Keystone select trout waters

I couldn't have said it better myself!

http://fishandboat.com/images/people/exec_dir/straight_talk/2015_09_10_opening.pdf

FT
 
I read the article in your link. I believe the PFBC's catch phrase is "protect, conserve and enhance" the resources. No disrespect intended but it sounds like the goals in the article were to increase license sales. Increased license sales = increased revenue, right? If the main purpose for increasing revenue is for pensions and more stocked fish, you've already lost me. If the revenue was going toward restoring lost habitat and less stocking, I'd buy 3 licenses. Invasive species or not, you'll be hard pressed to find a better success story than Big Spring. Restoration of holding water resulted in a population boom of trout......and nobody had to stock it!! Stocking in some waters may be the answer to keep the truck chasers happy but if you " protect, conserve and enhance" what mother nature has already given us, the fish WILL be there. Nature has a funny way of taking care of itself. Spring, Big Fishing, Valley And many others come to mind.

Instead of putting $50,000 of stocked trout into a creek with a healthy wild population, why not do $50,000 worth of stream improvements? The investment outlives a truckload of domesticated trout.

To quote comic Doug Stanhope: "Anyone in the audience ever do drugs? (crowd cheers). Ever see them advertised? (crowd laughs). That's right, you don't need to. If you've got a good product, people come around". Put out a better product (quality self-sustaining trout fisheries) and the public will respond. PA should be a destination for trout anglers like it used to be. PA is deep in fly fishing history and innovations. Restore PA and don't make it dependent on a truck to bring fish to the fishermen.
 
I'll add one other comment on the tailwater initiative and will use Raystown as an example. If the goal is to stock adult trout and release water at marginal temps(68-72 degrees), why even bother? We already have the Lehigh and Tulpehocken. You'd be making one more fishery that would be dependent on 'the big white trucks'.

If the intention is to release 50 - 55 degree water June, July and August_ that's a great start. The branch is short enough that the release should keep it cool all the way to the junction with the Juniata and possibly even further.

With the cold water releases, all you'd need if Whitlock boxes, some fingerling wild fish plus any already existing wild fish that have managed to survive in spite of 75-80 degree temps. No harvest for 3 years and the next thing you know, self-sustaining wild fishery. Keep creek limit at 1 fish per day, 14" or larger. You'd have the best tailwater in the state in under 5 years. A side benefit would be a slight cooling of the Juniata below the junction of the 2 rivers. Smallmouth are present and will use the thermal refuge when the main river temos exceed their comfort range.

Only ones that would lose are the catfish anglers below the spillway. There are countless places to angle for whiskerfish near there.
 
krayfish- Sounds awesome. How can we make it happen? Seriously. What an opportunity. Hope Mike would jump in on this topic as well. Or anyone else with info.
 
Been crying about this long before the rolled out the plan. I email all the time about the 'initiative' and get canned response emails thanking me for submitting my comments. I doubt I'll see it in my lifetime but would like the nephews to have that opportunity 20-40 years from now.
 
Kray, unfortunately for the time being, like I said in the "stop stocking" thread, a few generations of people will have to die off before we see any changes in wild, and native, trout management in PA.
 
krayfish2 wrote:
I read the article in your link. I believe the PFBC's catch phrase is "protect, conserve and enhance" the resources. No disrespect intended but it sounds like the goals in the article were to increase license sales. Increased license sales = increased revenue, right? If the main purpose for increasing revenue is for pensions and more stocked fish, you've already lost me. If the revenue was going toward restoring lost habitat and less stocking, I'd buy 3 licenses. Invasive species or not, you'll be hard pressed to find a better success story than Big Spring. Restoration of holding water resulted in a population boom of trout......and nobody had to stock it!! Stocking in some waters may be the answer to keep the truck chasers happy but if you " protect, conserve and enhance" what mother nature has already given us, the fish WILL be there. Nature has a funny way of taking care of itself. Spring, Big Fishing, Valley And many others come to mind.

Instead of putting $50,000 of stocked trout into a creek with a healthy wild population, why not do $50,000 worth of stream improvements? The investment outlives a truckload of domesticated trout.

To quote comic Doug Stanhope: "Anyone in the audience ever do drugs? (crowd cheers). Ever see them advertised? (crowd laughs). That's right, you don't need to. If you've got a good product, people come around". Put out a better product (quality self-sustaining trout fisheries) and the public will respond. PA should be a destination for trout anglers like it used to be. PA is deep in fly fishing history and innovations. Restore PA and don't make it dependent on a truck to bring fish to the fishermen.
Click to expand...


Sounds like a great plan that could be carried out on a few tail waters.
 
http://fishandboat.com/images/people/exec_dir/straight_talk/2014_09_10_tail.pdf

http://fishandboat.com/water/tailwaters/TailwaterFisheries2012.pdf

We're working on it but most dams, including Raystown, are controlled by the ACOE and primary purpose is flood control. We are getting some traction on the Lehigh and FE Walter where we have to fund a feasibility study to determine the costs of a new tower that if constructed could add a 20 mile reach of wild trout water. Check out the current condition at:http://fishandboat.com/images/reports/2016bio/lehigh-trout.pdf

FT
 
Kray - great idea. Its a no brainer. But govt moves at glacial speed - and the potential impact on the two-tier fishery due to release change is of huge importance to the PFBC. Im sure that both can exist BUT that will require change. And we all know change can be very difficult.
A local NGO also needs to lead the charge. Pa needs a tailwater advocacy group.
 
Fish_tales,
Thank you for the response. I've seen 2 of the 3 documents you've attached before.

As for feesability, please expand upon that comment. Is it feasible? If the cold water pool is sufficient and the flow plan is followed, yes.

I'll speak of 2 tailwaters that I'm pretty familiar with and one that is fairly new to me.

Blue Marsh / Tulpehocken system. Like other lakes, the primary purpose is flood control. There is a very busy recreational use and quality WW fishery in the lake. The ACOE does the best they can with the limited pool size available. Cold water is typically gone in early July. There is a spring creek that enters part way through the special regs water. The thermal refuge allows fish to carry to the next season and if I'm not mistaken, acts as a spawning grounds for the limited wild population. The limiting factor on this stream is the size of the cold water pool.

Cannonsville / WB Delaware. NYC for water supply and flood control are main purpose of the lakes. The lake itself provides a very high quality trout fishery and very high quality small mouth fishery. As you know, flow plans are drafted and approved thanks in part to all of the groups that monitor the river (including FUDR). In spite of constant mismanagement of the releases, the fisheries above and below the dam flourish. NY DEC, PA, NJ etc. all fight over the water in the lake an what flow plan works best. Even though the WB gets all of the press, there are a series of drinking water impoundments and tailwaters in that area. The Beaverkill / Willowemoc are freestones with wild trout populations. Tailwaters include WB Delaware, EB Delaware, Neversink, Esopus and Croton. Financial impact study showed that the quality fishing in the Catskills brought over 30 million dollars in from recreational anglers!! We could / should have the same here. Temps in the lower sections of those tailwaters often exceed 75 degrees but those sections still hold plenty of wild fish and some very large fish.
 
Fish_tales,
PM sent
 
Been on the Lehigh Krayfish and might have released some of the same trout that you did. Bob Bachman, our former Commissioner , recently told me that he believes the Lehigh may be currently better than teh Upper Delaware. Bob has fished both much more than me and is passionate about TW fisheries and he and Bill Worobec, also a former Commissioner, were instrumental in the TW policy I reference above.

Check out the last pic in my article.

I wish the Corps requirement for determining feasibility was that simple. Check out the process at http://www.usace.army.mil/Media/NewsArchive/StoryArticleView/tabid/232/Article/643197/the-corps-feasibility-study-finding-a-balanced-solution.aspx. We need to come up with several million dollars as a partners share to even begin discussing it.

These projects are not as simple as many on this Board think and the PFBC is no different than most of you. We have no authority or control over the dams. They are federal facilities primarily designed and built to store water and prevent downstream flooding. We continue to try to squeeze as much cold water out of these reservoirs as possible but there needs to be the funding and the political will to provide water at the right temperature and times to maximize the benefits for fish and resulting fisheries.

FT out

 
I've long been surprised that more voices in favor of a cold water tailrace at Raystown have not emerged in the Huntingdon area. The potential economic impact of a first class trout tailwater seems obvious to me. It would really diversify and broaden the outdoor tourism appeal to Raystown Country.

And this coming from a bass guy who loves the Juniata watershed for smallies. Even I'd strongly favor a cold water release regimen below the reservoir.

Working with the ACOE and other organizations is, no doubt, a tough slog, especially in these days of budget austerity. Nevertheless, a good project and one to keep on the "work it as best we can list."
 
Fish_tales,
What do you suggest the general public can do to support the PFBC? Form tailwater group, write local / state representatives or something different? I've supported FUDR for last 10 years and will continue to do so. Putting together a well informed group to lobby for cold water releases and for a flow plan could only help. I wouldn't even know where to start but am open to advice to try and get the ball rolling.
 
I am with kray. I would do whatever i could do to help. If there are any groups, or clubs that are started that want the Lehigh to be a wild trout fishery id be way more than happy to jump on board
 
If there was a tailwater fishery at Raystown that would be amazing.
 
Personally, I don't get it? Alot of the comments on this thread leave me scratching my head. So, a better quality fish is stocked....in an effort to draw more folks to the water. Versus everybody fishing for their limit of 9" Juvi fish. and that's a bad thing?

Some folks would complain if they got a brand new rod and reel with their license this year. It would either be a low quality reel....or the money could have been better spend on improvement on "their" favorite water.

I'm just glad they are doing "something". Maybe one of those big browns will make the day.....or life of a 12yr old? And turn a former playstation kid into a lifelong fly fisherman?

 
NJ,

As an uncle of 2 PlayStation nephews that I've started fishing / fly fishing over the past couple of years, I have a slightly different take. I started the kids out in the special 'kids only' sections where you couldn't drop a worm in the water without hitting a fish. Yes, the children loved it and caught a few fairly large fish. Where I see the negative side of things is that it is a fabricated fishery with unrealistic populations. The children learned that's what fishing is and the creeks are full like a raceway. The next year when I took them away from the kids section, they didn't catch many and sometimes they got the skunk. The kids would immediately want to run to the kids section where it was unrealistically full of fish. If forced to work for fish under normal conditions, they'd rather play video games.

So dumping a truckload of breeders into a 1.5 mile section of river might be fun / a novelty type of experience. For kids, I think it could set unrealistic expectations of what fishing is actually like. I also think it could result in more of them quitting when exposed to fishing under normal / natural conditions. To keep them in the sport, the key is to have a good teacher / mentor and not oversized fish. Just my 0.02
 
NJTroutbum wrote:
Personally, I don't get it? Alot of the comments on this thread leave me scratching my head. So, a better quality fish is stocked....in an effort to draw more folks to the water. Versus everybody fishing for their limit of 9" Juvi fish. and that's a bad thing?

Some folks would complain if they got a brand new rod and reel with their license this year. It would either be a low quality reel....or the money could have been better spend on improvement on "their" favorite water.

I'm just glad they are doing "something". Maybe one of those big browns will make the day.....or life of a 12yr old? And turn a former playstation kid into a lifelong fly fisherman?
Click to expand...

They already have a kids opening day the week prior to regular opening day where they stock a ridiculous amount of fish at the public lakes (some really big ones at that), at least 2 streams in my area have kids only sections where they do the same by loading it with a bunch of nice fish, and many private clubs host a public kids fishing day after opening day. Now this is only my area so I can't speak for the rest of the state, but if that's not enough opportunities to get a kid into fishing, I don't think there's much hope. And I'm all for kids fishing and off the gaming systems. I take my niece out once a week when the weather is nice to some of the listed opportunities and she has a blast. Everything I listed wasn't available when I was a kid and probably wasn't 10 years ago. I think we've already made leaps and bounds in the "kids direction".

The DHALO in place provide more year round angling opportunities. I can't honestly see how a new beginner or kid would enjoy fishing in Erie trib like crowds to extremely pressured fish even if they did managed to catch one. That's frustrating enough for someone who fishes often and catches their fair share. Google Laurel Hill trout farm and look at their price list. There's a lot of money being invested here that many others, and myself included, feel might be better spent elsewhere. Maybe it's stream improvement, maybe they feel its adding a new tail race fishery. I personally would like to see more trout stocked in the fall to double our fishing season in areas that lack year round holding water. That much is up to debate and personal opinion but I know I'm not the only one who feels that way.
 
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