MoFisch: Fishing Report

This is a copy of the response I wrote to members of the Flathead Lake co-op management plan. Please read and if you have any comment about the future of Flathead Lake and the co-managment plan, please email your comment to rosel@cskt.org Remember to stay involved and let your voice be heard.

Barry;

Let me start by saying, thank you for allowing me the opportunity to be involved in the process.
I agree with the plan to reduce the number of lake trout to bring back the native bull trout and west slope cutthroat trout.  The question remains how do we do that?
I think there are more questions than answers.  Many excellent questions have been asked.

1.  How do we measure success?
2.  What is the number of redds, to agree that the bull trout are on the increase, stable, or secure? We have a basic problem if the agencies cannot agree on the definition of stable, or secure levels. The agencies cannot agree on the creel data. How do we move forward without coming to some agreement on the data and how the data is defined? The redd count is the only measurable way to evaluate the population of the bull trout, so we need to look closer at the entire system in the life of the bull trout. The fact that the bull trout (redds) have not decreased measures some degree of success. It has been stated that what has been done in the past nine years has had no effect. Quoting Tom McDonald in the Daily Inter Lake Sunday, April 4, 2010 he states “However, we believe it is possible and imperative to stop the downward spiral of the bull trout population. Tom goes on to say, frankly, bull trout are just hanging on by their caudal fins. Tom states,
 that the exploding lake trout population, the native bull trout are in serious danger of vanishing from the lake.  But you say the lake trout have reached capacity.  How does a population keep exploding if the lake cannot hold any more? The redd counts suggest that the bull trout are not declining, in fact they seem to be holding their own.
3.  Is success attainable?
4.  How do we measure success? I feel that the fact that the bull trout have NOT crashed proves that they are not going extinct.
5.  Maybe a better course of action might be how do we stop the spread of lake trout out of the Flathead Lake system.
6.  Maybe containment  is a better approach than reduction. Can we contain the lake trout to  Flathead Lake? Can we keep the lake trout out of the upper lakes? 
7.  Can we have a viable fishery and low numbers of lake trout at the same time. The user days are going up dramatically with the Mack Days value. This is a true success story. The public wants to catch fish!
8.  I propose a year round bounty to promote more fishermen involvement for the next 5 years. Re-evaluate the redds, the increase in participation and the catch rates for the next 5 years after that. Now that the value of the lake trout has gone up, the public is expecting it to continue and this has put a commercial value on the lake trout.
9.  If the number of bull trout in the system goes up, wouldn’t the predation on the cutthroat also goes up, especially in the upper river system?
10.  I would also suggest a do-nothing approach for the next five years.  If the lake is at carrying capacity for lake trout, then we agree that the population of lake trout is not going to increase, then the lake trout would not have a effect on the decrease of the bull trout. 
 
 
Sincerely;
Bob Orsua
Flathead Lake Outfitters and Guides

Hi Folks,
Greetings from Chancy here at Snappy’s Fishing Dept.  I would like to invite you to our up coming weekend Saturday April 10th for our Mac Mania Weekend here at Snappy’s in the Event Center.    This event is FREE    FREE!!!!!!!!

    9AM                            Mo Fisch Charters    Captain Bob Orsua & Matt McComb
                          Lake Trout Trolling Technique-Hot Tips-Secrets to Fishing Lake Trout on Flathead Lake
                                    How to on Downrigger use and Steel line fishing for Lake Trout

    11AM                                    Dick Zimmer- A.K.A.  MacMan    Local tackle maker for Lake trout
                                                            Lake Trout jigging Secrets for Flathead Lake

    12PM                  Free Lunch                    Free Lunch              Free Lunch            Free Lunch

      2PM                                      Mike Howe  with MoFisch Charters
                                                Getting the Most out of your Electronics
                                              Summer Vexilar use and Storage of  your Vexilar
                                          UPDATE      Flathead Lake Gill Netting Update

                                                    Door prizes to be given away through out the day

                                            Come and Join us here at Snappy Sport Senter  April 10th

                                    Please pass this along to anyone u think might be interested

Thank You                Chancy Jeschke

HERE IS A LIST OF PENDING FISHING CONTESTS THIS WINTER:

Northwestern Montana, Region 1 Jan. 2—Sunriser Lions Family Ice Fishing Derby on Smith Lake

Jan. 9—The Perch Assault on Upper Thompson Lake Call Snappys at: 406-257-7525

Jan. 16-17—Fisher River Valley Winter Fishing Derby on Lower, Middle & Upper Thompson Lakes, Crystal Lake and Loon Lake 

Jan. 30—The Perch Assault on Lower Stillwater

Feb. 1-27—Annual Perch Pounder on all Region 1 waters 

Feb. 6—The Perch Assault – Fishers of Men on Lake Mary Ronan Phone Lake Mary Ronan Resort 1406-849-5264

Feb. 6-7—McGregor Lake Resort Fishing Derby on McGregor Lake Phone McGregor Lake Resort at:

Feb. 20—Ryan Wagner Memorial Scholarship Ice Fishing Derby on Murphy LakeFeb. 20—10th Annual LMR Derby on Lake Mary Ronan

Feb. 27—Canyon Kids Christmas Fund Fishing Derby on Lion Lake

March 6—The Perch Assault – Lake Mary Ronan on Lake Mary Ronan

March 13-14—1st Annual Bitterroot Bash on Bitterroot Lake 

Southwestern Montana, Region 2

Jan. 16-17—Pike on Ice on Seeley and Salmon lakes

South Central Montana, Region 3

Jan. 23—Stan Shafer Memorial Ice Fishing Derby on Clark Canyon Reservoir

I have designed and built my own style of releases. I needed a release for my Lyman Plugs, and any lure that pulls especially hard, to not release premature.  When I am fishing with planer boards it is very frustrating to have 8 lines out and one release on its own. The release that I have built will not relase premature unless you just don’t take a very deep set in the pad of the release. These releases also work very well on my downriggers, and for stacking multiple lines on a single downrigger. With this release it so simple to stack another line above the bottom line by just adding a 6oz. weight to the release. Also both the downrigger and the stacked line can be set independently.

Snappy Sport Senter is carrying the release go by and check them out. Also I will have them available on my web site very soon.

I recommend that you check out the new web site for Lyman Lure. http://www.lymanlures.com/ The new web site has new lures and colors. Also check out the recent updated stock of Lyman’s at Snappy Sport Senter.

remember troll in a S-pattern

Neah Bay was a great time. We got our limits of salmon. The silver salmon run was at its peak and we got limits every day. We also had the odd year when the pink salmon run is on and we could add 2 pinks to our possession limit daily. We also caught our limits of rock fish daily , which amounted to 10 black sea bass and 2 lingcod. It was a good time and I reccomend the Neah Bay, Wa. area to the angler that likes to fish salt water.

Keep a tight line

                                     Lake Whitefish in Flathead Lake

Lake whitefish from the Great Lakes were introduced into Flathead Lake starting in 1890 to produce a commercial fishery. Lake whitefish soon became abundant and commercial fishing was tried several times around 1915 but abandoned because of the bycatch of trout and lack of market. Lake whitefish became one of the most abundant fish in Flathead, making up 70 percent by number of gillnet catches, but were largely ignored by sport anglers. In the 1990s Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks started promoting lake whitefish for sportfishing but initial attempts were greeted with scorn and amusement. However, how-to guides along with high limits have converted many skeptical anglers over to these hard-fighting and tasty fish.

It is possible to catch lake whitefish year round but the most popular fisheries have been when fish are congregated enough to produce large catches. These include the summer fishery (late July to early September) at locations around Flathead Lake, fishing over spawning shoals in late October and November, the Flathead River run in October through early December and some limited ice fishing in lake bays. Each fishery requires different locations and tactics.

By far, the summer fishery is the most popular. So why are some years good fishing and some years poor? Well, it mostly depends on storms in spring. The summer concentrations of lake whitefish are feeding on huge schools of young of the year (YOY) yellow perch. Yellow perch spawn in Flathead Lake from mid April into May when water temperatures reach 45-50 degrees. Perch spread their eggs over aquatic vegetation in 5’-10’ of water, a single female can produce 10,000 to 50,000 eggs. Eggs incubate 10 to 20 days before hatching. Strong cold fronts during that time can drop water temperature enough to kill developing eggs or wave-caused turbulence can knock eggs into the sediment where they smother. Colder water also may delay zooplankton blooms which young perch need to feed on after hatching. Spring, 2009, had two strong storms. One was in around April 20^th with temperatures near freezing and winds to more than 20 mph which probably killed all eggs to that point. There was another strong storm around May 10^th that dropped snow and probably killed any attempts at late spawning.

In a better year perch will hatch and spread across the surface of the lake by the millions. Around mid July the young perch are 1” to 1-1/4” long and they start to form large schools and drop to the bottom on weeds and gravel patches in 35’ to 40’ of water. In good years the perch will show as black balls on fishfinders. Lake whitefish normally feed on insects and small clams but they happily take advantage of this perch food source, along with lake trout and probably larger perch. That’s why green and yellow-green jigging spoons and other lures that imitate small perch work so well. The most YOY perch we have seen in one whitefish stomach was 37. The perch stay schooled until late August when changing weather and strong fall storms disperse them and the whitefish. The whitefish next show up in October on spawning shoals around the lake and sometimes on calm days in football-field sized schools slowly porpoising on the surface in some kind of prespawning concentration. Noone has been able to get the surface fish to bite but spawners will hit jigging spoons on the bottom.

For more information, Fish, Wildlife and Parks at 752-5501

JV8/09

On my home page you will find a new ad for Boat Intruder Alarms. My partner and I have built,  selling, and installing these alarms. I regret that there is always the potential for someone to get into our boats and helping themselves to our gear. These alarms will give the security and the peace of mind to leave your boat for the night and feel comfortable that everything will be there in the morning.

Check it out, if you have any questions give me a call.