excessive striper dinks in C-land?

[waterdog101]

I love fishing cumberland, but the striper fishing isn't what it was before they lowered the lake. but the walleye bite has been the best this year on cumberland, I have ever seen it. I try to go to cherokee two times a week and fish for striper. I think cherokee has cumberland beat bad on striper fishing. I haven't caught a fish under 10 lb.

[twise7]

Just thinking outside the box...has anyone thought that perhaps the reason why you're seeing less and less of the larger sized stripers might be due...in part...to that fact that whenever you catch one of them you put it in your livewell and add to the mortality rate of that particular size of fish?

As a bass angler it never ceases to amaze me that a guy can complain about the lack of "size anymore" when he'll be the first to tell you he will take his legal limit of LM or SM home to eat. My response to his complaint...well DUHHH!!! The bigger fish are no longer in the lake...they're in your belly!!

[stripernut]

oh how true TWISE ! the mortality rate is 100% in the cooler ! the only drawback is when the water temps get on up there in the summer a fish that has been stressed will have a greater chance of dying....so the catch 22, keep 2 and stop fishing OR catch and release 7 or 8 with 5 or 6 having delayed mortality. then theres always the option to go catfishing.....you cant kill them rascals. p.s the thought of someone keeping a smallmouth that isnt a once in a lifetime fish is is pretty disheartening, but whatcha gonna do eh.

[mhall]

There is alot of pressure on the stripes boys that's no joke. Guides are out 7 days a week year round and there is a bunch of them. Not trying to ruffle feathers but that is alot of pressure even on a lake the size of Cumberland,

[Bobby Headrick]

So true Mark, reminds me of when me and a buddy was fishing a small water shed lake in Monroe co that has produced a largemouth over 11 and smallie over 7 for me, anyway we were fishing and saw this fellow with a jig pole in hand, we asked him how he was doing and he started complaining that last yr he caught over 50 bass from that lake that weighed between 3 and 5 lbs each, and that this this year he has not caught any. When asked if he released those fish he said no I am a catch and eat man, but he could not understand where al the bigguns were. That lake has no been the same. People do not relize that if you take all the bigguns then there are nothing left but small ones and then there are none.

[Mean Morone]

I've seen the threadfins explode as well. Last fall my buddy and I were up a creek(some would say without a paddle)and there were millions of shad everywhere. We were using Flitterbaits and ripping them through the schools of bait. We caught several nice stripers but we were wondering if these small shad were threadfins or gizzards. I accidently hooked one and gave a quick sniff. It was no doubt a small gizzard. I haven't seen so many small gizzards up in these creeks before. So it seems that the threadfins and gizzards are doing well. As for the Alewives, I had a big school of those things come up after my lure out on the main lake. The screen was full of bait and we were in 80 ft of water. I would think that with so much small bait in the water, these small stripers will be big striper in no time. Once they switch over to 12 inch gizzards and the water conditions are right, should see some big fish again in a few years.

[Embrey]

So true Mark, reminds me of when me and a buddy was fishing a small water shed lake in Monroe co that has produced a largemouth over 11 and smallie over 7 for me, anyway we were fishing and saw this fellow with a jig pole in hand, we asked him how he was doing and he started complaining that last yr he caught over 50 bass from that lake that weighed between 3 and 5 lbs each, and that this this year he has not caught any. When asked if he released those fish he said no I am a catch and eat man, but he could not understand where al the bigguns were. That lake has no been the same. People do not relize that if you take all the bigguns then there are nothing left but small ones and then there are none.

idiots...

[Lowerider]

I cpr when I can - it flat doesn't make sense most of the year on the lake though. And I'm 100% cpr on trophy watersheds save for one for the wall. If I had it my way there'd be a one fish 45 inch limit on the C-land river.

I think this topic is a little more complicated though. Keep in mind these fish (stripes) don't naturally reproduce and year classes (all other things being equal) are based totally on stocking. So in theory if they stock the same number of fish every year then all else being equal there should be the exact same number of 12, 13, 14, (you get the point) pound fish year after year. Obviously, the "all else being the same" is a big assumption but as long as you have the same number of fishing hours year after year and assume mother nature doesn't play a big role in a specific year class stocking mortality then in theory you should catch the same number of fish in the same weight class year after year.

My point is comparing stripe catch rates/harvest/sizes to that of the sunfish family is totally apples to oranges. We're not taking from the gene pool for one thing and stocking rates should be much more consistent than spawn rates of black bass.

I can't help but agree there has to be some correlation between the increased difficulty in catching alewives the last couple years, the excessive dinks in the lake, and the low water level.

I do know one thing though; catching 4 lb stripers with heavy gear is becoming a bore. I've been threatening to do more smallmouth and walleye fishing for years and now just might be the time to make good on that threat. I caught a 5 lb smallie pulling boards last weekend and that was by far the most fun fish of the trip. I would love to have had that thing at the end of a spinning rod with 6 lb test!

[mhall]

Alright Lowerider don't be dissing my smallmouth bass, you are starting to sound like Andrew, lol.

[Tim_T]

Just thinking outside the box...has anyone thought that perhaps the reason why you're seeing less and less of the larger sized stripers might be due...in part...to that fact that whenever you catch one of them you put it in your livewell and add to the mortality rate of that particular size of fish?

As a bass angler it never ceases to amaze me that a guy can complain about the lack of "size anymore" when he'll be the first to tell you he will take his legal limit of LM or SM home to eat. My response to his complaint...well DUHHH!!! The bigger fish are no longer in the lake...they're in your belly!!

So taking a stocked fish that doesn't reproduce and putting it in the live well has reduced the population? Well of course, those are probably fish that were going to spawn in Lake Cumberland!!!

The "I am more sportsmen than you are" attitude by some blows me away. The fish are put in there to catch and if they meet the requirements, keep if you like. Jeez, comparing native smallmouth and largemouth to stocked stripers that wouldn't exist there otherwise is like comparing apples to footballs!

[apb]

So taking a stocked fish that doesn't reproduce and putting it in the live well has reduced the population? Well of course, those are probably fish that were going to spawn in Lake Cumberland!!!

The "I am more sportsmen than you are" attitude by some blows me away. The fish are put in there to catch and if they meet the requirements, keep if you like. Jeez, comparing native smallmouth and largemouth to stocked stripers that wouldn't exist there otherwise is like comparing apples to footballs!

Actually, the post you refer to noted the size of the fish, not the total population. I agree, if you release stripers during the cooler months, then you should expect to see some larger fish in the lake. If you keep every one that you are allowed to keep, then they will not have the chance to grow to larger sizes. Also note that there is some natural reproduction of stripers in the lake. I wonder what affect the lower water levels have on that? From what I have heard, prior to the dam issues, it varied from year to year. Some years there was no reproduction, other years something like 20%.

How different was the river fishery of the Cumberland before it was dammed to now? Like would you have had smallies and largemouth in good numbers in the lake? Just asking cause I'm sure the dam has changed a lot of things for a number of species (river walleye, for example).

Andrew

[peter]

It is very possible the lower water levels have had an effect on spawning (I think). I haven't been up there but I have read some post on here saying that the South Fork of the Cumberland was more like it was before the dam or more like a river with boulders and stuff. If in fact the South Fork and maybe the Rockcastle are more like rivers now because of the elevation change of the lake relative to the elevation of those rivers (the lower lake levels are much more dramatic on the upper end of the lake) there would be more current and current is what is needed for the striper eggs to hatch. On top of that add the rainey springs we have had this may make for even more current at spawning times in the upper end.

Holding the lake at 680 makes the lake "more" like a river, water just passes through like it does on a river. They haven't let the lake back up (increase in elevation) as they normally did with the exception of a few times. It also makes the Cumberland River more like a River, High in the spring, low in the summer.

I have also been hearing of many people catching 6, 7 10, 20 of these 16 inchers in a day. I don't remember often hearing of folks catching those numbers of fish in the sizes we used hear about 9, 10, 12, 16 pound fish so maybe it follows there are many more of those smaller fish. I would guess this is true or the small fish have gotten dumber, or fishermen have gotten smarter but not smart enough to catch a big one.

When stocking is added to reproduction what does this do to the older larger striper's eating patterns and preferences. That may be basic fishery biology, I don't know.

This just came to mind. The stripers I used to catch at McAlpine dam on the Ohio were larger than that of Cumberland lately. It used to be skewed way the other way by a very large difference. It was explained to me by a fish and wildlife biologist that the fish on the river did not get very big because the water was the same temp from top to bottom and once it reached 82 degrees the larger fish stopped eating. 30 days of this and they die off. I could be wrong and I could check but I don't remember there being 30 days starting in mid August when the fish were forced to live in water that warm (30' to the surface) because of the lack of oxygen below that level. ...hoping the majority survived.

If some body calls fish and wildlife to see that they have been shocking up please post what you find out here. I have subscribed to this thread and get an email notification when a new post is made and would very much like to know. That's a handy feature if you haven't used it yet

I took a stab. If any body figures it out please let us know.