Arkansas Game and Fish .....This dosn't make sense

[Chuck from arkansaw]

I was reading an old post about the way lake Charles was being managed/mis managed
as far as crappie size. The statement was made that saugeye were a good fix for stunted crappie:

we cannot stock them in Lake Charles because the saugeye could escape and start breeding with the sauger in the Black River. We will continue to gather info on this population this coming fall. We are going to be looking at specifically at diets this fall.

However :Saugeye are considered "sterile" but have been scientifically documented to have some reproductive capabilities with both saugeye, walleye, and sauger, though all in low percentages.

And: There are both walleye and sauger already in Black river...Isnt the liklihood of saugeye reproducing naturally a more likely senario for the Blackriver sauger gene pool to be corrupted by saugeye...

Therefore: There is no REAL reason not to put saugeye in lake Charles...

Seems like Game and Fish uses some pretty convoluted logic to me...

[LMBarnett]

The saugeye is a hybrid. Most hybrids are not "sterile", but usually do not exhibit high likelyhood of spawning. But the AGFC has a good point in not wanting to corrupt the gene pool of either sauger or walleye in the balck, spring, elevenpoint, and current river systems. These are very nice rivers and hold nice populations of both species. As far as saugeye being a good fix for the stunted crappie in Lake Charles, I do not think an introduced fish would help the problem. If anything it could hurt the lake as a whole. Hybrid fish eat ALOT, and who is to say they would eat the smaller crappie. It would be more likely that they would eat the few baitfish that is in the lake and then hurt the lake even further.

Just my $0.02

[Bigben7]

+1 LMBarnett

[KRAPPIE KG]

I have never understood the concept of raising Hybrids anyway. Why not concentrate on the native species. The hybrid strippers in Greers are eating machine.

[dblevens]

Frierson has saugeye and they haven't helped the crappie at all.

[NIMROD]

Our AGFC is so inconsistant it's crazy. They stocked them in Nimrod and then said it was a mistake for the same reason. I hear they were stocked in Maumelle too. I have less and less faith in the folks running the commission , the seem to contradict their own policies too often.

[Chuck from arkansaw]

The point I was trying to make was there are spawning populations of both walleye and sauger in the greater Black river watershed (current, black, spring,eleven point rivers).

I further researched the issue and found that in two large studies conducted in the Illinois, and Missouri rivers, Not only were there naturally ocurring populations of Walleye-sauger hybrids, there were backcrosses of saugeye with walleye.

I don't think it is possible that saugeye are produced naturally in the Illinois and Missouri rivers, and not in the greater Black river watershed.

In nature walleye and sauger do hybridize, so to say that there is a danger of saugeye (a mostly sterile hybrid) corrupting the sauger gene pool seems pretty sketchy, since a saugeye-sauger cross would be geneticaly more sauger than a walleye sauger cross. This issue was addressed by Bill Batten of the AFGC when asked about saugeye stocked in lake Maumelle said:

"Not to say that it would be impossible for saugeye to mix with the natives but not likely to occur to the point that it would do longterm damage to the native sauger population."

The main issue is whether introducing saugeye would be a good way to thin out undersize crappie. I know that hybrid stripers were tried in the past. I also know they produced some outstanding sportfishing till they were caught out.

If stocking saugeye in lake Charles would help the problem, the small numbers that might get into Black
river should not be the deciding factor.

[Chuck from arkansaw]

Saugeye and saugers thrive in turbid (muddy) water which describes Frierson to a "T" . I heard that AGFC was going to place a heavy emphasis on saugeye in Frierson due to their success there...2 state records in a year.

[Mojorig]

I posted this "we cannot stock them in Lake Charles because the saugeye could escape and start breeding with the sauger in the Black River. We will continue to gather info on this population this coming fall. We are going to be looking at specifically at diets this fall" about Lake Charles. We have a Walleye, Sauger, and Saugeye Management plan. This is the protocol that we must follow. If we don’t follow this protocol then we get the inconsistency that was mentioned above. In the management report, it states that we cannot stock saugeye in a water body that is connected to a waterbody that has spawning populations of sauger or walleye. This is reason why we can't stock them in Charles. Saugeye that we stock are diploid. Thus they have the potential to spawn with sauger or walleye. There is such thing as triploid saugeye, which Ohio and Kansas are currently working on. The hatching and survival rates are currently low.

This management plan is currently being revised along with our other species management plans to incorporate all the new research conducted on these species.

For Lake Frierson, we are shifting our efforts to Saugeye. They appear to be doing very well in the lake.

As always feel free to contact Sam or me at 1-877-972-5438 and we would be glad to discuss any of these issues or fishing in general. We want to see Lake Charles Crappie population get better like everyone else does.

[rockmike]

I've caught saugeye in Crown Lake. Good fish for catching and eating.