. Anything is possible

i put the photo into one of my wifes photo programs, but the photo was off of facebook and the guys right hand looked jacked up. the pic on here was way better, and richz nailed it how he is holding it. i thought the dorsal didnt look right and the shadow, but who knows, i think out west down south. i dont reconize the guy either. think we would have heard more on other boards or sources on this? maybe a ny or nj tourney? who knows.

It was caught on a sad sad jr....

Dat bess bate!

I fished Candlewood once or twice. Thats Candlewood. Due south of the island at the bottom of Danbury arm facing west.

Gonna have to filet a striper. Hope I can keep my bunker alive

Good call? I would kill it in a heartbeat! Even if they don't eat bass they eat trout and the bait the bass feed on. A 40 inch striper eats a ton of bait. And Candlewood is tiny in comparison to,the big lakes that have land lock stripers.

Better call Cwood,like i said on FB,never would have released it would have filleted it!

Really is too bad he didn't keep it so we could have known for sure. I mean even if you weren't going to eat it wouldn't you think DEEP would want to see the fish?

Unless he's using one of Meds video cameras, I've seen clearer Bigfoot, UFO and CT Mt Lion videos....




CT MT STRIPER

Who shot the video, Fred Freaking Flintstone??

Should do like in the movie JAWS and put out a bounty for the "rogue striper"?

Surely it's possible with bucket biologists at work. A 20+lb fish was caught during a bass tourney at Lake Hous a number of years back. There were idiots that threw schoolies up over the dam and they have plenty of forage up top.

The trout would be in trouble if there were a bunch in there. They love trout...down south they use them for striper bait.

i believe the state is responsible for this fish being in cwood. the current MO seems to be stocking fish that cannot perpetuate into habits they can, but arent well equipt to survive, and will die out over time due to the fore mentioned inability to perpetuate.

this is just the first. wait til Wags hits the mill river!

i took it into photoshop and did my csi thing, that photo is 100% real, not a single pixel is out of place or has been altered since the image was taken.

I'm surprised you cwood guys can't pinpoint the shoreline with that blue shed...

From what I've been able to ascertain from biologists and from rather extensive reading on the subject, the eggs need to stay free floating, in fresh water for at least 72 hours following the spawn. That requires a degree of turbulence and a pretty good current flow. Candlewood would not be a likely place for it to be successful.

I was wondering if the fish in question could have been introduced through the water being pumped up from the housy as a fry or juvenile as it's been assumed that's how the Northerns in C-wood have gotten there. Personally, I think it's legit, after all we do have mt. lions all over the place.

I was wondering if the fish in question could have been introduced through the water being pumped up from the housy as a fry or juvenile as it's been assumed that's how the Northerns in C-wood have gotten there. Personally, I think it's legit, after all we do have mt. lions all over the place.

There are no fry or juvies in that part of the housy....

Just out of curiosity how many of you would like it if the DEEP started a hybrid stocking program in one of the bigger freshwater lakes here in ct, obviously one with some current or moving water which would take cwood off that list. Personally I think it would be pretty cool and a stocking effort that not only would be fun but would also work and be very effective in the right body of water.

they are about to axe salmon and big browns... what makes you think they would add any type of fish. this state is doomed as far as introducing new species. I still think musky could be amazing in lilly! but that will never happen.

I'm not saying that it will ever happen, I just think it would be far more effective than much of the trout salmon and walleye programs they've already set up. I totally agree with you on the musky, I'm not really a toothy critter fisherman but musky would be pretty rad, I'd like hybrids more though. one can dream lol

Completely stupid here. We are too close to their natural habitat. And our freshwater lakes are chock full of other AweSOme species already. This makes more sense to do in GA, TN, OK, wherever you have a truly landlocked system far away from salt....

What are you referring to with moving water??? Hybrid white bass/stripers do not reproduce....

Why do you keep saying hybrids?

I really don't know too much about the hybrid white bass/stripers I guess since they don't reproduce current wouldn't be an issue. I was just wondering if anyone else would have interest in having them in any of our lakes. personally I think it could be fun, just my opinion and will never happen so you've got nothing to worry about.

Landlocked striped bass[edit]
Striped bass are an anadromous fish, so their spawning ritual of traveling up rivers to spawn led some of them to become landlocked during lake dam constructions. The first area where they became landlocked was documented to be in the Santee-Cooper River during the construction of the two dams that impounded Lakes Moultrie and Marion, and because of this, the state game fish of South Carolina is the striped bass.[20]

Recently, biologists came to believe that striped bass stayed in rivers for long periods of time, with some not returning to sea unless temperature changes forced migration. Once fishermen and biologists caught on to rising striped bass populations, many state natural resources departments started stocking striped bass in local lakes. Striped bass still continue the natural spawn run in freshwater lakes, traveling up river and blocked at the next dam, which is why they are landlocked. Landlocked stripers have a hard time reproducing naturally, and one of the few and most successful rivers they have been documented reproducing successfully is the Coosa River in Alabama and Georgia.[21]

A 70.6-lb (32.0-kg) landlocked bass was caught in February 2013 by James Bramlett on the Warrior River in Alabama, a current world record.[22] This fish had a length of 44 inches (112 cm) and a girth of 37.75 inches (96 cm).

One of the only landlocked striped bass populations in Canada is located in the Grand Lake, Nova Scotia. They migrate out in early April into the Shubencadie River to spawn. These bass also spawn in the Stewiacke River (a tributary of the Shubencadie). The Shubencadie River system is one of five known spawning areas in Canada for striped bass, with the others being the St. Lawerence River, Miramichi River, Saint John River, Annapolis River and Shubencadie/Stewiacke Rivers.[23]

The hybrids are the offspring of a striped bass and a white bass.

Landlocked striped bass are not hybrids, they just are landlocked. They do have significant trouble reproducing as described above. Therefore the stocking programs can be easily controlled. And the damage to a local ecosystem could be minimal if managed properly. The people calling foul over this one fish are cray cray. Yes, if you dropped 1000 of these in Candy maybe, but jeeze the cormorants are the ones you should be worried about....

I do know the difference between the two and that this is a regular striper lol. I've just seen the lakes down south that have the hybrids (although I haven't done much research on them) and think it'd be cool to have a lake or two with them in ct, hell if they could manage regular stripers in a lake that'd be cool too. won't ever happen though. totally agree that this one striper in cwood will not have much of an impact at all.

Exactly...one 30lb striped bass eats what? the same as 5 or 6 6lb LMB? probably close to the same dietary requirement...how much impact would that have on C-wood? none...anyone who could have done this would not have done it on a scale comparable to a state stocking (hundreds or thousands of fish) so there are probably no more than a few trips worth of fish moved if they're transporting schoolies...hardly any impact what-so-ever.

As far as Muskie's in Lilli - I think it's just a matter of time before the Tiger muskies up in MA find their way down the same way the pike did.

OK, I have seen a lot of people confuse the two. I just wanted us to have our seasons straight....

*Species, not seasons...

I have caught plenty of landlocked Wipers and Stripers over the years in Arkansas, Tennessee, Mississippi and even Florida (sunshine bass). They can provide an amazing fishery. The Stripers can reproduce in most of the water I have fished, such as the TN and AR Rivers. These rivers have dams that mak lakes, so there is always moving water for successful spawning.

So, someone either caught or bought from a hatchery Stripers or a Striper and put it in Candlewood. I'll bet after all this publicity peeps are going to try to put stripers in all kinds of lakes....

What is this world coming to.... When KT is the voice of reason it's a little scary!

This is a fun thread,so here are a few questions. Say it was stocked as a 18-24" schoolie, how long does it take to reach 30 plus pounds?
That will be the start of the timeline. Then its real healthy and fat,that thing ate a fck load of alewives etc. Lastly,whoever put it in will eventually be found out and its believe its someone we know.They're not going to keep it secret,whats the fun in that

Let's get one thing straight people. KT is not the voice of reason: today or ever. Like Larry said , fun thread .

Other than your use of that awful "cray cray" thing, you're spot on. Cormorants eat more bass and trout than a couple hundred stripers would.

Rue Roe, that looks like the one I released a couple of years ago, only then it was about 24 lbs. I was startled that it was in Candlewood but didn't have the heart to kill it.

reading the comments on the VA fb page…

people are f@cking @ssholes and idiots kyle quinn gets another strike, strike 1 was the fb page, strike 2 on the water reports, strike 3 your stupid fb comments. you're out kid….


I'm glad he let it go, let it get people all riled up for no reason. big #*&! deal. probably not the first striped bass in cwood, and probably won't be the last. they would never be able to establish any kind of population, so big deal. that angler got the a fun surprise.

for once i agree with KT. one striped bass in cwood and all the internet superhero's go nuts, meanwhile in the time it took you to read this long winded stupid comment, some cormorant just ate 10 herring and 5 trout

Now we're talking!!!!

Quine's FINS!

P.S. Whoever is "stocking" cwood with striped bass, please stock Lake Lillinonah….

imagine the spring run of spawning striped bass up the housy and shepaug??? now that would be amaze balls!

Well it is legit. Fished a tourney and 2 of the guys saw it. I would 100 percent kill it. There may be a few more that some idiots put in there and they are feeding machines, on bait which bass and trout eat. There is enough competition for bait in there. Everyone agreed at the tourney too, should of filleted the byatch.

I would have filleted the damn thing too, but not for any moral or ethical reasons. I call it dinner!!! #killtaken

speaking of which, time to go cut some throats...

I really do think it's cool but it doesn't belong in the lake. I am glad my buddy took out the 39 inch pike he caught on my boat It was the biggest fish he ever caught so it's on his wall but I was glad it isn't in the lake. Hey Rich how are the smallies doing that you helped introduce into the lake, and thanks! But if people.start dumping stripers in here and the off chance they do reproduce I will have a bounty on there head!

Time to head up to the lake with some fresh bunker chunks, to get rid of this monster before the ladies and children arrive for the summer.

Thinking A fish big enough to eat a 2 lb bass shouldn't be in the lake is narrow minded? Ya OK. Lets talk more about the azz hole that put it in there illegally!! I fish the quite a bit and have lots friends that do also it several rimes a month. We all will be killing any striper we catch in there. Tell me how its beneficial to have them in there? Its not! Making my opinion baseful.

be on the look out for bowfin too. just sayin

Who said it was beneficial?

dont forget that candlewood, like almost every lake in ct, is stocked with non native fish. even my beloved smallmouths arent from these parts.

which is all the more reason to throw some damn drum and bowfin in!

You are all racist most of your sport fish aren't native and where stocked what makes trout and small mouth more of a fish. Candlewood is man made and Obama has granted amnesty to all illegals.

Would love to know the really story of how long that fish has been in the lake.

Was it one stick bait or two? Did you see that guy on the grassy knoll? MacGruber film...

FYI, I stocked candlewood last night with Mermaids..

There seems to be a fair amount of interest in catching land-locked stripers and hybrids from a good sized lake. The closest spot that I know of is Lake Wallenpaupak in the Poconos and second choice would be Lake Hopatcong in NJ.
I had a camp on the Delaware River for years and we fished Lake Wallenpaupak a lot. I have caught hybrids and regular stripers at night fishing down by the dam. I have also caught lots of smallies, some huge brown trout, my personal best non-Lake Erie walleye at 32 inches, and it is loaded with jumbo yellows and crappie. It is a bit larger than Candlewood at 5,700 surface acres and is a hydro impoundment. It has the same exact shoreline structure of glaciated boulders, gravel and some shale ledge formations and is the closest lake in size and in fisheries content to Candlewood that I know of in the Northeast. You can reach the lake via Rt 84 and from Danbury to the lake is about a bit over 2 hours of easy highway.
There is a tackle store down by the dam in Hawley, Pa. and they carry live herring just like Candlewood Bait & Tackle and the Valley Angler. The lake has multiple launching sites. I have used two, one big state launch at the dam and one mid lake at a marina. Either will accomodate boaters 24/7 and fishing all night is no problem.
Lake Wallenpaupak has about 50 bass tournies a year so I am sure others from our site have fished it besides me.

Wow,that's amazing What a great catch!!

no ones gonna comment on this... haha

just more proof that it isn't the first striper in cwood, and won't be the last.

#whocarestimetomoveon

#whereIcomefromtheycallemrockfish

#WhereIComeFromTheyCallThemDinner

so who is ctfishjunkie on instagram???

cause you're a class act you @sshole!

to quote him on instagram

"Obviously released by some d@mb f@ck do it yourself biologist, apparently this guy released it too."

some random angler releases what he think is a bizarre catch of the lifetime and that is what you have to say?

No numbnuts, the only "d@mb f@ck do it yourself biologist" here is you, because you actually think this fish can have any affect on the lake what so ever.


#PIMPSLAPNEEDED

Anyone have the video yet? Also, i'd love to stick a big fish like that on candlewood. I know its bad for the bass population but the idea of a 30 pound stripper lurking in the depths of a lake that I fish is very cool.

Just wondering if you even read this thread???


Tony Stewart have mercy on your soul.....

I wish I was 17 again.

For Christmas this year, I'm hoping to get a striper in my.... Stocking!

I'll fess up, never caught it and don't believe it.

Me 2

I'd like to hunt wild boar in Thomaston,think I'll bring up a truck load from Georgia and dump off on rte 254.I also likee the way asian carp jump out of the water,its funny seeing fisherman get hit in the head,they'd do good in say Bantam.

I'd like to hunt Asians too..... Wait different type I thimk

Wait till that fish swims through the causeway into Squantz. It'll be 40lbs in a month.

Comorant season is long overdue.

Homepage?

Sorry couldn't resist

Joe, from what I have heard there are some channel catfish in Squantz that must have been bucket stocked. That's a species that would grow to huge sizes in a lake full of herring, and there are more herring in Squantz per surface acre than in Candlewood. Plus with all of the underwater rock formations and crevices there is perfect spawning conditions for channels.

Serious question, I have seen the still picture which seems to be Candlewood after comments from site members who fish it much more than I do but on the video, in the beginning of it, there is a pan of the background and I can't identify anything on the shore there especially what appears to be a huge building in the upper right corner of the frame. For those who know the lake really well, what are those buildings?

I drove by there is am and it definitely is Candlewood. You can see the blue shed looking west as you cross the causeway

Somebody should burn down that blue shed!..... It will reflect too much light onto the lake and kill all the trout and smallmouth and hypoxiate the alewives....

As far as Muskie's in Lilli - I think it's just a matter of time before the Tiger muskies up in MA find their way down the same way the pike did. [/quote]


The Tigers do not get stocked in mass anymore and they can't reproduce seeing that they are hybrid and sterile. And there is some tigers making it to lilly from Woodridge I know of 3 that have been caught in there and a few wallys also

also Tom at Tom's b&t in shelton showed me a pic of a 26in schoolie in a little shelton pond that someone must have dropped in there on his or her way home from the river. I fish this pond for goldens in the fall and catch rate has gone from 10-15 fish a trip to one or 2 and I think this striper is the reason the goldies are not as plentiful as they were and it's probably not the only striper that was released there by the same person

I agree with the still picture and the blue shed but what I can't place is the video scan and the structures in the background, especially what appears to be a big building. Of course, the video is not very clear so it might be something very obvious but we just can't see it.

We live in ct. We don't need land locked striper in our lakes. Think about it. Tons of them in all 4 of our rivers all of spring,fall,and winter for many guys to have 50+ fish days. Then let's not forget about the sound. That's not enough water to fish???? Putting stripers in a lake like candlewood will have some kind of effect on it down the road and changes my cause damage to the fishery is now.

I heard about a few walleye being caught in the Housatonic above Lilli a few years ago. I traced upstream sources and could not figure out where they came from and came to the conclusion they came out of Squantz as fingerlings, into Candlewood, down to the New Milford arm, through the Pen Stock and into the river. Walleye are notorious wanderers.

Of course the state TRIED to start a walleye fishery in Lilli when it was first impounded. It didn't take, but enough fish escaped to Zoar to start a tiny population there. I don't fish the lake enough any more to have any idea whether or not it still exists, but when i did, we used to catch a couple a year from Zoar. But this one threw me for a loop in '81. As far as I can tell, that's either a sauger a saugeye. Note the general lack of gold in coloration, the blotchiness, and most important, the lack of a white tip on the lower tail.

Sure looks like a Sauger. And being in 1981 it would have to have been bred in Zoar. So where did the Sauger come from?
Almost every impoundment stocked with walleye ends up dumping walleye downstream somehow. The Lilli to Zoar transition was from a hurricane flood if I recall the history of that correctly.
Saltonstall dumps walleye into the outlet stream, same with the Saugatuck Res. in to the lower Saugatuck River.
Over in NY Sodom Res. dumps walleye into the lower Croton River and into the Diverting Res. Boyd's Corner Res. dumps them into West Branch Res.
Squantz into Candlewood, etc.

So my brother caught a smallie while fly fishing for stripers in the lower Housy today. Does that put the universe back in balance?

only if the hardcore fisherman threaten him and call him an @ss@#$% for releasing it...

Nice, there is a good trouser trout response!

Thanks Rich.

Enough already about that Striper.

They should stock them in there. After malloy is done there won't be any trout anyway. I would rather catch a 5 pound schoolies than a largemouth or smallies any day of the week!

#6
RANGERZ21
RANGERZ21 is offline
Club Angler
RANGERZ21's Avatar

Join Date
Sep 2003
Location
Flanders, NJ
Posts
519

Yup - A member of Bergen Bassmasters was pre-fishing our 4/20 tournament the day before and was in the Danbury arm. His buddy hooked into this 34 pound 15 ounce striper using a jerkbait fished on 10 pound test. After it nearly spooled him and they had to chase the fish with the trolling motor, they finally landed it.

No, Stripers are not native to Candlewood nor are they stocked. Clearly this fish was dumped into the lake and got fat feeding up on trout! It was not a hybrid either but stripers can survive in freshwater as this one has. The fish was released so it's still swimming around out there...


Copied this statement from N.Y.Bass fishing site.

No big foot sightings in over a year?