Thread: Questions for the fishery gurus

Originally Posted by D10

This is why it doesn't get better. Too many folks think the same way you do. If you don't keep dinks, who will. Everyone always wants to keep a cooler full of slabs. Sometimes this isn't the best thing for the lake. But you are entitled to fish the way you want and keep what you want (as long as it is within the regs).

Just let me know when your ready to catch a limit of dinks. Most days you can catch a jar full out of one brushpile.

Originally Posted by NIMROD

Just let me know when your ready to catch a limit of dinks. Most days you can catch a jar full out of one brushpile.

I don't discriminate. I love to catch fish, period. It's always a bonus if they are bigger, but I just LOVE to catch fish. I can have a blast catching (and eating) a stringer of longear sunfish (6 inches max) out of the Buffalo River. I am definitely coming up there this summer to fish with you. I'll help you thin some dinks out. I really want to bring my 4 year old boy up there to wrestle some whisker heads. He will probably flip out with some of those on the pole.

I'm no biologist but have fished Nimrod quite a bit in the last few years and I've often thought the fishery would be helped a lot if everyone kept everything they caught! It may be way beyond that helping, but there are so many small crappie, it seems you have to catch 100 to keep a limit of good ones. Is there any validity to that, Matt?

This reminds me of an article I wrote once on the subject that in the pertinent parts suggests to me that your lake may just be suffering from a cyclical lull as follows:

"I spoke to a fish biologist with the North Carolina Department of Wildlife Resources Commission recently about the subject who said that crappie species in some of the smaller North Carolina lakes and reservoirs sustain an annual harvest of as many as 30-40 percent of the entire 3 year old and older adult population. This should begin to show you that heavy fishing pressure (year around) over a period of just one year… can easily eradicate almost half of all mature fish in a heavily fished lake or waterway. If you look at the equation over two years time you can see that it is reasonable to think that 70-80% of all mature fish might be removed from these lakes.

He went on to say: "Overharvesting clearly affects the fish size ratios of a lake and "I think a lot of anglers assume crappies are an unlimited resource that can't be overharvested, but that's quite simply not the case at all. Crappies are prone to what is known as stunting. Because a strong year-class often dominates in a lake or reservoir, crappie might appear some years to be all of the same size or “stunted”. When these fish of a strong year-class grow large, however, the lake can quickly gain a reputation as a crappie hot spot which tends to draw more fishing pressure as the word gets around and then over the course of a couple of more years might just as quickly fade into mediocrity as a younger year class takes over again and the population crashes and the cycle starts all over again. This cycle is why you hear so much about lakes tending to have (either) a few really nice crappies and lots of small ones, or a good number of good-sized fish with few small or large ones.

It is clear that crappie populations are cyclic or erratic in (both) abundance and size distribution in any lake or waterway. When a strong year class develops in a lake, it can dominate the population for several years. Reproduction is limited and survival of young crappie is low until the dominant year class has been thinned out or environmental and hydrological conditions again become favorable for survival of young crappie. This pattern usually results in two to three years of good fishing followed by two to three years of fair to poor fishing… which may be the part of the crappie life cycle where your area lake is this year."

Good thread topic... just my two cents.

It's hard to say. But I think that if everyone kept their legal limit every time they fished out there, it wouldn't hurt.

Special K , Nimrod is an unusual lake as most years it floods big and we have huge spawns resulting in too many Crappie.

No matter how much we (biologists) think we are impacting a fishery with regulations, it pales in comparison to what mother nature doles out. Special K brought out some good points. Fish populations, especially crappie, are very cyclical. When a good sawn occurs, this results in a year class (same aged fish) that dominates anglers catches for years. Some times it doesn't matter what kind of regulations are implemented. Strange weather for several springs in a row, will have a bigger impact.

D10 thanks for your Time and good info.