West Boggs Drawdown To Begin

[MikeAxsom]

Sounds to me like your experience for the past 3-4 years is a fair reflection of what happens in a fishery after introduction of Gizzard Shad. You are also correct about the plan to ry to control shad numbers with the induced winter kill project. The total renovation is right now more a wish than a plan, as the cost of that is staggering. IDNR and our local agency are both aware of the need, but the renovation is probably still several years away.

In the meanwhile, I suggest you try to monitor the success of the winter kill project. If we get a good winter kill this winter, it will have almost immediate positive effects on bluegill and crappie in 2007. The fish are there and if t hey get a chance to compete for food they will thrive; at least until the shad population comes back up. I'll try to see that some winter kill info gets posted to our website later in the winter. That address is www.westboggs.com

[Moose1am]

Hey Guys:
I'll bet that there is some Crappie or Bluegill Growth Rate data posted in the research reports on the IDNR web site. Dan Carnahan has posted this type of information before. I know I have seen it posted for Patoka Lake, Hovey's lake, and for some of the pits on Bluegrass F&W area. I think I saw a report on West Boggs on the IDNR web site research notes.

When the gizzard shad population explodes the bluegills growth rates decline but the crappie growth rates may not be effected as much. In fact the Crappie may even grow bigger after the switch to a minnow diet.

Here is the link to the latest research for West Boggs:

http://www.in.gov/dnr/fishwild/publi...0rpt%20041.pdf


Regards,

Moose1am

[cgable8009]

I hope I am not asking a silly sounding question but why not netting the shad when they are schools could you not erraticate many by doing this?

[MikeAxsom]

The only stupid questions are the ones not asked? That is not true with answers, as we often find that some of those most freely applied are also infinitely silly. So, with that caveat, I’ll take a stab at responding to your question.

I have seen no research on controlling Gizzard Shad numbers by netting, or otherwise trapping them. Logic seems to indicate that it would probably work to some degree, given enough resources and effort. The problem would be that a successful program would have to overcome several obstacles. One is the fact that any wide area netting would also impact other species, dictating a labor intensive process of separating fish quickly and returning other species to the water unharmed. Another is that with equipment manpower and related operational costs, a netting project would quickly become a very expensive venture.

The process we are currently applying, using a water level drawdown combined with the effects of cold weather over winter, has a labor cost that is negligible, and requires almost nothing in the way of equipment or supplies. And it is not having any wide spread negative impact on other fish species. And it is probably at least equally effective as any trapping process might be in the overall control of Shad.

[cgable8009]

Hey Mike can you e-mail me at [email protected]