08-13-2016, 04:18 PM
The reason that you don't see lots of crawdads at Willard is that when the stick their heads out of the rocks, something eats it, be it a bass, wiper, crappie, walleye, catfish, or even a carp. They are there, but they try and preserve their hides by hiding most of the time. When heavily preyed on, they usually only come out at night.
The reason that you see more of them at someplace like Strawberry/Soldier Creek is that the trout species only prey on them when they are small. once they get over 1.5 inches, nothing but the bigger trout can eat them. DWR had a situation years ago at Enterprise Res. in Southern Ut. where they drained the res to repair the dam. There was a thriving crawdad pop down there, but the trout kept them in check because they cropped off the young of the year most years. When the res drained, the dads continued to thrive and grow, so then the lake refilled several years later, the dads had the upper hand and were impacting the growth of the planted trout. It was all made moot when someone put golden shinners in there, which resulted in the stocking of wipers to control them. Wipers and Striped bass feed heavily on crawdads.
The reason that you see more of them at someplace like Strawberry/Soldier Creek is that the trout species only prey on them when they are small. once they get over 1.5 inches, nothing but the bigger trout can eat them. DWR had a situation years ago at Enterprise Res. in Southern Ut. where they drained the res to repair the dam. There was a thriving crawdad pop down there, but the trout kept them in check because they cropped off the young of the year most years. When the res drained, the dads continued to thrive and grow, so then the lake refilled several years later, the dads had the upper hand and were impacting the growth of the planted trout. It was all made moot when someone put golden shinners in there, which resulted in the stocking of wipers to control them. Wipers and Striped bass feed heavily on crawdads.