Monson angler lands Moosehead brookie just shy of 7 pounds

Fish tales keep emerging from the depths of the state’s largest lake, and a Monson angler takes center stage with a brook trout he’ll never forget.

Jim Young reached out to share his story and a photo of the impressive brookie he caught while fishing Moosehead Lake recently. The monster squaretail weighed 6 pounds, 13 ounces and was 25 inches long. The fish was also 18 inches around at its widest point.

“The lake has been great for the last few years, after the rule change to get more of the togue out of the lake,” Young said, referring to fishing regulations that allowed for the take of thousands of small togue that had been decimating the lake’s forage base.

Photo courtesy of Jim Young
BIG BROOKIE — Jim Young of Monson shows off the brook trout he caught while fishing Moosehead Lake recently. The brookie weighed 6 pounds, 13 ounces and was 25 inches long with an 18-inch girth.

Young said he didn’t waste much time hauling the brookie onto the ice.

“The fight was short. I jigged it up with an old wooden jig stick [that had] no give,” Young said. “My buddy and I had fished well into the afternoon with no flags, no hits. I moved around to different locations until finally [I hit] the right spot at the right time.”

Young’s friend thought the fish was over six pounds, and estimated correctly. The trout was the biggest Young has ever caught.

“My first thought was, ‘I finally caught Walter,’” Young said, referring to the fish that was actor Henry Fonda’s nemesis in the 1981 movie “On Golden Pond.”

Young said his fishing buddy caught a 5.5-pounder last year, and the duo have released a number of brook trout that were between two and five pounds.

They aren’t alone.

Last week we shared the story of a Corinth angler who caught a 5.6-pound brookie at Moosehead. And a report from Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife biologist Tim Obrey has detailed the presence of huge shore-spawning brook trout that he and colleagues have discovered in the lake.

According to The Maine Sportsman, which maintains the lists of state fishing records, the Maine record brook trout was caught by Patrick Coan of Waterboro in 2010. The fish weighed 9 pounds, 2 ounces and came out of Mousam Lake.