02-27-2013, 05:33 PM
I think that F&G have done a good job on this year class.
Yellow perch are a horrible fish to manage. Especially with fluctuating water levels in most of our reservoir.
The way I see it is they develop two problems.
#1 is the most common.... The perch over populate and stunt their own growth. The answer.... fewer perch. Usually through more predators---fishing harvest included. Take as many of the smaller ones as you can stand to fillet. Leave the largest perch, bass, etc to prey on the young. Or introduce more predators like Tiger Musky.
#2 is less common ... A super strong and large year class suppresses all the younger years by preying on the young. If you are mostly catching 9 to 14+ and few little ones, then there are too many predators on the the smaller guys. Some of the larger perch and other predators need to be thinned or when they are gone you won't have a balance of up coming years. You get really good fish for a number of years then they die off. The young then survive in huge numbers and they stunt!
You see this also in Crappie. A really good year class and then not much coming up for several years. The balance of really big fish and a good up coming year class is hard to get. In those cases, harvest of the big guys actually helps to balance things.
Where is Cascade at, or going to be at in the next few years? I don't really know, maybe F&G does. It is hard to keep that fine balance, and I doubt if they can always. Then it will be blamed on over harvest, F&G not caring etc...
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Yellow perch are a horrible fish to manage. Especially with fluctuating water levels in most of our reservoir.
The way I see it is they develop two problems.
#1 is the most common.... The perch over populate and stunt their own growth. The answer.... fewer perch. Usually through more predators---fishing harvest included. Take as many of the smaller ones as you can stand to fillet. Leave the largest perch, bass, etc to prey on the young. Or introduce more predators like Tiger Musky.
#2 is less common ... A super strong and large year class suppresses all the younger years by preying on the young. If you are mostly catching 9 to 14+ and few little ones, then there are too many predators on the the smaller guys. Some of the larger perch and other predators need to be thinned or when they are gone you won't have a balance of up coming years. You get really good fish for a number of years then they die off. The young then survive in huge numbers and they stunt!
You see this also in Crappie. A really good year class and then not much coming up for several years. The balance of really big fish and a good up coming year class is hard to get. In those cases, harvest of the big guys actually helps to balance things.
Where is Cascade at, or going to be at in the next few years? I don't really know, maybe F&G does. It is hard to keep that fine balance, and I doubt if they can always. Then it will be blamed on over harvest, F&G not caring etc...
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