Burnt Meadow Pond is a pretty 69-acre body of water located next to Route 160 in Brownfield, Oxford County, Maine (see The Maine Atlas and Gazetteer map 4 B2). The public access is via a hard-top boat launch located at the southern tip of the pond right off Route 160. Ample parking space is available by the launch.
I am wading along the eastern shoreline (starting on the right in this picture) from the boat launch all the way to the small beach shown in the top left-hand corner.
The general setting of Burnt Meadow Pond is quite pleasing. Looming high above the entire area is Burnt Meadow Mountain. The surrounding region is deeply wooded and rural as is wont in Southern Oxford County. About a dozen houses dot the shoreline. The surface water is clear and clean. I am drawn to this pond because the state stocked it earlier this fall with 150 13″ brook trout and 100 13″ brown trout, which translates to between 3 and 4 one-pound trout per acre. It is not great but definitely worth checking out. As per the Maine fishing rules applicable to the South Zone, the pond is open to fishing between October 1 and December 31, but with artificial lures only (i.e., no live bait, worms, fish eggs, preserved fish, etc.) and all salmonids must be released alive. The pond has a maximum and mean depth of 45 ft and 17 ft, respectively, making it relatively deep for its smallish size. Click here for a depth map and more fisheries information. I know from past experience that this pond also supports a largemouth bass population.
Burnt Meadow Mountain looms large over the pond. Notice the yellow sandy substrate in the foreground of this picture
I arrive at the boat launch off Route 160 around 10:30 am. Several cars are parked and half a dozen people are getting ready to hike the Burnt Meadow Mountain trail to the summit. As expected for this time of the year, no one else is fishing and I have got the place all to myself. It is nippy outside (36°F) and overcast, with a light breeze. I put on multiple layers of clothing to stay warm, don my waders, grab my ultra-light spinner rod and small reel with a #2 Mepps spinner, and make a beeline for the water. Note that I cut off the third hook of the treble and flatten the barb on one of the two remaining hooks to facilitate lure removal and minimize damage to the fish. I will wade the entire eastern shoreline of Burnt Meadow Pond, from the launch all the way to a small sandy beach opposite the launch. This whole area is ideal for wading because the shoreline is devoid of houses and backyards, the substrate (with a few isolated exceptions) is firm and sandy, the bottom is unobstructed by woody debris or boulders, and the water remains relatively shallow within casting distance.
This small brown trout made it all worth the effort and the cold feet!
I slowly start wading in knee-deep water and casting out my spinner. I soon reach a patch of decaying aquatic vegetation and get my first hit of the day. Nice! I recast my lure in the same general area several times and soon see two male brook trout in their brilliant spawning colors chasing my spinner and picking at it. And then they disappear, and that action stops as quickly as it started. Meanwhile, I sprung a leak in my waders and my two feet are gradually getting wetter and colder… I ignore the leak problem and continue wading and casting along the eastern shoreline. I am about half-way through when I get a big hit and a hook-up! Yes, and this fish is putting up a hard fight on my ultralight rod. For a moment, the color of the fish makes me think that I hooked into a landlocked salmon (not possible since that species is not stocked in Burnt Meadow Pond) or even a rainbow trout (same deal). Instead, it is just a very silvery and hard-fighting brown trout. I marvel it this creature’s tenacity and will to live, take a couple of bragging pictures, and quickly release it back to its watery world. My two feet are now totally numb from being soaked with freezing water but I continue wading and casting until I reach the beach area opposite the boat launch. But I have nothing else to show for it… Overall, the fishing was rather disappointing this morning in that I failed to land even a single brook trout. On the other hand, the wading was super easy and that brown trout made my day.
The results: I caught one 15″ brown trout in 2 hours of cold-feet fishing.
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