Farms: Trout Fishing Virginia's Cripple Creek
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Editor's Note: It's been determined you do need a day license to fish the creek here. A license isn't required to fish the ponds on the property, however. No trout stamp is necessary. Southwest Virginia's Crippled Creek always gets stocked with big trout. However, not everyone catches these trophy rainbow, brown, golden and brook trout. Team Pautzke made the trip to this popular, private Southeast stocked trout stream last week and experienced excellent success using FireBait. The lodge has two-miles of Cripple Creek and permits 25 anglers per day (and is sold out every Friday-Sunday through summer already). On average, 350 pounds of rainbow, brook, brown and golden trout are stocked each morning at 7am so anglers can see that trout are actually being stocked. The fish tend to average two-to-three pounds, with some as large as 10. Therefore, if you take a three-pound average, roughly 116 trout are stocked each morning. Divide that by the number of anglers (25) that fish each day and 4.6 trout are stocked per angler. However, keep in mind, those trout are dispersed over two miles. Consider that when the state stocks streams they often put 500-1,000 pounds of half-pound trout in local streams, which means 1,000-2,000 fish. Examine the above figures and it can be determined that it's easier to catch trout in state-stocked streams. Catching trout in these private waters isn't easy. Meanwhile, the chance at hooking better quality, larger and trophy fish makes it attractive. And, for those who believe this is cheating and not real fishing, come try your luck here. When we arrived in the parking area at 2pm and talked to other anglers (who had been here since 7am) most had yet to catch a fish, others had one or two (limit is six). They bigger trout are smart and the clear water can cast spells on anglers. We weren't here for a fun fishing trip. We came to Cedar Springs Sportsman's Lodge and beautiful Crippled Creek near Rural Retreat in Southwest Virginia to film Pautzke Outdoors and prove Pautzke FireBait caught big trout. We, and many of you, know it does. If it didn't we wouldn't produce. However, if people don't see it with their own eyes they continue to believe that only Power Bait works. Power Bait works great. So does FireBait. To film our show and do a fair assessment I called Jim Hilton, longtime owner of Cedar Springs and asked him if we could have one hole to ourselves from 3pm to an hour after sunset. He agreed. And, in the video (coming shortly) you'll watch Mr. Hilton drive up and stock the trout minutes before we were to start fishing (he released about 15 total). He also watched us bait our hooks with FireBait and catch these trout with it, while many other anglers that day struggled to get any bites. Personally, I didn't know Cedar Springs Trout Farm raised trout are large as they did and it didn't take long to realize we didn't come with the right gear. My size 10 and 12 single salmon egg hooks and two-pound test were no test for rainbows to 10 pounds, brooks to five and browns to seven (we hooked, but didn't catch any of the goldens). Actually, I didn't catch a fish, partially because I was filming and also due to the fact that I was broken off five times in the first hour (Hilton was shocked FireBait worked so well). Fortunately, my friends Richard Weekley (who caught a personal best six-pound brown) and Greg Payne (who caught a personal best 10-pound rainbow) had four and six pound test on their rods and while they were broke off many times, they did manage to catch many trout, all but one on FireBait. We ran an experiment and fished Gold Label Pautzke salmon eggs and got bit instantly. Gold Label (our glitter Premium eggs) is the hottest egg in the Southeast right now and we had to try it! While there's endless colors of FireBait, we focused on some of our favorites: Feed Pellet Brown, Rainbow, Chartreuse Garlic, Garlic Salmon Egg, Peach Garlic and Atomic Garlic, and caught fish on every color. Ironically, a few of the fish Weekley and Payne caught had my broken off hooks in their mouth, proof that the scent of FireBait induces feeding. This trip to remote, Southwest Virginia proved FireBait belongs in everyone's tackle box, along with their other favorite Pautzke salmon eggs and dough bait. And, if you aren't a believer ask the other 22 people how many trout they caught that day after 12 hours of fishing (we fished for five). Many scratched or caught one or two. Hilton himself told us he can tell how well the trout are going to bite each day and was concerned we might struggle a little. You'll shortly see we didn't. Editor's Note: Pautzke FireBait is available in Southwest Virginia and East Tennessee Walmart stores. Cedar Springs Sportsman's Lodge can be reached at 276-686-4505. To Learn More About Pautzke Bait: http://www.pautzke.com Like us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pautzkebait
Comments
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Great place to fish, we own that farm with the white fence! lol
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people always said rainbow fire bait worked good but ive not tried it yet
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How does firebait work for natural rainbow trout? All the fish I see you guys catch are stocked....
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Favorite video
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beautiful trout country!!! but i don't understand why he throws the trout into the river from a net like that?? ummm just place the net in the water and let them swim of peacefully! I'm just gonna throw these trouts into water from a net and risk scratching vital slime and scales and make the fish stressed. dunno
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Awesome video guys we just fished it the other day and wore them out in the rain thanks again for coming our way and fishing.
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will you guys pleeeease come try out the south holston river i bristol tennessee? if you do, fish right below the weir dam! i pull in my limit every time i go. Nice rainbows and browns
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Please check out my Landscape video - https://youtu.be/q4yPWtPZ3Qs. I'm around the same area as you were. :D
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i live near wytheville, i fish in cripple creek all the time
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Is that under armour pull over available to buy?
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What's the contact number for this creek? I want to call them and go fish it.
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VIRGINIA IS WERE IM FROM AND IM GLAD TO SEE YOUR CREW COME THIS WAY AND SHOW WHAT WE HAVE TO OFFER. DONT GET RECONIZED LIKE OTHER PLACES FOR OUR FISHING AND WILDLIFE. THANKS GUYS..
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Ha, you call those mountains? Those are pitching mounds!
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1:39 sorry bud southwest VA is full of wild trout
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I live about 10 minutes from there lol
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I was there yesterday managed to catch 7 trout. 3 of them were citation rainbows one weighing 5 pounds and the other two were 4 3/4
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u guys whoop atlas in salmon eggs i caught a 24 inch rainbows yesterday
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Close to my hometown
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There is alot of big trout and salmon where i fish would them fire bait and eggs go well? if so i may buy some but i live in new zealand..
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Why the hell is he Throwing the Trout like that