Kingme2Go

Section 1 of this report shows DEC stocking levels of domestic rainbow trout and steelhead in Lake Ontario and explains strain differences. 

https://www.dec.ny.gov/docs/fish_marine_pdf/2021ontarioreport.pdf

Skamania Steelhead were last stocked in 2021, then discontinued. 

Domestic Rainbow were last stocked in 2019, then discontinued in Lake Ontario. 

Gambler is right- a rainbow is a rainbow for regulation purposes and harvest of all are limited to 25 inches in Lake Ontario streams downstream of designated locations that are spelled out in the 2023 regulations book. 

minimum size for rainbow trout is 25 inches in most lake Ontario tributaries now. 

https://www.dec.ny.gov/things-to-do/freshwater-fishing/regulations/great-lakes-tributaries

Hatchery worker comment... I hope you are joking... Otherwise that's ridiculous.and insulting to the people who work hard to bring us the fish that we all enjoy.. I've been to the hatchery many times and literally, they have to individually sort every fish in the ladder.   If they are there, they handle them,  every one of them... one way or another. 

16 minutes ago, Goldfresh said:

Cause if its not a shiner I don't want it in with the shiners and it needs to be a different price.  

That's not a blacknose dace.This link shows one

If.you want an ID take it to your local DEC regional headquarters and get an ID from a biologist. Identification of minnows from a picture is difficult at best even if you take a good picture and know the characteristics.

Maybe this is what you are getting at Goldfresh and you want to be responsible, but If you don't know what it is, DO NOT sell it.  Below are the allowable baits for purchase in NY.  Collection, transport and sale (and use) of an unidentified bait from Maine sounds risky and may.be illegal.

https://www.dec.ny.gov/docs/fish_marine_pdf/fishguide.pdf

From the regs guide...

Greenlist

Golden shiner • Emerald shiner • Common shiner • Spottail shiner • Banded killifsh • Fathead minnow • Bluntnose minnow • Eastern silvery minnow • Northern redbelly dace • Stonecat • Tadpole madtom Blacknose dace • Longnose dace • White sucker • Northern hogsucker • Creek chub • Fallfsh • Logperch • Margined madtom • Brindled madtom 

9 hours ago, King Davy said:

Rick anybody who fishes our tribs is a stakeholder which includes the 1000’s of out of state anglers who buys a license to fish NY , stay in the lodges and motels/hotels. Eat in the restaurants.

 

Last year in September to Columbus Day the Salmon river alone had over 950k angler hours, twice more than the entire lake season and yes 2019 lake season suffered from high water but the avg angler hours on the lake the last several years has been between 3 and 400k. The Salmon river alone outpaces the lake effort.

 

When you add in all the rest of the entire trib landscape the number can be 4x the lake effort.

 

Don’t believe me call Cortland DEC and talk to Scott. I’m surprised as great a salmon angler as you are ( and I’m truly not patronizing you) you need to kill 3 steelhead per man.

 

There are more total salmon in the lake than back in the 80’s and 90’s when we didn’t have the habitat that today produces millions of wild salmon hatches.

 

You just put a report out on a tournament that you won where you were targeting two year old kings to win. Can’t eat your cake... and have it too. Once you kill that two year old..... he’ll never return as a three year old stager.

 

Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United

 

..

According to DEC reports,  effort in Tribs and Lake are about equal..

https://www.dec.ny.gov/docs/fish_marine_pdf/2019lakeontannualrep.pdf

https://www.dec.ny.gov/docs/fish_marine_pdf/lorpt16.pdf

Lake Angler Hours last ten years Apr-Sep:

905,357   898,339   848,905   937,822   980,409   879,681  787,588   709,638,   922,527   820,695

All NY Lake Ontario Tributary Angler Hours including the Salmon River (Sep-May)

2005-6          2006-7      2011-12        2015-16   

1,001,990     913,646     1,582,428     989,437

In 2018-2019, Salmon River Sept-May:  840,258 angler hours, 2nd highest ever.

Seems eveyone has an equal stake.

8 hours ago, HB2 said:

 

BINGO! 

 

My exact feelings about this said in a scientific way  about lack of returns to western basin streams . Even with  the pen efforts which do help , the fish still have the Salmon river water in their DNA . It's not that they imprint to Calidonia , its  that they don't imprint to the Salmon river . 

 

The off the mouth , pier , and stream fishery is subject to weather,water conditions even more so than the lake . 

Makes me wonder if a certain amount of fish roam the lake and when it's staging time home in on the river that they are in front of with the right conditions . We would never know this until each ports fish were marked differently . 

 

Check sections 3 of the 2015 and 2016 DEC reports for that info.

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

DEC tagged each port differently and tracked the straying back to the Salmon River hatchery and found low straying from other sites to the Salmon river or hatchery. They also looked at tags to track the source of what is caught at ports through the year and in streams in the fall.. Most strays went to streams nearby where they were stocked. 

NOAA marine offshore forecast will give wind and waves by zone.. updated every 4 hours

https://tgftp.nws.noaa.gov/data//raw/fz/fzus61.kbuf.glf.lo.txt

For nearshore... Closer than 5 miles from shore by zone including lake erie

https://tgftp.nws.noaa.gov/data/raw/fz/fzus51.kbuf.nsh.buf.txt

There's also coho salmon clipped out there. See 

https://www.dec.ny.gov/outdoor/112942.html for more info.

The 50% value was from the river harvest, not the hatchery. The %wild at the hatchery was much lower. Not many wild fish strayed into the hatchery.

From the 2014 DEC report., "The percentages of wild  fish in the  hatchery  from 2009-2014 varied by age and  year class but were generally  low with weighted (by  sample size  at each age) averages of 1.4%, 2.2%  and 14.5%  for the  2008-2010  year classes, respectively."

"The low proportions of  wild fish in the  hatchery  were in sharp contrast to the high proportions of wild Chinook  salmon found in  the Salmon  River angler harvest sample, suggesting that wild fish display  a low degree of straying into  the SRH.  Although wild fish are a substantial component of  the  Salmon River fishery, they  do not contribute  much to the hatchery broodstock..."

Coho vs Atlantic. 

Coho has a black tongue and grey gums

Atlantics tongue is light colored

Coho has spots on upper lobe of.tail

Atlantic.does not have spots on tail

Coho has more rays in the anal fin >12-15 and  Atlantic  has 9-10

Browns also have 9-10 rays but they have a square tail vs Atlantic slightly forked. Browns have thick caudal peduncle, and 2 rows of teeth on the roof of mouth vs Atlantic have one.

Steelhead have horizontal rows of small spots on both lobes of tail and a white mouth. 

Both New York and Canada tagged fish for pen project studies, and they found that the lake is a big melting pot of Kings during the spring and summer......fish caught at one port are from stockings all over the lake including Canadian fish. 

Vince:

You might want to doublecheck with your DEC source. Everyone I've talked to who was actually there when the fish were rechecked (including the pen fish) say the trailer clipping was 98-99% accurate. Maybe you are confusing "clip" with "tag" as only a portion of the kings have been tagged. See the 2010 DEC stocking report. http://www.dec.ny.gov/docs/fish_marine_ ... 0part1.pdf

Also any report I've seen on ageing of Chinooks says that Kings are age 1-4 in Lake Ontario. See section 2 of the 2010 DEC report, table A10 and A13 for age breakdowns, or section 9 for fish in the hatchery. or page 41 of the Ontario MNR report, http://www.glfc.org/lakecom/loc/mgmt_un ... 011.01.pdf

So all stocked kings in 2012 will be clipped (most, >95%) are now).

I agree that there are enough alewife to produce big Kings but John's post is right on....that stocked and wild kings may both be important parts of the fishery. Time will tell.