Whopper Wonderland : Irvine Lake, Self-Proclaimed ‘Home of the Super Fish,’ Stakes Its Success on Its Trophy-Sized Hatchery-Raised Trout, Including One 21-Pounder

They don’t get big by being dumb.

--Fisherman’s adage

If that’s true, how does one explain the fish in Irvine Lake?

The self-proclaimed “home of the super fish” stakes its success on its whoppers, few of which ever saw a Rapala lure or a woolly bugger artificial fly before they were flushed from a truck into the man-made Orange County reservoir.

Raised in a hatchery from cultured eggs, they never knew wise old uncles who could put a fin around their gills and warn them, “Sonny, don’t go near those things.”

In fact, their first--and last--meal at Irvine may well be a gob of colored paste called Power Bait concocted in an Iowa laboratory by scientists locked in a cooperative scheme with others who create monster fish to eat the gunk and hype the new business of fishing.

These fish didn’t get big by being smart, either. They just haven’t had a chance to be dumb. Irvine, and other classic put-and-take lakes like it, is their chance.

Take the 10 tons of trout planted in Irvine for the official opening of the lake’s trout season last weekend. Seven tons were rainbows, the rest German browns, and all ran from two pounds up, with many between 10 and 15.

To grow that large, they didn’t have to survive in the wild, swimming miles and miles upstream to spawn, fighting their way past waterfalls, predators and lures. No, these traveled in style from northern California in an aerated, climate-controlled fish tank mounted on an 18-wheeler. And spawning is the last thing on their minds.

Where do all these big fish come from?

“We custom-grow them for these guys,” said Phil Mackey.

Mackey and his wife, Mary, own Mt. Lassen Trout Farms. He is president of the United States Trout Farmers Assn.

So, science has progressed to raising trout like tomatoes? On demand?

Not exactly. The Mackeys can’t keep up with the demand, even with their dozen hatcheries, which produce 1 1/4 million pounds of trout a year. By comparison, the California Department of Fish and Game’s 13 trout hatcheries turn out 4.7 million pounds of smaller catchable-size trout each year, most running two to a pound.

Trout farmers talk in pounds, not numbers of fish, because nowadays bigger is better. That’s why concessionaires around the state feel compelled to compete for the sportsmen’s dollars by buying oversized fish from private hatcheries. Eastern Sierra fisheries buy from Tim Alpers, others, such as Green Valley Lake, from the Whitewater hatchery near Palm Springs.

“We spend a million dollars a year on fish,” said Steve Miller, vice president and general manager of Outdoor Safaris International, which operates Irvine.

The return is about two pounds per angler--trout, catfish or whatever, depending on the season. As a private operation, Irvine requires no fishing licenses, but neither does it receive free state trout plants.

“We don’t have any support whatsoever from the state,” Miller said. “Our most important commodity is our fish. The trophy fish is the attraction here to keep people coming back. Where else do you go to catch fish like that--the Northwest? Alaska? It’s a commitment, but that’s what makes us what we are.”

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Are dedicated fishermen repelled by the thought of using artificial bait to catch artificial fish from an artificial lake? Not the ones who started lining up outside in their campers three days before the opener last week.

The piece de resistance was a rainbow of 21 pounds or more named Bad Bertha--the largest trout ever planted in the state, Mackey and Miller claim. The state-record catch is 27.4 pounds, and that was a steelhead--the seagoing version of a rainbow--taken from the Smith River near the Oregon border in 1976.

Anybody who caught Bad Bertha last weekend would have won $2,000. Now the offer has expired, although Bertha would still be worth an Irvine Lake record for trout. As it was, it wasn’t a bad weekend. The largest trout taken was a 13-pounder by Richard Johnson of Lakewood--one pound 10 ounces shy of the record--and another half-dozen topped 10 pounds. Most were taken on Power Bait, but a couple of purists used lures, one even a nightcrawler.

Few seemed to be taking the catch-and-release ethic seriously. That wasn’t the point. With these fish, the purpose is catch-and-cook. Mackey can always go back and grow more.

He’ll have to. These can’t reproduce. Except for Bad Bertha, whose 33-inch length and 22-inch girth contained a couple of pounds of eggs, the Lassen planters are triploids--meaning they have been given an extra chromosome to preclude reproduction.

The advantage is that they grow about 20% faster because all of their energy is spent on growing, not raising a family. They also have longer life spans.

“Seven or eight years is about average,” Mackey said. “Diploids (normal fish) would live less. Every time they go through that spawn cycle, it’s like a woman having a baby, except they don’t stay in the hospital afterward. They’re out in the wild and susceptible to predators.”

The Mackeys were among the pioneers in growing custom fish for anglers’ consumption.

“First you have to have the genetic capability,” he said. “That’s one thing we’ve been working on for a long time: the genetics for bigger, faster-growing fish.”

Lassen developed its program in cooperative research with the University of Washington and Scotland’s Sterling University.

Said Mackey, who is not a college-trained biologist: “The universities are a little bit behind the advancement of the industry leaders. We hire college graduates in this field, but maybe 5-10% of their knowledge is applicable when they walk through the door.

“I’ve been doing this since I got out of high school. I had the opportunity to learn from a lot of people that knew a lot of things. I’ve taken short courses through the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.”

A current project is crossing German browns with Atlantic salmon--meaning, one supposes, that the hybrids will swim upstream during Oktoberfest when the oompah bands start to play.

Lassen has 18 full-time and six part-time employees. It sells eggs to other hatcheries in 46 states and 26 countries and provinces. The fish are fed a special diet with as much as 48% protein. Mackey also sees that they work out a lot. His rearing ponds have a velocity of about four water changes an hour.

“What you’re doing is exercising those fish,” he said. “Instead of just rolling around eating and getting fat, these fish are conditioned. They’re in shape. We don’t have any couch-potato fish.

“One of the compliments we get is about how strong our fish are.”

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Irvine is Lassen’s best customer.

“This stocking is unrivaled,” Mackey said. “I don’t know if people realize how special it really is here. I don’t know of any situation where they’re putting this many big fish in, and we stock more trout than anybody. The opportunity to catch a trophy of a lifetime exists here.

“How many guys do you know that have caught a double-digit rainbow? Not too many, let alone right here in Orange County. That’s what the guys camped out for two or three days ahead of time are coming for: the big fish.”

Oddly, Mackey doesn’t fish.

“I used to fish a lot,” he said. “Now it’s kind of like a mailman going for a walk on his day off.”

But if he did fish, considering that he knows these fish better than anyone, how would he fish for the trout in Irvine?

“We raise our fish (at water temperatures) from 48 to 58 degrees. The trout are going to be looking for about 55-degree water. If I was going to fish, the first thing I’d do is use a thermometer and find (where it was) 55 degrees.”

The best bait or lure: “Minnow imitations. If you have big fish and little fish in a pond, the big fish are going to eat (the little fish). Power Bait is probably going to be the best bait. There’s some turbidity in that water and a trout is more of a sight feeder than a catfish, which uses its olfactory (senses).”

Elsewhere, anglers know how plants of fresh little hatchery trout draw voracious striped or largemouth bass in feeding frenzies. That’s not a problem with Mackey’s fish.

“Whatever got them, I wouldn’t want to get on the end of a line,” he said.