Ever catch a trout with a crooked smile? It was probably missing its maxillary process (or maxilla), the flap of bony tissue that extends along and beyond the upper jaw.
Here’s a photo of a brown trout, maxillary process intact, looking normal.
Now here’s a photo of a cutthroat I caught in Colorado last October.
If your trout is giving you a goofy grin like that cuttie, it was probably caught by another angler. It likely felt the pinch of a barbed or treble hook, or was possibly even “snagged”, which isn’t very sporty. All of these have been known to damage and even destroy this part of the trout’s facial anatomy.
Now why is this important? Besides looking strange, an absent or jacked up maxillary process may create troubles for a trout when it comes to feeding, depending on the severity of its removal. It can also indirectly give you an idea of fishing pressure in the location you caught the impacted fish.
However, trout can certainly live without this facial feature. Interestingly, the maxillary process is one of two structures on a fish that is targeted to be “clipped” by game agencies as a way to identify the origin of stocked steelhead. (The other is the adipose fin – the final, small curved back fin by the trout’s tail).
So there, the next time you see a fish with a jacked up face, you now know what to call its missing feature when you share that fish pic with your buddies. And even better, it gives you a reason to pinch those barbs, or even better fish barbless.
Who says you can’t learn anything useful online?
