schreckstoff

Out at first light, went west, worked 5’-30’ with sticks on boards, 2 for 4, both browns. Caught one on bright color in the clear water, the other one on natural color in the colored water. Surf temps 43 -45, didn’t find “pockets” of temp. Did mark a few areas with a lot of marks on sounder (~14’) but couldn’t get them to hit.

“Found” the submerged pier heads in the middle of the Little Sodus launch. Had a decent cross breeze, Just bumped them as we were drifting in, no damage but be aware.

congrats and good on ya for recognizing all the folks on this site

From the report on 2017 yr data that came out in 2018. (https://www.dec.ny.gov/docs/fish_marine_pdf/lorpt17.pdf).

We can get high catches of Alewife anywhere from 165 to 500 feet, but high catches are most common around 330feet.

Emeralds Interesting, thanks Vp, Keep those observations and ideas coming! 

I hear ya on the easy winter/early spring possibly altering bait behavior. Our mid-March shakedown was a record for getting out early, hopefully that can be the norm in the future.  We were also geared up to run acoustics during the spring survey this year to measure any off-bottom fish. Hopefully we can keep that up too.

I’m jonesing for some fish gossip...anyone find anything cool in stomachs this year? Someone must be catching something interesting....?

Every Cayuga LT and LLS I’ve caught this yr has been eating ...Alewife...go figure. Yearlings that are kind of smallish...which is maybe expected.

Team West end anything cool in stomachs? Anything eating lots of smallish smelt? Any more gizz?

Rebel - Thanks for the state updates, LOU always delivers,

Went out around 3pm with family, ran sticks off boards, got 2LT and 2LLS, a great day. 39-40deg on top

ramp was ok but Uber low water. There were some stockies in the ramp circling and waiting for pellets. I think maybe 5 other rigs in the lot. 

Launched Deans 10ish, water low but ramp was Just manageable with 22’ sea nymph. 

maybe 5 other boats, some perchin’

39 on surface 

got some kinks out of the boat and rigging and managed my sons first Cayuga salmon. I was definitely more  excited than he was.

Storm t-sticks, old & new style, off boards, bright colors

I like that name!

Yes I think so, mine got wet last yr, let me go see if it works

I thought so too until I looked at the phosphorus concentration data, which doesn’t really support that idea

I’m all for viable drinking water but less nutrients = less fish, a trade off everyone needs to understand.

It’s just the section that the dock connects to.

Harbor free of ice everywhere I could see

You know if it was up to me I’d tow every day we could in the winter. Shakedown is scheduled for mid March, still a bunch of maintenance to finish. I’m getting anxious to get out there! 
 

If that warm, early spring indeed happens we will be set up for good/great Alewife reproduction this year.

Tom, I am glad you asked and you are absolutely correct that many of the initial predictions for the impacts of eating fleas were negative. And yes, you did see pictures of preyfish stomachs with LOTS of spines in them (that still happens) . But since those predictions in early/mid 2000s we have had over 10yrs and have observed increased Alewife growth and then more variable growth. See Fig 8 in that report, the changes in weight at age are striking. When we line up the timing pattern of those ups (and downs) in growth they match up incredibly well to the annual patterns in flea abundance. Preyfish  diets also suggest when fleas are abundant the fish are eating fleas late into the fall, likely  extending their growing season relative to what was available when the fleas were not present. And while fleas are not the most energetically nutritious zooplankton, they are many times bigger then the zooplankton alewife were previously eating. One way I think of it is they are compressing the energy from small zooplankton into a larger, more efficient to eat, package. This idea that size of prey Alewife eat influencing growth has been observed and suggested in L. Mich.
 

I need to qualify that this work is still ongoing. We are double checking these patterns are consistent make sense, but the current thinking is fleas have a positive effect on LO preyfish growth.

In studying and discussing  Alewife I try not to talk in absolutes, but rather have multiple possible explanations for the observed patterns. As we get more observations and data, those data support some of those explanations more than others. This increases our confidence in out conceptual understanding how the system works, but almost never conclusively proves one idea over another. Critical to this process is to constantly reevaluate our ‘conceptual model’ for how the system is working  with different sources of data. This is one of the reasons the preyfish group has engaged anglers who are on the water a lot,to understand where their observations matches or sometimes don’t  fit our conceptual understanding. Where they don’t fit is where we often learn new things. 

Tom thanks for asking, my previous reply should not have been so short and definitely should have acknowledged how our thinking on fleas has changed. Time For me to stop with my science blather and go watch some internet deer hunting videos.

bw

Alewives do eat fleas but unfortunately do not grow big & healthy eating them as they have very low nutritional value.  

The idea that LO Alewife growth is diminished by 'fleas' is not well supported by the results illustrated in Figure 8 of this report:

http://www.glfc.org/pubs/lake_committees/ontario/2019_preliminary_status_of_Lake_Ontario_Alewife.pdf 

👍 

Awesome video as always. A great way to promote the fishery!

I was most interested in you screens! In your experience is that typical to seethe Alewife  on the bottom this time of year off Toronto ?  I’m always curious about the timing of when Alewife head to bottom in fall/winter and if they stay on bottom once they are there  or if they are just finding the warmer water as  the lake flips. 

What was the final tally of Meat vs Rocket?

bw

👍 for muskiedreams ideas

The Fish Community Objectives document Lucky linked to is a great source for Understanding Lake Ontario fisheries.

Another easy place to find information is this page: http://www.glfc.org/lake-ontario-committee.php. Besides having the documents Lucky posted it has links to other reports and recorded presentations. Each Great Lake has a page like this, they are great sources of info about fisheries & mgmt.

rdebadts- I definitely hear u about the spatial “holes” in the trawl survey, we are trying to fill it all in. If you look at old reports you’ll see the survey historically only sampled to Olcott. We  added the Bar transect and extended it deeper when the survey went whole lake. North shore still has the biggest unsampled areas & we have a trawl site recon mission for the Brighton area planned.

That said, the survey  indicies are lakewide averages, weighted by lake area, so even if a relatively small unsampled area has a higher Alewife abundance it , it doesn’t change the average lakewide abundance as much a you might think. 

I learn a ton out of the questions and comments posted on this site (thank you hosts & mods). I try to think about all our survey work like this Edmund Burke quote: “He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper”.

Don’t stop the thoughtful critiques!

Sorry, there were some details missing from my previous question.

Lake Ontario scientists are discussing ways we might index juvenile (age0) salmon.  This is all just in the discussion phase.  We have some field obervations but few of the historic surveys sample in ways we would expect to catch them.  We're reading literature from the west coast surveys and Lake Michigan.  We realize anglers try NOT to catch them, but we figured someone might have some opinions or ideas where they commonly encounter these small kings (12 inches or so) in late August, September, November. We are wondering what depths and what lake regions you have observed these small Kings.

Feel free to PM me if you don't feel like posting.  Thanks to Capt V, GillT for some great ideas. 

Thanks in advance,

bw

Ah, ok wrong use of shaker. We are wondering where, if ever, folksget those smaller ones? Do those have a name? 

We are reviewing habitat and methods other people use to catch that size in the fall. In the pacific they  mostly mega trawls that Can sweep surface down to 60’ with one trawl.

Let’s hypothetically say you were trying to catch shaker kings in Lake Ontario in September, where would you troll? What depth or temperature? Offshore or nearshore? West, east? What baits would you use?

By shaker, I mean the 6” - 12” fish that were either stocked or came out of the streams this spring.  I realize no one targets them,  but has anyone witnessed a pattern where they frequently run into these sized King’s in fall?

Thanks in advance for any ideas,

bw

Legacy thanks for posting the report link.

The 2019 report is meant to be ‘just the facts’. If anyone is interested in More details on how survey are conducted check out the annual reports that can be found here:

https://www.dec.ny.gov/outdoor/27068.html

and here:

http://www.glfc.org/loc_mgmt_unit/

The scientists learn a lot by reading the different observations posted on these forums. Questions posted here help everyone to learn more!