DEC Atlantic salmon stocking proposal MUST READ

[King Davy]

For Gambler, Brian of course there wasn’t 2700 Landlocks in the Oak two years ago. But there were a few hundred that were caught several times. As far as misidentified, people usually confuse a salmon as a brown trout not the other way around. 

 

The St Mary’s is a multifaceted fishey loaded with everything from Kings, coho’s  pinks and Atlantic Salmon as well as steelhead, kamloops rainbows walleyes, bass and tons of white fish. It’s has alewife, smelt, a huge caddis and Hex hatch. 
 

Right now the river is filling up with LL’s. Around Labor Day the Pacifics arrive. Then steelhead. 
 

Why the river is so successful for all these species is the St Marys drains Superior into Huron so water temps are favorable . And you are catching these fish while the big ships are transversing the two lakes. 
 

it took Roger Griel the lead biologist at Lake Superior State University nearly 20 years to create this highly successful LL program.

 

Lake Michigan is also having success with LL’s. All of the Great Lakes programs are members of the Great Lakes Fishery Commission. GLFC’s mission is to kill the sea lamprey, and restore native species to each lake. Before everyone gets crazy about the current lamprey infestation, remember our rivers went two years without TFM treatments due to Covid and closed borders. The TFM team is from The Soo and the St Marys river area.

 

There is a new Sheriff in town. Bureau Chief Steve Hurst has revised fishery management plans for all of NYS. Lake Ontario and all the inland waters. And he is keen on trying to rehabilitate native  species not just in LO but the ADK, Catskills,  Finger Lakes, Tug Hill etc. 

 

Love Stripe Bass and they are a formable foe in the salt. But I personally wouldn’t enjoy them more in LO than the Chinook’s. Besides traveling to the sound to fish for them and the tuna’s

gets you a shot at some of the greatest fresh sea food on the east coast.

 

Lots of opinions on the LL program. Make yourself heard and respond to the public comment period.

Edited July 12, 2022 by King Davy

[zimm298]

Fat Trout, first of all there's NEVER been a striper problem in the Columbia River Basin. As for your....laughable comment about the stocked salmon, trout, and smallmouth? Get real. There are so many lakes across the country that have stripers added to the environment, and there are not any, I repeat ANY issues with them being this voracious fish as you're trying to imply. So, I really don't care about this insane support of fish that can't sustain themselves. It's pathetic. How about the main concern is fish that are viable? Would benefit the environment? Add exponentially more revenue for the fishery?  You're speaking without any true education on this fish. It shows. Oh,, and as for the cormorants? They're a pain in the ass. Here and on salt water. You've got a bigger problem with them than stripers. But, I digress....

[GAMBLER]

19 minutes ago, King Davy said:

For Gambler, Brian of course there wasn’t 2700 Landlocks in the Oak two years ago. But there were a few hundred that were caught several times. As far as misidentified, people usually confuse a salmon as a brown trout not the other way around. 

 

The St Mary’s is a multifaceted fishey loaded with everything from Kings, coho’s  pinks and Atlantic Salmon as well as steelhead, kamloops rainbows walleyes, bass and tons of white fish. It’s has alewife, smelt, a huge caddis and Hex hatch. 
 

Right now the river is filling up with LL’s. Around Labor Day the Pacifics arrive. Then steelhead. 
 

Why the river is so successful for all these species is the St Marys drains Superior into Huron so water temps are favorable . And you are catching these fish while the big ships are transversing the two lakes. 
 

it took Roger Griel the lead biologist at Lake Superior State University nearly 20 years to create this highly successful LL program.

 

Lake Michigan is also having success with LL’s. All of the Great Lakes programs are members of the Great Lakes Fishery Commission. GLFC’s mission is to kill the sea lamprey, and restore native species to each lake. Before everyone gets crazy about the current lamprey infestation, remember our rivers went two years without TFM treatments due to Covid and closed borders. The TFM team is from The Soo and the St Marys river area.

 

There is a new Sheriff in town. Bureau Chief Steve Hurst has revised fishery management plans for all of NYS. Lake Ontario and all the inland waters. And he is keen on trying to rehabilitate native  species not just in LO but the ADK, Catskills,  Finger Lakes, Tug Hill etc. 

 

Love Stripe Bass and they are a formable foe in the salt. But I personally wouldn’t enjoy them more in LO than the Chinook’s. Besides traveling to the sound to fish for them and the tuna’s

gets you a shot at some of the greatest fresh sea food on the east coast.

 

Lots of opinions on the LL program. Make yourself heard and respond to the public comment period.

The project is more than likely successful due to the alewife crash and a more diverse forage base for the Atlantics.  Possibly the reason it took 20 years to be successful.  

[King Davy]

Actually Roger’s biggest problem was raising LL’s in captivity. They are according to the scientists I know the hardest fish to raise in a hatchery. His hatchery is in the basement of the US power plant on the St Mary’s. A long way from a highly technical hatchery of today. 
 

the biggest problem for LL’s and alewives is not death to the adults it’s failure in reproduction of spawning adults. If the plan is a grow, put and take, the issue with LL and alewife isn’t a big deal. But if DEC was truly trying to gain a natural wild LL population then they should be treated with VB at the egg stage and as fry. Tunison was ( and still are) capturing adult female and male salmon from the LFZ and beaver dam Brook, taking them to Cornell and successfully spawning them, and as yearlings releasing the off spring back into the salmon. 
 

Again the releases were all the way up river. Just now they have started stocking them at the mouth as that method has proven most successful at the Oak. 
 

So possibly the program continues as new methods of stocking just came into play and DEC wants to see if their stocking changes have a positive effect. The Pen rearing just started as well, and while there were some glitches some tweaks will be in play to see if pen stocking is successful.

[GAMBLER]

51 minutes ago, King Davy said:

Actually Roger’s biggest problem was raising LL’s in captivity. They are according to the scientists I know the hardest fish to raise in a hatchery. His hatchery is in the basement of the US power plant on the St Mary’s. A long way from a highly technical hatchery of today. 
 

the biggest problem for LL’s and alewives is not death to the adults it’s failure in reproduction of spawning adults. If the plan is a grow, put and take, the issue with LL and alewife isn’t a big deal. But if DEC was truly trying to gain a natural wild LL population then they should be treated with VB at the egg stage and as fry. Tunison was ( and still are) capturing adult female and male salmon from the LFZ and beaver dam Brook, taking them to Cornell and successfully spawning them, and as yearlings releasing the off spring back into the salmon. 
 

Again the releases were all the way up river. Just now they have started stocking them at the mouth as that method has proven most successful at the Oak. 
 

So possibly the program continues as new methods of stocking just came into play and DEC wants to see if their stocking changes have a positive effect. The Pen rearing just started as well, and while there were some glitches some tweaks will be in play to see if pen stocking is successful.

According to the link originally posted from the DEC, adult mortality due to thiamine deficiency is an issue.  Just like the steelhead, Atlantic’s are susceptible to thiamine deficiency killing adults.       (The steelhead die off a couple years ago is a perfect example of thiamine deficiency and adult mortality).

[King Davy]

Welp Gamber I’ve seen plenty of steelhead die from eating emaciated alewives… once in nearly 50 years after the polar vortex which is the only time I’ve ever seen that. I’ve never seen or found a dead LL in a river or stream or floating in the lake or heard of them washing up on the beach.

 

And I’ve never seen it in the finger lakes where they eat alewife in the open waters and run it’s rivers. During the polar vortex seasons and the alewife die off to poor health I witnessed 100’s of chinooks spawning in the DSR. Seemed they didn’t have the energy to run up river. You always get some spawning but not like that 2015 fall. DEC collected eggs from some of those fish and they were extremely high in thiamin-ease.
 

My point is no salmonid is unaffected by sick alewives. It’s hard to compare the effect in a species that spawns and lives, and one that dies no matter what. 

[LongLine]

If the St. Mary's is loaded with Kings, it is only during spawning time.  Superior has no Alewives & Huron has only a very few.  This study says tagged Kings from Huron go to Michigan to eat.

Massive tagging study reinforces link between alewife densities and Chinook salmon growth patterns | Michigan Sea Grant

 

If the NYSDEC, USGS and/or USF&WS would say they fear the alewives were going to disappear (like they did in Huron); that would be one thing but to pursue the project because an unquantified number of guys (who may or may not be able to properly ID them) want more diversity is totally another.

 

 

[GAMBLER]

56 minutes ago, King Davy said:

Welp Gamber I’ve seen plenty of steelhead die from eating emaciated alewives… once in nearly 50 years after the polar vortex which is the only time I’ve ever seen that. I’ve never seen or found a dead LL in a river or stream or floating in the lake or heard of them washing up on the beach.

 

And I’ve never seen it in the finger lakes where they eat alewife in the open waters and run it’s rivers. During the polar vortex seasons and the alewife die off to poor health I witnessed 100’s of chinooks spawning in the DSR. Seemed they didn’t have the energy to run up river. You always get some spawning but not like that 2015 fall. DEC collected eggs from some of those fish and they were extremely high in thiamin-ease.
 

My point is no salmonid is unaffected by sick alewives. It’s hard to compare the effect in a species that spawns and lives, and one that dies no matter what. 

So because you never have seen an Atlantic die off it isn’t happening?  The DEC is saying it happens.  More than likely they die before entering the tribs or before even reaching maturity.  The other salmonoids are affected but not as much as the Atlantic’s.  It was in a slide years ago in the state of the lake meetings when they found out why the steelhead were dying off.  They stock close numbers of coho yet the salmon River is LOADED with coho come September.   It’s not the lake guys killing all those Atlantic’s.  We average about one Atlantic a season on my boat.  We average a lot more coho per season.  

[Fat Trout]

4 hours ago, zimm298 said:

Fat Trout, first of all there's NEVER been a striper problem in the Columbia River Basin. As for your....laughable comment about the stocked salmon, trout, and smallmouth? Get real. There are so many lakes across the country that have stripers added to the environment, and there are not any, I repeat ANY issues with them being this voracious fish as you're trying to imply. So, I really don't care about this insane support of fish that can't sustain themselves. It's pathetic. How about the main concern is fish that are viable? Would benefit the environment? Add exponentially more revenue for the fishery?  You're speaking without any true education on this fish. It shows. Oh,, and as for the cormorants? They're a pain in the ass. Here and on salt water. You've got a bigger problem with them than stripers. But, I digress....

[emoji1787] i dont give a crap about the atlantics and feel free to take your fully vetted new predator idea to the DEC. Im sure they'll get right on that for ya.   Oh and laughable is the fact that this time last year you were on here asking for tips, pointers and on the water help for how to run downriggers and the "whole gamut" as you were tired of "fumbling around".   Respectable.....but lets ease off a bit on pushing fisheries management so abrasively.  Dare I say, thats a bit laughable.   I don't need to be right and am wrong plenty of times but I have 35 years in this fishery so you can kiss my bass.  

Sent from my SM-G990U using Lake Ontario United mobile app
 

Edited July 12, 2022 by Fat Trout

[King Davy]

Well Gambler, I wonder why if it was a total lost cause DEC is not only dedicated to continue, but adding more fish, adding pen rearing bringing in a river from the past that had good results, keeping another as a possible stocking site. If all their data year after year pointed south then why bother.

 

I stated I don’t like the plan but then again when is the last time you actually saw a published plan for this species. They shut down the Skamania program. Ended the domestic rainbows in LO. Looks like to me when they don’t think a program has any merit they scrub it.

 

I’d be pretty sure if this plan is executed to their design and fails to meet their goals, they’ll pull the plug. 

[GAMBLER]

I’m pretty sure they are trying to continue the program because the fish are raised in federal hatcheries on their budget not the states. 

[spoonfed-1]

41 minutes ago, GAMBLER said:

I’m pretty sure they are trying to continue the program because the fish are raised in federal hatcheries on their budget not the states. 

 

 Hit the nail on the head Gambler. Federal money. Ma ran an Atlantic restoration program for well over a decade probably closer to two decades. Millions and millions of dollars wasted. Lots of Federal money coming in before they pulled the plug King Davy. The evidence of a complete failure was apparent well before the plug was pulled. I spent a lot of time trying to find out exactly how much money was taken in by the state and how much went into the program. What a surprise, that information wasn't available. I'm sure you will have better luck getting this information than I did so please post it up here when available. Thanks.

Edited July 13, 2022 by spoonfed-1

[King Davy]

Bingo!!!!!!! Feds are going to be highly involved. While I’d love to have a consistent summer fishery for LL’s and I did experience a few good summer seasons. It hasn’t been consistent. For us who want to fish for Atlantic Salmon we have to travel.  I’ll be in Labrador one month from today on the Big River. Sea run fish as well as sea run Brook trout and Arctic char. 
 

We’ll see what happens with the new plan but I expect to travel many miles to get good fishing.

Edited July 13, 2022 by King Davy

[LongLine]

Has anyone seen this year's prey fish assessment?  For alewife numbers/condition?  It's not online.  They didn't do one according to Annual Report in 2020. rather they looked at fish stomachs.  Kind of "fishy" that this draft comes out before we can see the data for 2021.  Talk is that there was an explosion in Alewife population this year & it appears Kings are being caught on smaller clean spoons this year.

[GAMBLER]

4 minutes ago, LongLine said:

Has anyone seen this year's prey fish assessment?  For alewife numbers/condition?  It's not online.  They didn't do one according to Annual Report in 2020. rather they looked at fish stomachs.  Kind of "fishy" that this draft comes out before we can see the data for 2021.  Talk is that there was an explosion in Alewife population this year & it appears Kings are being caught on smaller clean spoons this year.

Shreksoff on this site is the man to answer this question.  He runs the Kaho.  The info was released last year that the YOY year class was huge.  This years has not been released to the public from what I have seen.

[LongLine]

Was hoping he was following this. 

[schreckstoff]

I'm here, and have been following closely, and learning a lot!  It really is a great discussion.

 

Regarding Spring Prey fish (Alewife) survey - 

2020 survey was canceled by administrative restrictions (COVID) and trust me no one was more pissed than me.  The silver lining was that with the help of all the cooperating anglers and captains we were able to look at the stomach data and figure out the 2019 Alewife year class was below average.  That is section 16 in this annual report: https://www.dec.ny.gov/docs/fish_marine_pdf/2020ontarioreport.pdf

 

One of the issues with the annual report is it comes out too late for decision making.  This is why we've changed the reporting and data release format.  Now the report and the data are all publicly released in Aug (or early Sep).

 

The 2021 survey results are reported here: 

http://www.glfc.org/pubs/lake_committees/ontario/Weideletal_April_PreyFishSurveyResults_AlewifeAssessment_year2021.pdf

and data here:

https://www.sciencebase.gov/catalog/item/6140e604d34e1449c5d6011a

The 2020 Alewife was as big as we've seen in 20 years.

 

The 2022 survey was a success and the results are in progress. I still have to interpret the last few hundred otoliths from the Ontario boat, re run the numbers, and get the data QC'd and ready for release. Putting this report and data out early and publicly was to increase transparency and make sure decision makers and the public had the best available, objective information for their discussions.  Keep up the constructive critiques, questions, and observations, they help us to improve our science.

 

 

 

 

 

[LongLine]

Thanx!   (What are they eating?  Fleas more nutritional than originally thought?)

[schreckstoff]

You all know what the predators are eating, For silvers almost all  Alewife but when and where other prey fish are abundant (Rainbow Smelt, Giz, Perch) they show up in diets. LT and Browns get up to a quarter of their energy from Goby but still rely on Alewife.

 

Alewife are definitely eating fleas and the correlations suggest that has caused Alewifie growth to sky rocket. I don't think I have the figure in a report anywhere, but basically once Bythotrephes abundance really increased around 2004 or 2005 then Alewife size at age increased. In some years Bytho didn't show up, and in those size at age comes back down. I've hypothesized it is partly because the fleas concentrate the energy of the smaller zooplankton, making it more efficient to feed on a larger item, but also because Bytho can be abundant waaay into the fall, essentially allowing Alewife an extra month. or 2 or 3 to feed efficiently. 

 

 

[LongLine]

Thanx!  I asked cuz i remember a few yrs ago at St of Lake meeting one of presenters suggested fleas not very good for Alewives.  

[LongLine]

Read through your report...quite interesting.  Water Authority temps much better than mid-lake buoy, however it's been my experience that temp at same depth a few miles away can be quite different.   Wish there were a lot more thermometers out there.  

 

Did some looking today & found this:

Surface temp from beginning of this year warmer than 30 yr average.  Also somewhat same for last year.

 

Did some more looking - at Historical % Ice coverage. 

www.glerl.noaa.gov/data/ice/#historical

Your report states 2012, 2016, 2020 were good years and 2014, 2017 & 2018 poor years.  I noticed that for the good years % ice coverage was relatively low and ice gone by early-mid March, whereas poor years had much greater %'s and ice lasted into end of 1st week in April.  

 

El Nino/La Nina. ???  I think La Nina usually gives us warmer weather.  I know NOAA has said this is 2nd La Nina year in a row & are predicting it'll last into 2023.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[GAMBLER]

11 hours ago, LongLine said:

Read through your report...quite interesting.  Water Authority temps much better than mid-lake buoy, however it's been my experience that temp at same depth a few miles away can be quite different.   Wish there were a lot more thermometers out there.  

 

Did some looking today & found this:

Surface temp from beginning of this year warmer than 30 yr average.  Also somewhat same for last year.

 

Did some more looking - at Historical % Ice coverage. 

www.glerl.noaa.gov/data/ice/#historical

Your report states 2012, 2016, 2020 were good years and 2014, 2017 & 2018 poor years.  I noticed that for the good years % ice coverage was relatively low and ice gone by early-mid March, whereas poor years had much greater %'s and ice lasted into end of 1st week in April.  

 

El Nino/La Nina. ???  I think La Nina usually gives us warmer weather.  I know NOAA has said this is 2nd La Nina year in a row & are predicting it'll last into 2023.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We (the water authority) have two intakes for our two plants Tom but we only go by the Temp sensor at the Plant on Dewey Ave.  Our intake at the Basket Rd facility is at the same depth and generally runs close to the other plant.  Its interesting to watch the temp changes with certain winds.  As we all know, NE or East winds bring the cold water in during the summer months.  It does the exact opposite during the winter.  It is also cool to see how rapidly temp changes when the water densities are different due to water temp.  When the water is in the 70's on top and 39 down deep, things change with very little wind.  In spring and Fall when temps are in the low 50's or colder, there is very little temp change unless we have big winds.  

[Gill-T]

The “lava lamp effect”

 

[LongLine]

Brian (Gambler) - It's been my experience that west of river at 100 Ft or so is generally colder than east of river at same depth.  I've seen 4-5 deg difference.  That's why I prefer taking a left out of the river.

[Chuck Smth]

What about the Seeforellen brown trout?  Anybody else been fishing as long as some if us and remember the predictions of 50# brown trout swimming around? What ever became of that one?