Thread: Reduced limits on KY and Barkley Lakes

Gas prices are going to hurt the fishing economy. Driving down the road, there are a lot of boats for sale.
I think Kent. wildlife does a whole lot more than TN Wildlife. What ever KY does, TN will follow. TN raised the price of liscense last year. I have not seen anything done to help the crappie fisherman, for the price hike. KY says the spawn wasn't good in 05 and 06. I fished a lot in that time frame. Water levels were very consistent and there should have not been a problem with weather or water levels either year, at least around Camden, TN. We have caught more crappie in the last 3 years than we have in our life. But all that happened becasue for the last 5 years we have worked our butts off building matts and putting them in the right areas. That is what the fisherman who catch fish consistently do. The folks who catch 10 and have a good day, do nothing or very little to help themselves catch more. Then gripe and want to cut limits, for the people that do catch more. Jealousy

I don’t have any strong opinions on the limit change. This would have effected me only 3 times this year and this has been my best year yet. I have only caught the limit once in my life. I did have a concern about the ones that are able to catch the 20 fish limit. I wondered if a lot of culling would be going on, reducing the largest egg layers. I am sure that the officials considered this.
They have been wanting comments on the proposed changes for a while. Out of 43 E-Mails only 2 have opposed the reduction.
I did read the article that Rister wrote about the lack of small fish in their serveys and this shocked me because everyone that fished in the area I fish (including myself) had to catch 4-6 fish to get a keeper. When I would mention this to others (including guides) they said that the serveys were taken someware else. Maybe the population is not as bleak as they think. I also hope that Politics are not involved.

Politics is where it all started some of the big wigs from KDFWL could not go and catch the limit or get close .

I just noticed that I made a mistake, instead of 43 E-mails it was 45........something that I ment to post was something that Paul Rister said that suprised me “Our studies have shown that fishing mortality is around 74 percent annually,” Rister said. “In other words, for every 100 keeper crappie that you’ve got swimming around out there, 74 of them will get caught and harvested this year.”

This came out of an article in the paper in March

I would have to disagree with the 74% statement. In looking at the electronic tracking survey in 03, almost all of those fish were tracked every week for a long period of time. If 74% were caught , how coiuld that be?

Hey Jigboy, If your not pleased with the new crappie limits on kentucky lake, wait till you see the Canadian daily limits, and it makes no differance how long your there one days is all you bring back. Have a great trip, It's important for dads and sons to be together.

If there is a problem, then Government intervention is not the solution.

Jigboy has a good point with the tagging permit system with payout. Use the payouts to support a Crappie broodery on private land and work with the state on stocking crappie. Just gotta get the right people together.

Regarding people keeping undersized fish. Keep the Game Warden's phone number handy and let them know what's going on. If you believe in the limits do what your conscience tells you to do.

We have a limit of 15 on Table Rock with a 10" limit. It works well for our fishery and I rarely get a limit per person in the boat. 15 fish over 10" is plenty of meat for a days work. We used to fish Kentucky in the spring during spring break and it was rare to have more than 15 per person. I'm not sure the limit of 20 will make that much of a difference.

We all have to remember that the lake was created for so called ' Flood Control ' and not for recreation. (Interesting that the Government fix to flood control is to permanently flood the area that would flood.) So it'll depend on the relationship between your Wildlife Managers and the Corps. to work together. Here in Missouri, our DNR works with the Corps on lake levels in the spring to enhance spawn for BASS and other gamefish. They do a good job at holding the lakes steady during the spring. Unfortunately our poor spawns the past couple years were due more to weather fluctuations than the lake level.

Question though. What's made KY so much clearer the past decade? Is all the introduced vegetation filtering the water?


G.

Originally Posted by Kit Papermouth

Question though. What's made KY so much clearer the past decade? Is all the introduced vegetation filtering the water?


G.

All the soil is gone from the shore and changing agricultural practices reduce soil erosion into the water.