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Posts: 20211
Location: oswego, il | It is becoming sickening to see all the misinformed people. Almost every time I go now I run into somebody who thinks the muskies have destroyed the lake.
Last saturday I fished this lake, a guy on shore tells me there is a musky by his dock and to catch it and get it out of the lake because they ate all the panfish. I told him the rusty crayfish took all their habitat and the walleyes ate them all.(overabundant small walleye lake). He said all the walleyes are small and I said, I guess the muskies are not doing their job. He then said I was right.
Just down from him I encountered 2 unattended lines. One was a small bait, the other a musky sucker bobber. I pulled it up to find a lively 10" smallmouth lip hooked with a treble which I immediately released. He obviuosly was catching bait and rigging it for a musky. I ran into the game warden and turned him in. He told me he has pinched him for it more than once.
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| We need fact-based research findings to prove what muskies really eat. Muskies eat opportunistically and the majority of their diet is garbage fish and not gamefish. A little research and education go a long ways, and we need this to further our stocking efforts.
Steve Crook
Head of Stocking
FRV Muskies Inc. |
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Posts: 459
Location: New Baden IL | Muskies have been in Kinkaid down here in southern IL since 1986, and they are still showing up with their eyes poked out and their gills torn out.
It's really hard to change people's minds when they dont want to believe what you are telling them, even if it is the truth.
I wish the game wardens had the time/resources to go out and catch some guys doing this ignorant stuff, but at least here in IL, their budgets are cut razor thin and you almost never see them out.
Moreorver, what should we do? I have tried to report some violators I've seen but when the dispatcher tells you the closest Officer is 40 minutes away what can you do?
Take Kinkaid for example: About 3 years ago, they had the lake drawn down to fix the spillway and ramps. The drawdown killed off a BUNCH of the weedbeds that these guys had historically caught good numbers of bass from.
Now if I went to a lake and couldn't find weedbeds where I caught fish before, I'd think the fish were somewhere else, but these knuckeheads went ballistic and blamed the shift in fish on the predation by muskies.
When the lake went back to normal pool these guys kept fishing the same areas the same ways.
Now the bass are smarter than some of the guys fisihg for them and they have moved off the structures where the muskies are setting up to put the feedbag on. So once again, the bassfisherman who used to catch those fish on the weeds cant find them.
They are still out there but in differnt locations. Guess who the villan is again: YEP the Muskies.
I try to politely tell bass fisherman my theories on why they aren't catching fish in the weeds like they used to but usually get an ignorant comment or threat. I'm suprised I still have air in my tires at the end of the day.
What can we do?
Rod LaCaze |
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Posts: 32884
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Muskies definitely are not the 'problem' most times. It's either overharvest or other problems I hear about, if there's really a problem at all. Many states tried to use musies to control panfish populations and found that didn't work very well. Ignorance is the enemy, we all need to know the answers and politely present them whenever the opportunity allows.
There's already pretty extensive research looking into muskie predator/prey relationships, I have read quite a bit on the subject. |
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| not only do we have to deal with that here in Minn..but we also have people using our release ratio against us too now!!,,stating that,,'Since the muskie anglers are relasing all their fish and its mostly a catch and release sport very few muskie killed",,then we should reduce the number of muskies put in these lakes because few are taken out" |
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Posts: 2112
Location: The Sportsman, home, or out on the water | I run into people that blame the muskys as well. What gets my goat is when people ask me what musky taste like. Depending on my mood, I either tell them that i fish purely for the sport, and that there are not enough musky in any body of water to keep them to eat them, or, if I am in one of my "moods", I tell them that they taste alot like human flesh. The looks are priceless. |
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Posts: 152
| Shawn hurst is the area fish biologist for Kinkaid Lake. I was talking to him in the spring and he told me he had shocked good numbers of bass up to fifteen and a half inches, but few over sixteen. There is a sixteen inch limit on the lake, and he deduced that either the Muskies only ate bass over sixteen inches, or the bass fishermen were killing them in tournaments, or keeping them. A few years ago the crappie had a couple of bad spawns in a row and the Nuskies were blamed for eating all the crappie. A nine inch limit with twentyfive fish a day was instituted and now the crappie are thick. If these people take the blame for over harvesting and killing fish in tournaments they could improve the fishing. The problem is, people never want to be responsable when they can put the blame someplace else. That is why all the facts in the world won't change won't change how most people think. That would make them responsible. I'm thankfull we have what we do here in Southern Illinois, becose a few years ago we didn't have any Muskies. Later |
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Posts: 2024
| Did anyone read the "Research" article in Esox Angler. I thought that was pretty good.
I dropped a guy off at Shelbyville the other day who was going to fish with a bass dude, I was chasing muskies. When the other guy gets there and finds out I'm fishing muskies he says, "Go get 'em! Go get them all! Those fish are destroying the bass population." I wanted to tell him to fish better, that Shelbyville is a tough lake. I also wanted to tell him that 1 or 2 muskies per acre is not going to make a dent in the bass population. I also wanted to give him my theory that since muskies primarily predate on smaller fish (i.e. 4-10") they are likely eating bass, which make up only a fraction of their diet, in the 6-10" range. If they eat those fish they are eliminating competition that the bigger 4+lbers have to deal with. The muskies presence would therefore be helping the QUALITY of the fishery. And Shelbyville is certainly not a dink lake. Every tournament I've ever participated in or been present at I've seen at least one 3.5 lber and have seen two 6 lbers caught in one tourney.
We could lecture these guys all we wanted, but they will never understand, or accept. |
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Posts: 20211
Location: oswego, il | 50, I would have told him that, I don't let them get the last word.
I see alot of unattended lines in indiana too which are illegal. I decided last sunday that from now on, any unattended line I see gets spooled.
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Posts: 2024
| If he says it again I will. Even after telling bass guys my thoughts on muskies and bass coexisting with eachother they still tell me, "It don't matter, man. I'm still going to use my hammer on 'em if I catch one of the bastards. If they aren't taking my bass, they're taking my $16 Sammy's." Like a tree or a big bass (or stupid fisherman who doesn't check their line) couldn't take your precious little lures? It's just ignorance. Sheer stubbornnes. |
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Posts: 32884
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | I am pretty sure most bass anglers don't fall in to that catagory. Those who do are in serious need of the facts, and it's up to us to present the facts with patience and at least a small amount of tact. Education is the key all the way. |
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Posts: 2024
| I couldn't agree with you more, Steve. There are several guys in my bass club, both the area club and Illini Bass Club, that respect all fish and have actually pursued muskies in the past. And I still "preach the good word". But there are still a select few who won't listen to a thing you say.
My slogan, too, is education is the answer. But, like the rest of the world, there will always be a few.... |
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Posts: 122
Location: Pittsburgh, PA | Part of the problem is that we, as muskie fishermen, are targeting the wrong groups with the information.
Example: The article in EA this month was very interesting, but who read it? The people that don't need convinced that muskies are not eating all the game fish. We need to get articles like this out in other publications like In-Fisherman and BASS. |
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Posts: 8774
| It's been my experience this season that muskies don't eat ANYTHING resembling a game fish  |
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Posts: 1335
Location: Chicago, Beverly | What I don't like about Shelbyville is all the 5lbs Largemouth I have to shake off to catch a Musky... and their hitting big baits too..lol..  |
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Muskies are not eating all your favorite fish!