Thread: Would you support this ?

I am having a good time on Ky Lake. I have caught a lot of fish.

I've been coming down here for 37 years on vacations. But now that I live here, I plan on fishing every chance I get.

Hopefully this thread will get people thinking about what fish they want to keep and what fish they don't.

I believe the crappie Population on KY Lake is healthy right now. But I just wonder what it is going to be like in 10 or 20 years.


I was fishing last week in the Tennessee portion of KY Lake. And I talked to some guys, who claimed they had caught and took home over 250 crappie during a 2 week period.

I started thinking about this. And thought if 2 men can take 250 crappie out of KY Lake in just a few weeks.

Imagine how many fish, tens of thousands of fisherman can take out of KY Lake each year.

Originally Posted by prister

Some good discussion on regulations so far, but let me throw in some angler attitude facts and biology. As for bass, the trend we see is actually too much catch and release. Now don't throw tomatoes at me for that comment. But here is the problem. A typical creel survey on KY Lake shows that only 23% of the harvestable size bass (> 15 inches) are harvested. So right now, 77% of the legal bass caught, are released. The bass fishery can withstand greater harvest than that. By removing a few more bass, allows the others to grow bigger. The smaller the body of water the truer that statement is. Think of the fishery like the economy; supply and demand. The supply of shad (forage) versus the demand (bass wanting to eat). We have a great abundance of shad in the lake, which supports an excellent bass fishery. Could it be better if we released more bass? Probably not. You also have to factor in growth season and genetics. The lakes have the potential to produce the occasional 10 pounds, and periodically an 11 pounder. With the data we collect, when there are large year classes their average growth will be a little slower, as compared to a year class with less fish. So, it is ok to harvest a bass. But that is not to say catch and release has not helped. It has. I might sound like a politician on that issue; going both ways. But, anglers should not be scared that keeping a limit of bass on an occasion is going to crash the population.

As for crappie in comparison, creel survey data indicates only 4% of the harvestable (>10 inches) crappie that are caught, are released. The exploitation study (tagging study, 2003) that we did indicated that harvest mortality was around 41%. So for every 100 crappie we tagged, 41 were caught. But then you have to factor in that some anglers did not send in their tags (reporting error), some tagged fish lost their tag (tag loss) and a few tagged crappie might have died (tagging mortality); so then harvest mortality could be as high as 74%. Similar results were seen in a study conducted in 1988, before the 10 inch size limit. This is high for fishing mortality, but the opposite of this, which would be bad, is to have high natural mortality. High natural mortality would suggest that regulations are too protective and therefore the crappie are just dying of old age. Like at Lake Weiss, fishing mortality in 1991 was estimated at 34%, while total annual mortality was 73%. Fishing mortality accounted for only 20% of the annual mortality. Therefore at that time, their study suggested that harvest restrictions were not warranted. Now that is a 20 year old study I reference, so things may have changed since then at Lake Weiss. That just happen to be a research paper I had read. At KY Lake, we have high harvest mortality and good growth, which indicates we need harvest restrictions, which we have. If we went with a higher size limit, our harvest mortality would go down, and natural mortality would go up. Crappie are short lived fish. Old age for a crappie would be around 5 or 6, though we see some up to age 10. However, in last years sample, crappie 12 inches in length ranged between 3 and 9 years old (average is age 5). So you can see genetics also plays a role in fish growth. We have aged some 15 inch crappie, and they were 8 years old. The crappie are sexually mature at age 2, and the 10 inch size limit is protecting crappie to age 3 and 4. So, most will get off 1, if not 2, spawns before being harvestable size. Yes, protecting them a few more years might make sense, but the biology does not support it. Reducing the limit during March –May, also makes sense, but makes enforcement and regulations more difficult. I wish regulations were a simple process, but to change a regulation due to governmental bureaucracy, takes almost 2 fishing season. If we felt a reduction in creel was needed, we would do it across the board for the whole year. But we are not to that point yet. Should we reduce the limit to 10? It might help. But this process of fishing regulation sometimes seems to be 10% biology and 90% angler attitude. It is a balancing act. We have to manage the population for sustainable yield, while keeping the angler happy and buying a license. You have to think, at what point does the limit have to be reduce, for you to say the limited number of fish is no longer worth the cost of a license. So then you give up fishing, or at least buying a license.

Here is another study to supports my theory about crappie at KY and Barkley lakes. Every few years there could potentially be a good year class due to population densities; however you then have to factor in environmental conditions that affect spawns. In other words, just because you have a lot of spawning potential (lots of adult fish in population) does not mean you will have strong year classes. Actually, having moderate spawning potential should produce stronger year classes, if spawning conditions are favorable (water level not fluctuating and no cold fronts).

Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci. 58(3): 594–601 (2001) | doi:10.1139/cjfas-58-3-594 | © 2001 NRC Canada
Quasi-cycles in crappie populations are forced by interactions among population characteristics and environment
Micheal S. Allen and Leandro E. Miranda

Abstract: Crappie (Pomoxis spp.) populations have been characterized as cyclic, with strong year-classes recurring at 2- to 4-year intervals. We evaluated the potential for cyclic trends in crappie populations using a population model that included a density-dependent stock recruitment function and random environmental variation. Slow, medium, and fast growth were simulated over 100 years. The model predicted highly variable recruitment that was strongly influenced by environmental fluctuation at low and intermediate stock densities. At high stock density, recruitment was low, even if environmental conditions were favorable. Significant quasi-cycles occurred, but they were not sustained throughout the time series due to random environmental fluctuation. Quasi-cycles occurred because intermediate stock density and favorable environmental conditions occasionally combined to produce a very strong year-class that greatly increased stock density in the following 1–3 years and produced low recruitment, even if environmental conditions were favorable. Empirical data from 32 years of sampling age-0 crappies at Ross Barnett Reservoir showed trends similar to the simulated fluctuations. We conclude that crappie populations likely do not exhibit true cycles but may show quasi-cycles as a result of the interaction between random fluctuations in environment and density-dependent mechanisms. The frequency of such quasi-cycles may be enhanced by rapid growth and high exploitation.

I just wanted to quote that to see what it would look like....LOL:D Thanks for your time prister! You know your stuff.

Originally Posted by Kentucky Lake

Imagine how many fish, tens of thousands of fisherman can take out of KY Lake each year.

Now imagine how many pounds of fish are in a 160,000 acre lake with a drainage area as large as KY Lake.

Something to ponder; because we will never know exactly how many crappies are in KY or Barkley lakes. In the last few years that we have conducted creel surveys on KY Lake, the annual harvest of crappie was estimated to be around 300,000 (I rounded up). Now just for the fun of it, let's imagine that our creel surveys are not very accurate, and they actually underestimated the harvest. So let’s double the annual harvest to 600,000.

One of my research projects while at Murray State was to estimate the fecundity of crappie (i.e. how many eggs did the females have). As you would expect, the number of eggs varied. The number of eggs ranged from around 32,000 to well over 100,000. The bigger fish had more, of course. The average (best I can remember off the top of my head) for a 2-3 year old crappie was 72,000. Now I know that not all the eggs will be laid, and not all the eggs will survive to age 1. The actually number that survive depends on a few different variables, so we don't actually know how many survive. But let’s guess low. Let’s estimate only 1% of a female crappie’s eggs will make an age 1 crappie. So that would be about 720, age 1 crappie produced per adult female. And, then we could determine that we only needed 834 females to replace the annual harvest. So, I hope you can see where I am going with this. There are definitely more than 834 females in the lake; therefore there is a bunch of crappie in the lake. Even if you said only 0.1% of the eggs laid produced an age 1 crappie, you would still only need 8,334 females.
We have done bass sampling were we compared hook and line to electrofishing. Working with TVA biologist, we would block off a cove with a net, let the average bass anglers fish the cove for about an hour. Count their fish. Then sample the area with electrofishing. The anglers lost. Their catch was in the teens, while our catch was in the hundreds.

Some of you guys are great fishermen, but you never see a drop in the bucket of what is really in the lake.

We have watched anglers fish an area with no catch, then electrofish it and numerous fish (crappie, bass) come rolling up. Don't mean to put any of you good fisherman down, but the same thing happens to me. The worst part of my job is that I know the fish are there, I just can't get them to bite.

So does Uncle Lee's carry this electrofishing gear?

Reducing possession limits might destroy crappie fishing. I agree with Prister when he said it could cause some people to not buy a license and hang it up. I love catching crappie and eating them too.

It would hurt our feelings if we realized how much each crappie fillet was costing us in licenses, gas, rods, reels, baits, etc. We do it because we love to be on the water and the "thump" a nice crappie gives when he takes your bait.

I've made several trips this year where I've returned a few very good fish because there wasn't enough to make it worth the time to clean them. I also hate to kill a fish that is legal at 10 inches but doesn't have much meat on his bones.

I think we will see a change in regs. in how many poles a fisherman can use in the next few years. This could help keep the sport in sportfishing.

Mr. Prister might tell us if making certain bays off limits to fishing would make a difference in an increase in crappie over a few years. From what he's already told us, I doubt it.

Right now we may just be in a down cycle. Unfortunately, I agree with the post that we may have a much more serious threat to worry about if the Asian carp and other exotic species aren't controlled.

I do know that one of the worst things that can happen is to lose the support of fishermen. If we're not able to enjoy what we do, we'll do something else and spend our money elsewhere.

If Mr. Prister has any ideas to share that fishermen can do to help the fishery, I'd appreciate if he would share them. My understanding is one the that helps is all fishermen would add cover to the lake (trees, brush, etc., crappie can use for cover)

Fishing helps me forget all the things I've had to deal with all week. Catching some good fish that are great on the table is icing on the cake.

The problem is even if a lot of crappie lay eggs, a lot of the fish that hatch will be eaten by other fish.

I read a study, I believe it was conducted on toledo bend lake in Texas. They estimated that less than 3% of crappie hatchlings survive their first year in the lake. Other species such as Bass, and shad and even bluegill ate them.


If tens of thousands of fish are caught each year out of KY Lake, by lowering the limit on fish people can keep, or by just simply raising the size of crappie to 12 inches you could save tens of thousands of fish per year.

Originally Posted by Bronson

I think we will see a change in regs. in how many poles a fisherman can use in the next few years. This could help keep the sport in sportfishing.

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Now your really gonna stur up a stink!