Rich,

I don't know, and I don't know any bios who know what these fish are. So my unscientific wild ass guess might be about as good as anyone's. Here goes:

You say you have been catching them this past year but not in previous years. I think that has to be taken into account - I'm assuming you were also fishing the Bogy in past years. You said they weren't smolt, sea runs, or hybrids. Tell me also that they were unmarked, but I'll assume that for the moment.

Hatchery summer steelhead smolts are released at the Calawah ponds, and adult summer runs return to both the Calawah and Bogy. Some of those fish escape the fishery and survive to spawn naturally. There were and may continue to be a few native summer runs in the system. Rivers that support natural summer steelhead production seem (my opinion) to have more resident rainbows than rivers that support only winter steelhead.

Last year was a dry one, and many river systems had poorer than usual spring smolt outmigration conditions. Successful smolt outmigration is known to correlate positively with spring river flow levels. In response to poor outmigration flows, more than the usual proportion of naturally produced summer steelhead smolts might have residualized in the river.

Flaw with this hypothesis: A residualized smolt could attain 14" but not 20". A 20" would have to be from the year before, at least. I know 20" resident rainbow do occur in steelhead rivers, but they are usually 5 years old to reach that size. Guess I can't explain the sudden presence of these RBs. Anyone else got an idea?

Sincerely,

Salmo g.