Food for thought on Big Crappies

[itchmesir]

How did that 11 1/2 inch crappie ever survive the pan for 10 years? If you want some fish to eat definetly do so ,I prefer to keep sunnies from 5 to 7 inches. Is this stunting the fish, should I realease these and only keep the 8 to 9 inch fish and so on? Does anybody know the answer? From what I have searched it seems kinda up in the air. I caught alot of sunfish with deformed spines this year on bb lake, from search engine, causes - pollution- overpopulation-lack of food. I will go by the limits and regs the dnr sets. Do they know the answer? If they do just do what needs to be done.

that doesn't seem to be a part of the topic that has not been brought up in this discussion i believe.. maybe some of your lakes just don't have ample food for the sunfish.. therefor they are not growing as big and plump as one would want.. if there is more fish than food.. then obviously they are going to be stunted.. a heavy carp population would be one factor that would lower food levels in certain lakes.. do some of these metro lakes maybe have too many invasive that are depleting sources of food for native fish to eat? it's definitely not just angling practices to blame for lack of big fish

[BrdHunter01]

I just brought up the idea of a closed panfish season as a last resort or something I could possibly see the DNR imposing on certain lakes and possibly statewide if people are out to fill freezers. Luckly people do care about the resource and can limit themselves to selective harvest when these fish are vulnerable during the spawn.

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I'm not sure if I misunderstood this post or if your just blind? If you read through the forums on here you will read many story's of people catching and keeping way over there limit of small, medium, and big crappies.... There are many "old timers" or locals (to a certain lake) that hog fish during the spring spawn. These ppl DO go back day after day and keep buckets FULL of fish! Just because you and I practice selective harvest doesn't mean everyone does! Not even close!

[PEATMOSS]

Originally Posted By: itchmesir

like PEATMOSS said.. if you don't like the fishing conditions.. find new water

If everyone lived by that there wouldn't be any good water left. Special regs imposed on certain lakes wouldn't make everyone mad would it? Sure it's more regs on an already highly regulated sport, but we are still debating quality here.

It won't ever happen. Too many people(or more likely their wives)are simply unwilling to make the sacrifices needed to live in the remote areas where the best fishing is.

Nothing wrong with a few experimental lakes, just so we don't get carried away and start managing the whole resource for those that consider fish to be their playthings.

The problem with managing for "quality" is the fact that we can't agree on what that magical buzzword everyone is so fond of actually means.

[PEATMOSS]

Originally Posted By: Bluegill1510

I just brought up the idea of a closed panfish season as a last resort or something I could possibly see the DNR imposing on certain lakes and possibly statewide if people are out to fill freezers. Luckly people do care about the resource and can limit themselves to selective harvest when these fish are vulnerable during the spawn.

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I'm not sure if I misunderstood this post or if your just blind? If you read through the forums on here you will read many story's of people catching and keeping way over there limit of small, medium, and big crappies.... There are many "old timers" or locals (to a certain lake) that hog fish during the spring spawn. These ppl DO go back day after day and keep buckets FULL of fish! Just because you and I practice selective harvest doesn't mean everyone does! Not even close!

What you are describing is an illegal activity and imposing MORE laws and regulations to combat it makes about as much sense a using gun control laws to control crime.

[delcecchi]

Due to excessive harvest on the few fishing areas in Olmsted county, the following rules were added this year

Rochester-Olmsted County Area Lakes (Olmsted

County) includes: Bear Crek Reservoir (Chester

Woods), Cascade Lake (Cascade Ponds), Foster Arend

Lake, Gamehaven Lake (Boy Scout Lake or Willow

Reservoir No. 4), Kalmar Reservoir, Quarry Hil

Nature Center Pond, Manor Woods Pond (Country

Club Pond), Silver Lake, Silver Creek Reservoir,

Wilow CREEK Reservoir. The daily and possession limits

for the following species apply to the waters listed above as a whole,

that is, only one daily and possession limit may be taken from the

group of waters that comprise the Rochester-Olmsted County Area

Lakes.

Sunfish, black and white crappie, yellow perch: combined

possession limit 10, and only 5 may be black or white crappie.

Largemouth or smallmouth bass: possession limit one. Northern

pike: possession limit one

[fisherdog19]

I'm not sure where anyone called fish "play things", we all like to fish and most like to eat some as well. There are far more people that live in areas where it is nearly impossible to catch quantities of decent sized fish, I for one am fortunate to not be one of them. That being said, it is becoming harder to find water with decent sized fish in them, thus the possible need for some stricter regulations to protect the resource. Maybe not a statewide deal, but in certain lakes it would work wonders. I enjoy catching fish much more than I enjoy keeping and cleaning them, and I certainly enjoy catching larger fish than a bunch of stunted potato chips. That is what I think people are getting at here, they would like the enjoyment of catching larger fish for the fun of it, not just for the table.

[kotadust]

Why would it have to be that someone is trying to FEED their family on fishing. I doubt very seriously that anyone here is trying to maintain their family's entire food source on fishing ..........But it can help to supplement ones food source and depending were they are taken they are a healthy food source.

Some ppl just down right enjoy eating fish and if I can enjoy myself catching it at the same time as providing some food for me and my kids then so be it.

Seeing i have had 98% of my fishing equipment for quite a while it does help to supplement putting food on the table that I don't have to pay outrageous prices for(especially the prices for fish). It helps even more that I dig most of my own worms and try (key word there lol) to trap as many of my own minnows as I can, I am also looking in to learning how to try and trap or catch leeches this year also to keep my fishing as inexpensive as I can at the moment.

I can honestly say that I have never fished only to try and catch a trophy. I have never mounted a fish and more then likely never will.

I never have a freezer full of fish cause heck they never last long enough to make it in the freezer (and just to be clear no i am not catching a limit every day and then eating fish every day even I whom i must say does love fish would get sick of that real fast I have maybee 2 meals a week through the summer of fish some times less)I catch them today I eat them today or tomorrow usually lol(fresh fish is just to dang good to wait for when ya have it). Now I don't have anything against ppl who want a trophy .......as long as that's not all the fish is getting used for IF it is to be killed in the process.

Now that being said I also agree that there does need to be a certain amount of regulation ...but some ppl just want to get stupid with it and from what I have seen and heard most of those ppl are the ones who really don't care about eating what they catch, all they are worried about is getting the biggest fish in the lake.

If I am wrong I am sorry just stating what I have seen in my experience

[Shawn Kellett]

Why is it so tough for some people to get their head out of the 50's? We have so much good data on our fisheries now that if people were to just open their minds a little the over all fishery in this state could get even better!

People always put the "food on the table" argument against the "trophy" argument. Sorry, but 6" crappies and 4" sunfish and 22" pike aren't good for either!!! Now if we changed a few things we could probably get those averages up a few inches and most everyone would be happier. The net gain for those that like to eat fish could be realized and those of us who are sick of catching nothing but potato chip pannies and hammer handles would be too. This argument doesn't have to be an either/or you know...

DTRO, if we lifted all the restrictions our fishery would be decimated in a matter of a couple years. Greed is human nature and there are enough anglers out there that would exploit it just as they always have.

[FutbolGuru]

Well said Shawn. I would hope your post will end this thread....

[Bluegill1510]

Quote:

I'm not sure if I misunderstood this post or if your just blind? If you read through the forums on here you will read many story's of people catching and keeping way over there limit of small, medium, and big crappies.... There are many "old timers" or locals (to a certain lake) that hog fish during the spring spawn.

Brd...No I am not blind at all I do realize and do know that overharvesting of bluegills and crappies does happen during the spawn. I mean I don't have to even read stories on here to know that, I've heard them over the years form old timers and even seen it happen years ago when I was a kid, when you don't know better or even heard of TIP. I just said my comment to illustrate that the guys on these forums really care about the resource and get it that you release the big breeders, and its catching on! I met quite a lot of good friends in college who could care less to bring fish home and just went to go fishing even if they did catch big panfish or hundreds of fish each outing. The younger generations of fisherman are getting it, and selective harvest is slowly catching on.

If these guys are going back day after day then we all should do something about it when it happens and help a CO out and call it in.

[PEATMOSS]

Why is it so tough for some people to get their head out of the 50's? We have so much good data on our fisheries now that if people were to just open their minds a little the over all fishery in this state could get even better!

People always put the "food on the table" argument against the "trophy" argument. Sorry, but 6" crappies and 4" sunfish and 22" pike aren't good for either!!! Now if we changed a few things we could probably get those averages up a few inches and most everyone would be happier. The net gain for those that like to eat fish could be realized and those of us who are sick of catching nothing but potato chip pannies and hammer handles would be too. This argument doesn't have to be an either/or you know...

DTRO, if we lifted all the restrictions our fishery would be decimated in a matter of a couple years. Greed is human nature and there are enough anglers out there that would exploit it just as they always have.

No one is lookiing to go back to the 50's or even the 70's. We've learned so much in such a short time. I remember the fishing magazines in the 70's with photos of the Lindners, Roland Martin etc. all hoisting stringers loaded with huge specimens of every fish. Both our understanding of fisheries biology and our mentality has changed dramatically since those times. The vast majority of us now understand the importance of selective harvest and embrace sound management of our resources.

That being said, there seem to be those who wish to push further and further towards what can only be described as trophy management.We are seeing the same trend in deer hunting. Those of us that do not fish and hunt simply for amusement are starting to stand up and question the mentality of management practices that reduce wild critters to our personal playthings.

In my lifetime, I have seen the Crappie limit drop from 30 to 15 to 10, how much lower do we really need to go? Further, why is it always harvest that needs to be adjusted? If folks are really truly concerned about the resource, why not put methodology on the table?

[OnAFly]

If you have a finite number of fish in the state, and a growing number of fisherman, one would think you would need to reduce limits as the amount of fishermen grows to keep the same amount if harvest.

Apparently we need to go as low as the number of fishermen in the state dictates.

My last question on this thread:

There are closed seasons for every other game fish out there. Why not have a closed season for panfish? They've become nearly as popular as anything else.

[Shawn Kellett]

OnAFly, I believe panfish are MORE popular then anything else. I'll look for those numbers.

"Why is it always harvest that needs to be adjusted"

Because it's the harvest of fish and it's impact on the remaining members of that species as well as the rest of the fishery that is the issue. It takes time to replace fish that are harvested plain and simple. Also, ecosystems can only feed so many mouths of a given size at any given time. All the while our ability to locate and catch fish has grown exponentially, especially for panfish where intelligent icefishing has really caught on as well as our "right" to fish and harvest them 365. If we don't harvest with a plan that takes what we know about a species and the ramification of that resource being removed we alter the fishery, usually for the worse.

When I really "got it" was when I was a kid and we used to harvest buckets of crappies out of Green Lake in Spicer. We'd go out in the afternoon and pound them. We'd clean them, eat them for dinner and go back out. We usually had 3-4 boats each with 3-4 people taking their limit. Fast forward 5 years and we stopped catching them. Nobody could figure it out why this spot didn't have fish on it "like it used to". People will keep what we let them (and some keep more). That's the nature of people, especially in certain areas of the state. If you don't address this as a bag limit issue, then how can you?

[DTro]

DTRO, if we lifted all the restrictions our fishery would be decimated in a matter of a couple years. Greed is human nature and there are enough anglers out there that would exploit it just as they always have.

I really don't think so.

Just look to Iowa. Up until recently there was no bag limit on panfish, yet you could go down there regularly and catch 10" gills on one of the most popululated lakes. There are not enough fisherman to decimate the states population of fish in only a couple of years.

[PEATMOSS]

Shawn, I'd be very curious to see exactly what you have in mind for managing pannies. Maybe we agree more than I think we do, maybe not.

[Getanet]

I'd prefer to see education and peer pressure take the lead on this as opposed to increased regulations. Most lakes can't sustain the kind of pressure Shawn described, and I think younger anglers are more aware of this then older generations.

If the limit was reduced to 5 crappies that wouldn't be a meal for a family of 4. Heck, it might not be a meal for 2 people.

[Shawn Kellett]

Peat, I think that there probably isn't a silver bullet to this problem, if there was it'd be shot by now. There's probably going to have to be a multi-prong approach to problems like these. I know a lot of people in the DNR and have some "inside" information on some of the lakes by me, especially Minnetonka.

For example: on tonka most bluegills for all practical purposes stop growing at around 5-6". There's a couple schools of thought as to why that is:

1. when big bull gills are pulled off their beds the "sneakers" are allowed to either spawn or eat the eggs protected by that fish. Also, when we as size selective anglers keep the biggest, most fit specimens then the smaller fish are going to thrive. When small fish spread their genes you're going to get more small fish. Genetics 101.

Possible Solutions: smaller limits and/or close spawning season and/or slots

2. When milfoil took over the lake it created more cover for bluegills to evade predation. When you have all these small mouths to feed and no predation you're going to probably get stunting unless you have a large forage base. Even if that were the case the bluegills would still probably over populate at some point.

Possible Solutions: Try to affect habitat change to the advantage of predators and/or change the habitat to increase the forage abundance.

Truth of the matter it that it's probably some of both of these factors as well as some others we don't know about.

Now here's the kicker that brings this full circle to all anglers. The most destructive force in this lake is the stunted sunnies. What's happening out there is that since they're so abundant they're very hard on the natural reproduction of all other species in the lake. Stocking walleye fry in that lake is a waste of time. Muskie fry don't have a chance and the perch population (great forage base for all sport fish way better then sunfish) isn't even close to what it used to be 20 years ago out there from the DNR people I've talked to. So in this case the change in how we manage the sunfish in tonka can have an effect on the rest of the species in the lake.

These are the lessons we've learned over the last 50 years that many in the "I fish for food camp" either aren't informed about or simply don't care. I love eating fish, but I also think that we have to be smarter about our harvest then we did in the past. We need to look at how each species population dynamics change when we harvest different year classes. We should then target the sizes of fish that will lead to long term stability of the species and ecosystem. If we do that we will all be winners.

[OnAFly]

Well put.

[PEATMOSS]

Shawn, I'm still at a loss as far as understanding where you're coming from and exactly what it is you are proposing. If you're looking for some special regs to combat a specific management issue on specific bodies of water, like 'Tonka, I couldn't agree with you more. If you're proposing a further reduction in statewide bag limits or other one-size-fits-all restrictions, then I'd have to disagree.

As a side note, I've got to say that I'm a little put off by the tone of your posts. I don't know if it's intentional or not, but you seem pretty condensending towards those that might disagree with you. Those that fish primarily c&r are not nescessarily more enlightened, better stewards of the resource or sitting on higher moral ground and your assertions to the contrary are only going to deteriorate our conversation.

Among the "fish to eat" crowd, as you refer to us,there are resposnsible anglers and there are still some that don't understand the importance of sustainable harvest. There are also some flat out greedy, mangy, slobs. Likewise, among the c&r crowd there are responsible anglers and those that are so driven to run up their numbers that they fail to take into consideration the conditions they are fishing in and the effects of their practices.

[Shawn Kellett]

No disrespect whatsoever. My point is that to fix some of the problems we have there needs to be an acceptance of the data that we have gathered and a willingness to do what is necessary to maintain a quality fishery (for both harvest and "quality") for our children and their children, etc. I probably am a bit jaded from banging my head against the wall arguing with people who just want to do what they want and bleep the rest of the anglers out there.

I used Tonka as an example, but there are probably many (maybe most) lakes that could do with a special reg to get the lakes into a self-sustaining balance between anglers demands and what the ecosystem can provide. That is a huge task and probably not going to happen with the deduction in funds that the DNR is seeing right now.

[PEATMOSS]

On our lakes that are highly monitored, like Minnetonka special regs may prove useful. Further, it doesn't hurt to set aside a few lakes as "trophy" lakes. Beyond that, I'd leave things as they are for numerous reasons. Any disagreement with that?

[DTro]

Without proper enforcement, regs are pretty much meaningless.

The double dippers and trippers will continue to take as many as they want.

[Jim Uran]

As a side note, I've got to say that I'm a little put off by the tone of your posts. I don't know if it's intentional or not, but you seem pretty condensending towards those that might disagree with you. Those that fish primarily c&r are not nescessarily more enlightened, better stewards of the resource or sitting on higher moral ground and your assertions to the contrary are only going to deteriorate our conversation.

[Tom7227]

Round and around and around without much in the line of sciense.

Please Google Bass Harvest, An Essential Management Tool For Lake Owners and then read the article. Yes, it is about bass and not panfish. But it does provide a pretty decent idea of what needs to be done to promote large fish. The answer is to miinimize the number of fish in a given body of water to keep a balance in place on the amount of food vs the amount of fish. If you read the research you will learn a lot.

[PEATMOSS]

Agreed Peatmoss, I never said it was a personal attack and your comments are great and welcomed.

Or not.

Do you have some specific ideas regarding the subject you'd like to weigh in with or are you going to wait around to poke a sharp stick in my other eye?