Pond Brook Cabins in Eagle Lake posted this photo of a lake trout caught on February 21, 2016 by Vaughn Plourde of Eagle Lake on, guess where? Eagle Lake, of course. This amazing fish measured 39 inches long, and it took Vaughn nearly an hour to get the fish out of the water and onto the ice. According to Pond Brook Cabins, the fish weighed 23.5 pounds right after it was caught, and when the weight was verified 18 hours later, it was 22.65 pounds.
Lake Trout, also known as togue, are one of the longest living freshwater fish. In Maine, the department has documented numerous lake trout that are older than 25 years, some older than 30.
Eagle Lake has a small, naturally reproducing lake trout population. Generally, but not always, when fish are stocked by the department, one of the fins are clipped, so biologists can later tell how old the fish are. As you can tell from this picture, none of the fins are clipped.
Looking back at stocking records, we did stock Eagle Lake back in 1989 with lake trout that were not fin-clipped. If it is one of those fish, this fish would be 27 years old. It could also be a stocked togue that swam down from St. Froid Lake where lake trout were stocked in 1976. That would would make it 40 years old.
No matter how old the lake trout is, it truly is an amazing fish. Thank you Pond Brook Cabins for sharing the photos and congratulations Vaughn for this remarkable catch.