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Posts: 95
| I am working on a story about Rusty Crayfish and their impacts on habitat for muskies, pike and other species. I would appreciate the perspective of muskie anglers from OutdoorsFirst.com based upon your personal observations and experience.
Thanks! Kevin, MUSKIE Editor http://www.muskiesinc.org/indy_files/mimag.html |
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Posts: 2024
| I was up in MN on Vermilion on a family trip this June and did some musky fishing with a friend who guides up there. I had done some fishing alone on the east end of V before fishing with him and some of cabbage spots he had pointed me too were simply not there. However, on the west end we were able to locate more weeds. However, he noted to me that there were several cabbage spots that no longer are as big due to the crayfish, and one of his favorite spots in the narrows didn't even exist anymore. I grew up around Vermilion and was shocked at the sheer number of crayfish I saw on the shoreline of the resort we were staying at. Since I no longer live up there and rarely get to Vermilion when I am home, I had not heard of the invasion and explosion. I'm not a biologist, but maybe people need to start having more crawfish boils up there! Or maybe the DNR needs to stock more fish that target crayfish. |
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Posts: 56
| Over the past 5 years at Eagle Lake in Ontario some of the best weed beds have been steadily disappearing, to the point where it really isn't even worth fishing them anymore. The locals and guides say this is the result of crayfish.
Hard to say how this will affect fishing, but it definitely reduces some of the better weed areas. I worry what will happen in 5 years. Nothing is going to eat those crayfish fast enough. |
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Posts: 20230
Location: oswego, il | The rusty crayfish seem to impact weeds in hard bottom areas. They do not seem to wipe out weeds in muck filled bays. Take vermillion for example, bays like bystrom, armstrong and canfield are nearly void of weeds but rice bay for example is all muck bottom and has plenty of vegetation.
If you get a small lake with rusty crayfish and they take out all the weeds, the forage base can be wiped out.
Edited by ToddM 9/1/2012 3:16 PM
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Location: Sawyer County, WI |
Stock smallmouth bass and create a new trophy fish destination.
(Awaiting pointer's view on how stupid that would be...  ) |
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Posts: 16632
Location: The desert | dfkiii - 9/1/2012 4:30 PM
Stock smallmouth bass and create a new trophy fish destination.
(Awaiting pointer's view on how stupid that would be... )
Why would that be stupid? |
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Location: Sawyer County, WI | Pointerpride102 - 9/1/2012 5:31 PM
dfkiii - 9/1/2012 4:30 PM
Stock smallmouth bass and create a new trophy fish destination.
(Awaiting pointer's view on how stupid that would be... )
Why would that be stupid?
No idea, but I'm not a fish biologist so I imagine there was something missing in my logic.
All I know is that the smallies on the lake where our cabin is in Sawyer County chow down on crayfish, and anything that remotely looks like them is a successful presentation. |
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Posts: 16632
Location: The desert | dfkiii - 9/1/2012 4:50 PM
Pointerpride102 - 9/1/2012 5:31 PM
dfkiii - 9/1/2012 4:30 PM
Stock smallmouth bass and create a new trophy fish destination.
(Awaiting pointer's view on how stupid that would be... )
Why would that be stupid?
No idea, but I'm not a fish biologist so I imagine there was something missing in my logic.
All I know is that the smallies on the lake where our cabin is in Sawyer County chow down on crayfish, and anything that remotely looks like them is a successful presentation.
Smallies like crayfish. Having a big number of crayfish as a main forage can yield some very nice bass. While they likely won't eradicate the rusties, you can create a decent bass fishery.
Now if the bass are to be stocked in a non native area then some other issues should be addressed. See the Yampa and Colorado rivers. |
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| I think like on Eagle the bass wont eat the rusty crayfish |
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Posts: 906
Location: Warroad, Mn | Here's some things I've seen on the LOTWs There are plenty of smallie and walleye in the LOTWS who love to eat crayfish, yet the Rusties seem to be doing well. I don't quite remember the first year they where found in the LOTWs, but I would think a call to the Kenora MNR office would give you this info, If I remember right it was somewhere around 25 years ago. As I recall they where first found in Snake Bay just off Whitefish Bay. No doubt brought in by a smallmouth fisherman. Surprisingly, from what I can tell the weeds in Whitefish haven't been effected as much as the dark water areas of the lake. They seem to have slowly worked their way up the east side of the lake toward Kenora, with many weed beds missing. Around 10-12 years ago they started to show up in the Angle area, and the weed beds are slowly but surely disappearing. They seem to be slowly working their way south and east and there are areas in Miles and Sabaskong that used to have great cabbage seems to be gone. Surprisingly one bay that used to have great cabbage will be empty and a half mile away the next one will still have cabbage. However, this changes every year with more and more bays and islands missing cabbage. I've seen weed beds the size of football fields disappear over the course of one year. The green cabbage is the first to go and there's very little of this left in the Angle. The Red Cabbage and the coontail are the last to go as their stems are larger and harder or the Rusties to clip off. What's left is a few patches of densely clustered Red Cabbage (must be a different species than the old ones), but so dense that it would be hard for a fish to swim through it. later in the season there is a growth of what I call spaghetti (tall stringy shots of string like weeds). These seem to show up where their used to be cabbage. Not real sure what this will do to the fish populations on the LOTWs, but I doubt that it'll help. The young of the year use weed beds as nursery spots as they provide cover and food. Without them I sort of wonder about the potential for natural reproduction. However, in the last ten years since the weeds have started to disappear i still seem to see many small fish. This year I've probably seem more 20" fish than I've every seen, but I have no accurate records, so it may just be a personal perspective. I still see plenty of Young-of-the-year, so maybe the muskies don't think it's as big a deal as I do. Time will tell. Fishing still seem to be good, but I have the feeling that the number of big fish available is falling. I've also sensed that this year the catch rate is somewhat lower than in past years. Who knows if this indicates a lower population of fish or something else. Wish I could met the guy who brought the Rusties to the LOTWs, as I'd like to have a little talk with him! Doug Johnson
Edited by dougj 9/1/2012 9:59 PM
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Posts: 2024
| Stock the local communities with some some cajuns. They love crayfish! |
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Posts: 688
Location: Northern IL | It all sounds so scary.....
AR, you know they're showing off when you hear, "suck the brains out". Ha ha!
The good thing is I won't have to pull weeds off my lure when I make the mistake of running into them while trolling a weedline, ha ha!
The little guys will still have the shallows to get away from those big nasty predictors,,,,, how long have muskies been in lakes and reproducing "without human intervention" just fine thank you,,, and what are you gonna do to stop this awful atrocity, nothing.... Sleep well my friends it'll all be okay.....
Edited by jerryb 9/1/2012 10:44 PM
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Posts: 32895
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Doug's response is spot on. The rusty is a stream crayfish, not native to lakes, and once introduced, they very quickly over run the native population and begin the process Doug describes. Rusties made a mess of Pelican for years, and still have a significant impact despite TONS trapped out and sold overseas. They are a destructive invasive that bass don't control well at all. The destruction of most of the vegetation in any body of water is bad, but the added impact of a living carpet of Rusties eating nearly every egg dropped during the spawn doesn't help NR. Nasty critters, and one should not make light of the impact.
There are lakes in this area with ZERO vegetation left as a result of this invasive.
http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/invasives/aquaticanimals/rustycrayfish/i... |
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Posts: 95
| Thanks to the many replies so far. Steve and Doug really highlighted the challenges.
Several observations and discussions got me fired up on this:
1. The stark difference between the east and west basins of Lake Vermillion.
2. The changes I have observed in Sabaskong Bay over the past 5 years.
3. My observations in July and August this year of the surface of several Sabaskong Bay bays littered with small pieces of tape grass, and then my son landing a big Rusty Crayfish on a double 8 spinner in one of those bays after a backlash; it wouldn't let go. Please keep the reports coming. I may contact a few of you for additional details. Kevin, MUSKIE Editor
http://www.muskiesinc.org/indy_files/mimag.html
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Posts: 16632
Location: The desert | If you want some scholarly articles about them, let me know. |
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Posts: 410
Location: one foot over the line | Most of the rustys have disappeared from my cabin lake in north-central WI. I used to trap them and eat them by the bucketfull and now I can barely get six. Lookin for a new spot to trap hundreds or thousands, so if you are inundated with rustys and are close to the tomahawk area let me know. I realize that this isn't a solution, however, you might get some satisfaction out of helping a hillbilly with a meal. thanks |
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Posts: 4080
Location: Elko - Lake Vermilion | Seams like a lot of work to get much to eat from these little buggers ?
How do you cook, and eat them ? is there Brain sucking going on?
curious. They tend to be to small to bother with.. a Crawdad is much bigger, isn't it? |
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Posts: 2279
Location: SE, WI. | Pelican's weed beds use to thrive when the common bullhead was present. So did the musky and walleye!!! After the commercial netting and the eradication of the bullheads from Pelican seemed to lead to the mass invasion of the rusty crayfish. What do you think ate the rusty's when in their soft shell state....THE BULLHEAD!!! Maybe they should start stocking bullheads again??? Probably also helped the jig fisherman who used to fish black creatures...Huh! :) |
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Posts: 87
Location: Brainerd,MN | On the west end of Vermilion we would trap rustys for a meal the past couple years or so. We would set traps about 1/3 mile from one of our weedy milk run muskie spots. We would get about 100 or so rustys per night. We would only keep the rustys and throw the natives back. This year when we set the trap in the same area we noticed a big change. Only got about a dozen caught. Noticed that the weedy area where we set the traps have disappeared. This year we've noticed that our good muskie spot has gone dormant as well. No weeds left. So within the past 2 years the little buggers have made a big impact and are heading rapidly to the west.
I haven't seen any change in the muskies at this point other than they have been displaced. My primary spot has become an after thought and my secondary spot in the area is now my primary. The concerns for me would be loss of habitat not only for their home but possible spawning grounds as well. Fish do adapt to other structures but how long would it take for fish to adapt to those without disruption in spawning? A year or two of disruption could cause a big effect on year class populations. On the positive side to rustys is that the perch and smallmouth have thrived on them. Lots of jumbos being caught. Only problem is that rustys reproduce much faster than they can be preyed upon.
All invasives cause problems with the ecology of a healthy fishery. Everything from zebra mussels to milfoil to rusty crayfish. But I do believe it's a 50-50 problem thou. 50% bad for the lake and the other 50% it just flat out screws with us fisherman. Sometimes us weekend warriors have a harder time adapting to the changing conditions that invasive species cause. And of course when that happens the mentality is that the lake has become a sewer.
Jeff Young |
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Posts: 540
| the famous seven mile weed beds of portage bay leech lake were wiped out basically 3 yrs ago all that was left was a 1/4mile chunk close to 2 points, most weeds in the big lake were gone. yrs ago we used to catch way more burbot (eelpout) than we do now and the big eelpout festival as had a huge impact on the lake population of pout. From what I have gather over the yrs is crayfish are the #1 source of food for the pout so it doint help that they are thinned out as much as they are. In the last 2yrs I have heard that the rusties had taken a big hit, no one knows why but the weeds are coming back and portage bay has alot more again, like doug johnson said alot of coontail and stuff has replaced the cabbage though. One theory that I wonder about the the rusties taken a hit was that they litereally ate themselves out of house and home. |
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Posts: 781
Location: Ames, Iowa | 99-
Get hold of Gretchen Hanson at the Univ of Wisconsin. She's the expert. I suggested to her years ago that the rusty was responsible for the walleye decline on Leech as much as or more than the cormorants. My opinion was that the rusty was consuming walleye and perch eggs at a rate that would destroy local year classes. I think that rusty crayfish experience boom and bust population cycles based on how much of a lake's weeds are consumed. I think they eat themselves into population decline. Most of the perch, rockbass, bluegills we get on leech have been feasting on rustys. |
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Posts: 688
Location: Northern IL | It's the world we live in today and no one's ever happy when invasive species invade. Change causes change, if the zebra muscle comes calling on your body of water, the weeds will grow to a deeper depth and we can anticipate fish movements to be deeper as well. The zebra muscles have cleared many of our waters forcing fishermen to fish deeper than ever before, the fish are still there just harder to catch.
I 'll be honest I don't get too caught up in many things I have no control over, say what you want about that, theres a lot of others to fill that void. So I admit I'm not totally up to speed with all the negative effects of these little critters besides,,, now, ha ha the destruction of weeds and the eating a few eggs, don't blue gills eat eggs? When I read less weeds, I thought "hooray"' were always looking for less weeds.... But that has more to do with water color and fish movements being more shallow. I may have been a bit sanguine, that happens,,, earlier about the subject however if the loss of weeds, which I'm sure there's probably a big long list Im not yet aware of is the only bad thing, I still say so what! Nature will right herself, she always does, but for now I actually like the idea..
This is exactly the kind of thing I talk about all the time, distractions... Do you fish to catch fish or since you don't catch fish do you get all caught up in distractions.
A lake is no better or worse if it has weeds or it doesn't, I get the caster like having something to throw at but some of the best waters in the world are body's of water with NOTa single blade of grass!
Mr. Johnson said, "I still see plenty of Young-of-the-year, so maybe the muskies don't think it's as big a deal as I do. Time will tell. Fishing still seem to be good, but I have the feeling that the number of big fish available is falling. I've also sensed that this year the catch rate is somewhat lower than in past years. Who knows if this indicates a lower population of fish or something else."
My answer to that which I agree with, is guys are casting at weeds, or a "break" that are either not as large as they once were or not there at all, meaning the fish wont be hanging around as long which equals less fish being caught, Okay, time to make a change.
Edited by jerryb 9/3/2012 3:33 PM
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Posts: 32895
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | You might want less weeds in a eutrophic, over fertile systems that have been aged 1000 years in less than 50 by pollution and rimmed in Milfoil, another wonderful invasive, but I sure don't want less weeds in the mid to late Meso systems here and Mesotrophic systems in Canada. Rusty crayfish eat more than 'a few' eggs when they are there in numbers, the bottom can and does literally move with a carpet of the things.
If the substrate Muskies use to spawn in is damaged or altered significantly by an invasive, NR can nearly cease and stocking is the only answer to maintain healthy populations.
That wouldn't be my choice, and I bet it sure isn't our DNR's.
Not everything is answered by a spoon plug. And no one is saying they don't know how to use a spoonplug or adapt to changing condiftions, Jerry, we get it that you are a disciple. Spoonplugging is one method of many that are effective. We can't troll up here at all. |
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Posts: 16632
Location: The desert | jerryb - 9/3/2012 2:30 PM
It's the world we live in today and no one's ever happy when invasive species invade. Change causes change, if the zebra muscle comes calling on your body of water, the weeds will grow to a deeper depth and we can anticipate fish movements to be deeper as well. The zebra muscles have cleared many of our waters forcing fishermen to fish deeper than ever before, the fish are still there just harder to catch.
I 'll be honest I don't get too caught up in many things I have no control over, say what you want about that, theres a lot of others to fill that void. So I admit I'm not totally up to speed with all the negative effects of these little critters besides,,, now, ha ha the destruction of weeds and the eating a few eggs, don't blue gills eat eggs? When I read less weeds, I thought "hooray"' were always looking for less weeds.... But that has more to do with water color and fish movements being more shallow. I may have been a bit sanguine, that happens,,, earlier about the subject however if the loss of weeds, which I'm sure there's probably a big long list Im not yet aware of is the only bad thing, I still say so what! Nature will right herself, she always does, but for now I actually like the idea..
This is exactly the kind of thing I talk about all the time, distractions... Do you fish to catch fish or since you don't catch fish do you get all caught up in distractions.
A lake is no better or worse if it has weeds or it doesn't, I get the caster like having something to throw at but some of the best waters in the world are body's of water with NOTa single blade of grass!
Mr. Johnson said, "I still see plenty of Young-of-the-year, so maybe the muskies don't think it's as big a deal as I do. Time will tell. Fishing still seem to be good, but I have the feeling that the number of big fish available is falling. I've also sensed that this year the catch rate is somewhat lower than in past years. Who knows if this indicates a lower population of fish or something else."
My answer to that which I agree with, is guys are casting at weeds, or a "break" that are either not as large as they once were or not there at all, meaning the fish wont be hanging around as long which equals less fish being caught, Okay, time to make a change.
Oy. |
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Location: one foot over the line | Top H2O - 9/2/2012 5:37 PM
Seams like a lot of work to get much to eat from these little buggers ?
How do you cook, and eat them ? is there Brain sucking going on?
curious. They tend to be to small to bother with.. a Crawdad is much bigger, isn't it?
With a little practice, a seasoned crawdadder can consume a hundred in 15 min. A good sized rusty is around 4 inches (not including the claws). I empty my traps into a large cooler and cover them with water, then pour some salt on them (this makes them crap out) and then rinse or leave the hose on them. Get yourself a large pot, boil water, throw in some old bay seasoning, chunks of lemon and onion. drop crawdads in water, boil for 8-10 min. drain. dump onto paper-lined picnic table. Feast! Serve with lots of cold beer and melted butter.
I'm still looking for those lake suggestions. and, YES, there is alot of brain sucking going on, that's all part of the fun. thanks
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Posts: 2024
| Beer, you can also boil some corn and new potatoes before you add the crawfish and it's all done at the same time.
Edited by ARmuskyaddict 9/3/2012 5:30 PM
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Posts: 4080
Location: Elko - Lake Vermilion | Dang,...... That sounds pretty good.
Vermilion's East End has lost most of it's weeds and still has a good Muskie bite.
The Rusty's have moved into the mid section now, so they aren't as numerous on the East side as they once were. I noticed them 13 yrs ago , and watched them move about 8-10 miles since then.
Greenwood Bay used to be thick with weeds 4 yrs. ago, now it's very sparse,......But you'll still find Muskies there, same with Stuntz Bay.
Smalley's love em too.
Jerome |
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Location: one foot over the line | If you ever get a chance to go to a crawdad feed, it will be well worth your time! Surprised more wisconsinites don't do this. Maybe its just the redneck in me. AR, I do my potatoes and corn in a seperate pot to preserve their flavor and not have everything taste like crawdad. Anyway you slice it, with enough butter and beer you can never go wrong. Shoot, i'm gettin hungry! |
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Posts: 906
Location: Warroad, Mn | I suspect that on lakes that rely on mother nature to produce the fish we pursue that weed growth is quite important, and that's why I'm worried. I've watched many a muskie spawn on the LOTWs and it has always been in areas that would have emerging weeds about the time that the young-of-the year are born. I'm worried that without the natural nurseries that the weeds would provide (cover and food) the small fish will be food for every thing that swims. As I say I see less and less weed beds every year and that worries me. As I also say time will tell. I sort of have doubts that the LOTWs muskie can adapt to a very new environment in a very short period of time, as they have been spawning on emerging weeds for thousands of years.. On lakes that are stocked I would guess that weeds are nuisance. I doubt that a spoon plug will produce little muskies! Doug Johnson
Edited by dougj 9/3/2012 7:52 PM
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Posts: 1023
Location: Lafayette, IN | Being from Indiana and having been on Big Winnie back in the 60's and now Vermilion for the last 12 years there has always been something exciting, challenging, romantic, even euphoric about the vast cabbage beds of Minnesota. Although I've never seen cabbage on Big V like I saw on Winnie when I was a kid the overall decline in weed beds on Vermilion in the last 12 years has been startling. I've slipped back into bays on the northeast end that had depth and a soft bottom with reeds around the edges and not a single weed present! Only the presence of rusties moving across the bottom like a wave. Almost creepy. Thankfully, I know there are many trophy fish still present on this beautiful lake. I simply have to work harder and smarter to get them. Not something I typically do on vacation... but, the point remains. I'll leave it up to the experts to come up with a solution (if one is needed). In the meantime I'll CPR so you can also catch the memories and will keep my boat clean of invasive species. Interesting thread. |
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