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GAMBLER

GAMBLER
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mudflat

mudflat

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DEC Delivers press release

DEC Delivers Press Release - Information to keep you connected and informed from the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation

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DEC Announces 2020 Lake Ontario Chinook Salmon and Lake Trout Stocking

State Adjusts 2020 Stocking Plans to Maintain Lake Ontario's World-Class Fishery

Sport Fishery Continues to Produce Record Catch Rates and Thriving Populations

New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) Commissioner Basil Seggos today announced the state's plans for fish stocking in Lake Ontario to ensure the lake remains one of the top fishing destinations in the country. Lake Ontario offers opportunities to catch trophy-sized fish from a wide variety of species, including Chinook and Coho salmon, steelhead, brown trout, lake trout, Atlantic salmon, bass, walleye, and panfish. To ensure these species continue to thrive and to address a further projected population decline of alewife, a crucial prey fish, DEC's 2020 stocking of Chinook salmon and lake trout into Lake Ontario will be reduced by 20 percent. More than 3.6 million salmon and trout will be stocked in 2020, and DEC remains committed to supporting Lake Ontario's world-class sport fishery as part of its adaptive management approach to ensure its continued success.

"This past year, salmon and trout fishing in Lake Ontario was outstanding, and DEC remains committed to ensuring that the ecological, recreational, and economic benefits of this sport fishery are sustained through science-based management," Commissioner Seggos said. "New York's Lake Ontario fishery represents the best of the best, and we intend to maintain our world-class status. The adjustments announced today represent our commitment to an adaptive management approach for the long-term sustainability of the fishery. I am optimistic that fishing will be exceptional in 2020, and encourage anglers to take advantage of this extraordinary resource."

Effectively managing for the long-term sustainability of the trophy Chinook salmon fishery requires balancing predator numbers with available alewife as prey.

Scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey, Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, and DEC forecasted declines in the adult alewife population following the relatively severe winters of 2013-14 and 2014-15, that contributed to poor alewife reproductive success. Managers documented strong alewife reproduction in 2016; however, these fish now appear to be under intense predation pressure and scientists have forecasted a further decline in the adult alewife population in 2020, due to the diminishing 2016 alewife year class and relatively poor alewife production in both 2017 and 2018.

DEC reduced the number of Chinook salmon and lake trout stocked in Lake Ontario by 20 percent in 2017. Chinook salmon stocking was reduced by an additional 20 percent in 2019. Based on the newest population assessments, DEC will reduce 2020 Chinook salmon and lake trout stocking by an additional 20 percent from 2019 levels.

The stocking adjustments highlight DEC's commitment to science-based management to maintain a high-quality Lake Ontario sport fishery. With these stocking reductions, 2020 lake-wide salmon and trout stocking in Lake Ontario will exceed 3.6 million fish, including approximately 1.1 million Chinook salmon, 755,000 rainbow trout/steelhead, 556,000 brown trout, 601,000 lake trout, 325,000 coho salmon, and 200,000 yearling Atlantic salmon. Additionally, many Lake Ontario tributaries also produce "wild" Chinook salmon each year. These wild salmon make a significant contribution to the fishery, comprising on average 50 percent of the adult salmon population. DEC is optimistic that these management decisions will maintain high-quality fishing opportunities, and Lake Ontario will remain a premier sport fishing destination.

Additional information about the status of Lake Ontario alewife and 2020 DEC stocking plans can be found at DEC's website.

http://www.dec.ny.gov/press/press.html

 

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Gill-T

Gill-T

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I would have liked to see less cuts on kings and more cuts on lake trout. Lake trout in Ontario can live for a decade, contributing to more alewives and smelt being eaten than a salmon that lives 2-3 years. Pray for Canadian wilds to fill in gaps. 

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GAMBLER

GAMBLER

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Hopefully they trawl over the bait this upcoming spring and this reduction only lasts one year

The lake temp is right on track for the same as last year. It got below 40 degrees on the same day last year almost the same hour. I wouldn’t expect a great YOY survival.


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PD Buoy

PD Buoy

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4 hours ago, Gill-T said:

I would have liked to see less cuts on kings and more cuts on lake trout. Lake trout in Ontario can live for a decade, contributing to more alewives and smelt being eaten than a salmon that lives 2-3 years. Pray for Canadian wilds to fill in gaps. 

X2 Gill-T, maybe way less lakers and more Coho.

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rolmops

rolmops

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The amount of salmon that is being stocked becomes less important every year because natural reproduction is on the rise all the time. We probably are near the tipping point where even if they stop stocking altogether the salmon population will hardly be impacted. As for the smaller size compared to some years ago, that happens in the hatchery as well as in the wild. A lot of the hatchery fry is descendant of the "wild" salmon that hatches freely in the river. It is an evolutionary thing. The smaller the lake, the smaller the fish, unless outside stock has been introduced and that outside stock usually adjusts its size after a number of generations. It is not really reasonable to expect pacific ocean size to remain in a relatively small lake Ontario. After all, in the pacific there is almost always another place to go to or food will come to you while Lake Ontario has more limited fresh supply of food (compared to the pacific).

Anyway,a happy Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa or whatever you celebrate in the season. 

Edited by rolmops
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HBC

HBC

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Good luck on the CDN stocking to help out.  We are merely parrots and mimic what the US does so I suspect the MNR will follow suit.  Remember, this is a lake wide thing so they both consult with each other before they develop a plan.  I'd like to see greasers stocking cease for 5 years.

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horsehunter

horsehunter

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I love Kings but I do like lakers especially for us guys in the north east corner of the lake in April and May. I would much rather a 20 pound laker than a 3 pound brown. I don't know where all the browns the OMNR are stocking in the east end are going but I don't think they are getting the return for the bucks invested.

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Sweet Caroline

Sweet Caroline

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Rolmops, 

 

I hear ya, but Michigan has seen a huge rebound of 35 to 40lb salmon in 2019. They estimated their wild contribution to be even higher at 60 + %. I think size will come back some once we have a better balance. Agree that stocking reductions alone won’t have as much of an impact as it did in the 90s due to natural reproduction and pen rearing. 

 

 Problem with natural reproduction is it is unpredictable with boom and bust years. I think the DEC uses 50% as an average but some years it could be higher or much lower. 50% is a misleading number though when it comes to total population.  50% of 2 million is a vastly different number then 50% of 500,000. Stockinq and pen rearing artificially keeps the population consistent, but that doesn’t mean the wild population will be as consistent. 

 

In a natural environment there is usually symmetry between predator and prey abundance. When prey abundance is up, predator populations follow. My guess is that our Chinook natural reproduction is lower right now. Usually the same environmental conditions that cause a prey population to shrink, in our case cold winters, have the same affect on predator survival. Plus the YOY chinook that do hatch have less of a chance of survival because their main food source isn’t as abundant, slowing their growth rates and making them susceptible to predation themselves. To a lesser extent the same probably happens with our stock fished although they have a bit more of head start on their growth from the beginning. I’m sure there are some years though where our pen reared and stocked fish have better survival then others. 

 

The reduced stocking of lake trout though, for the most part, probably does directly impact their population over time since they do not have the reproductive success of chinook. My guess is that with all the great chinook fishing the adult lake trout population has rebounded after years of being hammered in the 90s and early 2000s. That, along with the cold winters, has likely played a role in our current alewife population. Lake trout aren’t the massive alewife eating machines that chinook are, and reductions in their stocking numbers certainly will have less of an immediate impact on current alewife predation, but over time they take their toll. 

 

We could not stock any chinook at all, totally protect our spawning population once they hit the tribs and have them naturally reproduce. We will have years of great fishing and years of poor fishing but both the predator and prey population will be in perfect balance as usually happens in a natural environment. Then again, their is nothing natural anymore about our current Lake Ontario ecosystem. 

 

Really the best solution is to have a couple warm winters that produce outstanding alewife hatch’s. At the end of the day, I will always enjoy chasing trout and salmon regardless of what happens. Some years will be better then others, but my passion will be the same. 

 

Happy Holidays 

Edited by A-Lure-A
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Gill-T

Gill-T

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There is a pretty large catch and release-only section already on the Salmon River.  There is nothing wrong with catching kings, but I would like kings to be catch and release-only stream-wide after November 1st.  

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