Why streams with no harvest?

[HopBack]

I think we need to add a fish fry to warmwater jam this year! Crappies/bluegill from the local lake and god forbid even a few trout!

 

[bigjohn58]

I don't like fishing Spring Creek because of all the small fish. Its like catching the same fish over and over and over again although I do remember a day when my brother and I caught browns 21" and 24". I had heard a few years ago that they were considering some harvest on Spring Creek. That is one stream where harvesting some fish would be beneficial. I could be wrong but I believe traces of those chemicals that caused Spring to be catch and release are no longer found in the fish. This is why there were rumors of allowing some harvesting. I'm all for catch and release BUT there are some situations where harvesting a few fish does make sense. I personally feel the harvesting numbers on non stocked streams are way too high.

 

[MKern]

Spring has big fish...usually just down stream of a hatchery though.

I have caught large bows right below Benner and I co-worker at a fly shop caught and has pictures of a 29"+ brown that looked like a rugby ball.
Caught on a green weenie too.

I have caught what appeared to be wild browns pushing 18" there too, but usually fairly thin.

 

[mote1977]

krayfish2 wrote:
Yeah, between pesticide spills and sewer spills, that creek is actually pretty fortunate to have fish or insect life.

Side note:. Does the keystone state have any quality wild trout fisheries that are closed to harvest....other than ones closed due to PCB or other contamination?

I'm not asking about a 1.2 mile stretch of blah blah creek that has been labeled FFCR or ATCR. I'm asking about "insert name" creek that is 11.8 miles long with a strong wild trout population. The entire stream is not polluted yet it's closed to any harvest....and open to all methods of angling. I don't think anything like that exists here, does it?

'Resource first' on one side of the truck and 'here comes another truckload of family fun' on the other

Upper Kettle Creek basin comes to mind, 28.3 miles, catch and release all tackle.

 

[sarce]

I don't think you'd have an abundance of larger fish on Spring if harvest was allowed, due to limited big fish habitat. If an average fish is now 8-10" and you started allowing harvest, the remaining fish still have to live in the same water those 8-10 inchers live now. So maybe you get more 11-12 inchers. Is that really worth it? I'm not against harvest of browns, just don't know if it would change Spring Creek enough to notice. And you'd be opening the door to large fish being removed by harvest.

I also think the large trout there now don't need to be cannibals because of the outrageous number of sculpins...there would be more cannibals if that other food source wasn't available.

 

[WildTigerTrout]

MKern wrote:
Spring has big fish...usually just down stream of a hatchery though.

I have caught large bows right below Benner and I co-worker at a fly shop caught and has pictures of a 29"+ brown that looked like a rugby ball.
Caught on a green weenie too.

I have caught what appeared to be wild browns pushing 18" there too, but usually fairly thin.

I know who that is. I remember when he caught that big brown. I saw the photo and heard his story about that trout too. I have never heard of or seen a bigger trout caught in spring creek. What a monster!

 

[DGC]

As regards LJ, I find the size structure quite good. For grannoms 2018 I caught nothing under 12 inches and good numbers of 14 and 15 inchers. A great deal of effort has been put into fine tuning regs there.

Not sure about the law on this, but there are a number of access leases that may have "veto" rights on what happens to regs for adjacent sections. Also, NESL signed a one year agreement with the idea that mainly C &R adult anglers would be using their property. It was not an easy negotiation from what I have been told. I can't imagine harvest and the likely presence of children making the next negotiation easier.

 

[laszlo]

A stream that I fish has Trophy Trout regs, but 90% of the fish I catch are between 4-8 inches, I can count on one hand trout caught over 14 inches. Can anyone explaine the reasoning behind the Trophy Trout Reg?

 

[FrankTroutAngler]

DGC wrote:
As regards LJ, I find the size structure quite good. For grannoms 2018 I caught nothing under 12 inches and good numbers of 14 and 15 inchers. A great deal of effort has been put into fine tuning regs there.

Not sure about the law on this, but there are a number of access leases that may have "veto" rights on what happens to regs for adjacent sections. Also, NESL signed a one year agreement with the idea that mainly C &R adult anglers would be using their property. It was not an easy negotiation from what I have been told. I can't imagine harvest and the likely presence of children making the next negotiation easier.

For the record, the one year agreement with New Enterprise Stone & Lime was a lease agreement and the cost was $5,000.00 (to cover their liability insurance). It was paid by the Little Juniata River Association. I believe the one year contract ends in late November 2020.

 

[FrankTroutAngler]

I often get ridiculed for documenting the trout that I catch, but when you write them in a notepad it gives one a clearer picture of the sizes of the trout that are in a stream.

On June 12, 2019 I fished the Little Juniata River for 8.75 hours and caught 111 trout. Eight of the trout were stocked trout as best I could tell, so I will exclude them in this discussion. One hundred and three were wild brown trout.

Here are the sizes of the wild brown trout: 1 - 5.5", 3 - 6", 1 - 6.5", 7 - 7", 10 - 7.5", 15 - 8", 8 - 8.5", 9 - 9", 3 - 9.5", 7 - 10", 5 - 10.5", 12 - 11", 3 - 11.5", 5 - 12", 1 - 12.5", 2 - 13", 3 - 13.5", 3 - 14", 1 - 14.5" and 4 - 15".

In total, 57 of these trout were under 10" and 46 were 10" or longer. The average size was 9.67".

I'm submitting this post to show that if you go to the LJR don't expect to catch trout that are all 12" or bigger unless you are fishing some method that excludes smaller trout. Also, in my opinion, the sizes of the trout I caught show a healthy trout population -- if all of the trout were 12" or larger that might be a sign of a couple extremely poor year classes.

 

[FrankTroutAngler]

laszlo wrote:
A stream that I fish has Trophy Trout regs, but 90% of the fish I catch are between 4-8 inches, I can count on one hand trout caught over 14 inches. Can anyone explaine the reasoning behind the Trophy Trout Reg?

From a creeling standpoint, "Trophy Trout Artificial Lures Only" regulations mean that you can keep up to two trout that are 14" or longer during the regular season.

I too know of a stream with these regulations and there are very few 14" or larger trout. I believe the reason for these regulations is to not only protect the overall trout population but also to appease local land owners (and their kids) who want to be able to creel a big trout once in a while (i.e., social reasons).

 

[RLeep2]

As I recall at one time (and mine you my recall is increasingly subject to lack of 100% recall...), PFBC had a criterion for inclusion in the Trophy Trout Program that specified that 5% or more of the trout found in a stream survey had to be 14" or larger. Not 5% of the biomass, but 5% of the individual fish.

I'm pretty sure I didn't imagine this, but I have no idea if it is still the operative criteria...

 

[Mike]

RLeep2,
I had to look it up. It is 5% of the adult trout population that is 9 inches or longer must be 14 inches or longer to qualify for the Trophy Trout program. Unfortunately, that guidance was ignored when Commissioners pushed for simplifying regs and eliminated the Selective Harvest management program, which had a 12 inch length limit. That reg was appropriate for some streams which could not meet the Trophy Trout requirement...Codorus Ck within the special reg area for example...but those stream sections were transferred to the Trophy Trout program anyway. Depending upon the management history of certain Trophy Trout sections, this could be a reason why anglers might not find any or at least many “trophy” trout in Trophy Trout sections.

 

[Acristickid]

My favorite streams are polluted with no harvest- and they are terrific.

 

[troutbert]

Salmonids originated about 88 million years ago, a very long time before humans existed.

How did they ever manage to maintain a balanced population, free from over-population and stunting without our help by harvesting them for all those years?

 

[tomgamber]

troutbert wrote:
Salmonids originated about 88 million years ago, a very long time before humans existed.

How did they ever manage to maintain a balanced population, free from over-population and stunting without our help by harvesting them for all those years?

They weren't stocked where they didn't belong. And we didn't affect their environment in countless other ways.

Everything evolves to try to adapt to its environment. Guess who has the greatest effect on the Earth's entire environment?

 

[Mike]

From a fisheries management perspective across coldwater, coolwater, and warmwater species, I see nothing wrong with manipulating or attempting to manipulate population densities, population size structures, habitats, or forage bases with the objective of enhancing fisheries for those who like to catch larger fish. If one desires to catch smaller fish in abundance, that objective can easily be met in Pa.

Across the broad spectrum of fisheries, why would anglers or fisheries managers want to limit themselves to improving the size quality in fisheries only by reducing harvest in situations where maintaining the status quo or increasing legal harvest might be more beneficial?

Reduced overall population densities in appropriate habitats for more larger fish can produce larger fish. This is not just a theory; it can happen and did so through an undesirable mechanism within the Smallmouth Bass population in the lower and middle Susquehanna River.

 

[troutbert]

Mike wrote:
If you want to see what can happen to the size quality of a fishery through reductions in abundance, let me refer you to the middle and lower Susquehanna Smallmouth Bass population over much of the past five years.

Is that because the growth rate has increased, and fish of the same age are now much larger?

Or is the growth rate similar, but more fish have been able to live enough years to get big, due to the greatly reduced fishing pressure?

 

[krayfish2]

Another bass question for Mike...

Why is it that when the closed spawning season regs were removed and now it appears there's a 'population crash' of larger fish.... Explanation or pure coincidence?

 

[larkmark]

Spring Creek and Penns had good numbers of fish in the 12-15" range years back. You would catch them in the same places and ways as you now catch those little ones that are as long as your hand. You could also catch some 18' fish fairly often. I'm talking on dry flies during sulpher and olive and caddis hatches. Also on tricos.

Can anyone give an explanation of what changed on those streams in the last 25 years?

I have a pretty good idea but let's hear what you think.