TOPIC:

Lake Trout - Too Many Mouths to Feed

Lake Trout at Flaming Gorge
Anglers urged to keep lake trout at Flaming Gorge Reservoir

Dutch John – You can make fishing better at Flaming Gorge Reservoir-and provide a healthy and tasty meal to your family and friends-by keeping your limit of lake trout.

Currently, the popular reservoir in northeastern Utah-known for producing some of the largest lake trout in the country-has too many small lake trout in it. The abundance of small lake trout is creating competition for a limited food supply. The competition is reducing lake trout growth rates and reducing the number of kokanee salmon and rainbow trout available for anglers to catch.

Ryan Mosley, the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources lead fisheries biologist at Flaming Gorge, says growth rates for lake trout have diminished in the reservoir since the 1990s.

"An eight-year-old lake trout was about 30 inches long in the 1990s," Mosley says. "Today, an eight-year-old fish is only about 23 inches long. On top of the decreased length, the number of lake trout in the reservoir has increased 89 percent in just the last two years, so we're concerned the situation may only get worse."

Mosley says reducing the number of smaller lake trout would decrease competition for food among lake trout, kokanee salmon, and rainbow trout. Reduction would also increase the survival of salmon and rainbow trout and provide more of them to catch. Since kokanee salmon and rainbow trout are the primary prey for trophy lake trout, it would provide more salmon and rainbows for the remaining lake trout to eat, allowing the lake trout to grow quicker and larger.

"And, unbeknownst to many anglers, the smaller lake trout are quite tasty," Mosley says. "They're one of my favorite fish to eat. In Flaming Gorge, they're a close second to kokanee salmon on the taste scale." Lake trout limit

To address the lake trout concerns, the states of Utah and Wyoming liberalized lake trout limits at the Gorge in 2006. Decreasing the number of smaller lake trout is the goal of the liberalized limits.

Mosley says the daily lake trout bag limit at the Gorge is eight lake trout, but only one of the fish can be longer than 28 inches. He says anglers are crucial to controlling the number of lake trout in the reservoir. "Now that the ice is forming in many reaches of the Gorge," he says, "it's a great opportunity for anglers to get out and target these smaller fish."

Tonya Kieffer, regional conservation outreach manager for the UDWR, says the beginning of the ice fishing season tends to be the best time to get out and secure a limit of lake trout. "If temperatures stay below the freezing mark," she says, "the thickness of the ice should improve."

What's described in this article is "density dependent growth"

There's only so much food to go around, and if there are too many mouths to feed, that means that you have a bunch of small fish. On a small scale, an oversimplified example: if you can have 100 pounds of game fish in a pond, you could have 10 10-pound fish, or you could have 100 1-lb fish.

This is the same reasoning behind stocking cuts on the great lakes. Unfortunately in such large systems, liberalizing regulations on bag limits does not have nearly enough impact like it does in smaller lakes

Almost all salmonid species are smaller than they used to be, because there is not enough food to go around.

The exception is that lake trout body condition has not degraded nearly as much as the other salmonids, probably due to all the gobies they are eating, and their ability to be extremely flexible in what they eat

Bringing predator in prey in balance in the lake is probably going to require more cuts... lake trout, steelhead and chinook in particular. But it will be a huge uphill battle to enact them; was tough enough to get the latest one through. And steelhead weren't even in that conversation. All the river guys and steelheader chapters are going to mobilize in addition to the chinook boaters if steelhead cuts are on the table in the future

Thanks Ben,

looking down the road- I saw that Wisconsin is acting on the laker emergency clause and are going to a 5 laker limit with no closed season.

I think you mentioned that Indiana is moving from 2, to a 3 laker limit starting July 1st of this year. Is there a possibility or a means to go to 5 in Indiana? Wondering since most lakers for a big portion of the fishing season are actually out of Indiana water would it hurt to consider moving to 5?

We actually may be able to accelerate the 3 laker limit to April 1 under emergency rule, rather than waiting until July 1 under the normal cycle. In the process of trying to do that.

Several WI biologists I talked to a couple months ago had expected a limit of 3, so I am not sure on what is going on over in Wisconsin. As I understand it it is not finalized yet - they are going to have public input on it before moving forward. I don't know if there is politics at play, if they actually want 5, it's a trial balloon, or what is going on.

Edit - just saw that as of yesterday WI NRC approved the 5 limit and awaiting approval from the governor. Seems likely he will support it

As far as Indiana going to 5, a couple things on that. Number one, we wanted to increase the limit. But we also wanted to be the same limit as southern Michigan regs, because a lot of people fish both Indiana and Michigan in the same trip, since lakers are often in that 80-120 foot zone just over the border. Having a limit of 3 in MM-8 and in IND just makes it simple for everybody.

For a good portion of the season, lakers are outside Indiana waters, so it would probably would not have much impact on a broad scale (which is in itself a good reason not to change, imo). I am hesitant to go to 5 limit for lakers in Indiana for 3 reasons: it wouldn't have much impact on the population because lakers are not in our waters when most of the fishing effort happens, it would introduce more issues with cross-state bag limits, and the localized impact would probably be negative: the winter light-tackle fishery jigging lake trout is rapidly increasing in popularity, and that population is finite, especially since no more lake trout are scheduled to be stocked in Indiana. I would worry that a 5 fish bag could rapidly deplete that resource

Actually, make it 4 reasons - let's see how this 3 fish bag works out for a few years before we consider making another change

As we have seen on this forum I dont think that the increase bag limit will have a large effect on population as most are not keeping Lakers. If some of the tournaments change their weigh in regulations as mentioned there will be some extra pressure there. Since there are no tournaments in the winter there wouldn't be a big reduction there.

Matching Southern Michigan limits on the angler side does make things a lot easier and the most sense. Leaving and returning to Indiana but fishing Michigan waters, no more questioning if you are in or out of compliance fishing one area and returning to another.

Increased limits in Indiana wouldn't accomplish much on most boats. The only time we are targeting Lakers is in the winter cold water period where we are jigging for them. Even then, 98% are released. During the summer my policy is if you want it, you clean it.

I can't see many fisherman, except for charter boats, bringing back 15-20 Lake Trout a trip. You can't eat that much and many fall into the do not eat size slot.

I'm also not in favor of the extreme waste I've seen on other lakes, regarding sheephead in particular, where fisherman would slit the gills and feed them to the seagulls.

Ben, since someone brought it up what are the penalties in Indiana for wasting game and fish. Since the fish we talk about in these forums are considered game or sport fish would their protection be in the hands of state DNRs or would they fall in to protection by the federal government since these are coastal waters. Could there be violations of the Lacy Act moving around with fish from one state to another?

I am not law enforcement, there's enough biology and then some to keep straight.

I would contact the Michigan City DNR Law Enforcement at 219-879-5710 to ask them directly

I don't know how the Lacey Act would apply to moving a game fish over the state line in conjunction with wanton waste.

It would almost certainly be state DNR that would be enforcing that.

i did not mean the waste of fish and game, I was concerned about moving fish from one state to another and exceeding bag limits from state to another. And the fact that the lake is federal water.

No, as long as they are legally taken there is no issue with Lacey Act

No issue from Indiana if you go to Michigan and catch a Michigan limit and then come straight back to an Indiana port. The issue would arise if you go to Michigan, catch your Michigan limit of 3 lakers (for example, as it currently stands) and then came back into Indiana and resumed fishing, which currently has a 2 lake trout bag. You would likely get a ticket as you are actively fishing in Indiana waters while possessing more than the daily bag limit

Again though, I am not a CO, so please don't take my word for it if you are concerned about breaking the law. Better to hear it from the guys that will be writing you the ticket