2017 Muskellunge Plan Update

[Mike]

It's not all about trout for AFM's:

http://www.fishandboat.com/Fish/PennsylvaniaFishes/Documents/MuskyManagementPlan-2017update.pdf

 

[JackM]

Nice Gemallunge.

 

[afishinado]

Good info, Mike.

Thanks for posting.

 

[Mike]

Thanks . If nothing else I thought that angler here would be interested in the bar graphs that compare Muskellunge and Tiger Muskellunge trap net survey results from around the state.

 

[Dave_W]

Yes, definitely interesting - thanks for keeping us posted.

It's good to see that riverine sampling is starting to come together and that CPUE baselines are available. The discovery of natural repro and the possibilities for such management in rivers is also great news (which we have discussed). Finally, the plans to utilize yearlings over fingerlings is also strongly supported by current studies and will, I'm optimistic, produce continued good results.

I'm not sure about the future of tigers. They're neat fish and I like their style, but I'm inclined to think that future PA muskie management belongs to purebreds (especially in rivers).

I'm also not sure about the plan to stock every other year. It makes sense from a manpower point of view but I wonder about population structure if weather events might cause high mortality of yearlings. Nevertheless, plans like this are about what is possible rather than ideal and perhaps every other year stocking will work out fine.

Kudos Mike to you and your colleagues for all the work you have put into this plan and the studies that support it.

 

[Solitariolupo]

Dave_W wrote:

I'm not sure about the future of tigers. They're neat fish and I like their style, but I'm inclined to think that future PA muskie management belongs to purebreds (especially in rivers.

Not even sure why they would they take the time to make them into a hybrid and stock them. The tigers are sterile so no natural reproduction will happen. But the fish commission is into it and every other year they will need to be stocked for us to catch.

 

[Dave_W]

Solitariolupo wrote:
Not even sure why they would they take the time to make them into a hybrid and stock them. The tigers are sterile so no natural reproduction will happen. But the fish commission is into it and every other year they will need to be stocked for us to catch.

A generation or so ago tiger muskies were the hot new thing in pike and muskie management. The reason so many state hatcheries adopted them is that they would eat a cheap pellet diet whereas purebred muskies required live minnows. So tigers were just cheaper to raise.

Another angle was the perception that they grew faster and were more aggressive. This meant that anglers could catch them easier and they would be larger.

These points don't hold up as well now. Research has revealed that tigers don't grow faster than purbreds beyond the first year or two and new diet R&D has produced pellet feed that works with purbreds.

Out West, however, tigers have a huge fan club these days. Those states don't want to introduce reproducing non-native muskies so tigers are ideal. Some of the most avid tiger anglers in the US these days are in the western states.

 

[Mike]

But you can also get brood males for tigers early in the season, which allows you to start the hatching and growing process earlier and get the fingerlings to a larger size more quickly than the pures. This is also helpful in hatcheries with shorter growing seasons.