Blue Rainbow Trout are a rare mutation that occurs in hatchery production of rainbow and brown trout. It is so rare that one hatchery has reported that in a spawn of about 40 million eggs only about 30 of them are indeed blue. If you are looking to hook one of these rare trout, you should expect to catch millions of fish first or maybe not. Ronnie Goodwin was able to capture one as seen on his stunning video embedded below.
The blue trout in a hatchery population are a weaker fish and must be isolated early in life to survive, otherwise they may be eaten by other fish or the rigors of hatchery life prove to be their undoing. Being mutations, they do not have the ability to reproduce. It is suspected that they suffer from a thyroid deficiency and this hormonal imbalance causes the trout to only form the blue pigment.
According to Craig Lodowsky, a 17-year veteran of the Sandwich Fish Hatchery in Cape Cod, he has seen only one blue trout in his 17 years at the hatchery. Excerpts have been taken from Mountain SpringsTrout Park and from the Cape Cod Times.
FLY from Ronnie B. Goodwin on Vimeo.