I have had some good fishing days at Jordanelle, some big trout and smallmouths too. I am wondering why there is seldom a post here from there? Is it too early or has this fishery gone bad? I have caught browns there over 23-24 inches, nice fat rainbows and my wife caught a smallie over 6 lbs, are those days over? Any recent reports would be great, tackle, tactis etc. Cheers!
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This is one of our families favorite lakes to visit. We are not into trout so we chase perch. Haven't been up there yet this year but even the perch fishing hasn't been that great to us. Overall we enjoy the scenery and being on the water.
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Too many ski boats.
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Jordanelle and Pineview share the skiboat problem. It gets to be downright dangerous to be out there in anything small and slow. Never mind the 13-dB speakers, the 500-hp motors, the tsunami-sized wakes; it seems like some of those idiots get their jollies playing chicken with anybody trying to fish.
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[#0000FF]Welcome aboard.
I'm guessing that most of your fond memories of good fishing days happened more than about 5 years ago. A year or two before that the food chain got all out of whack and the fishing went downhill.
In former years, Jordanelle had a great food base for the predators...lots of chubs and perch. Then the exploding population of smallmouths cleaned out all the small chubs...leaving only a few big ones. The big ones kept spawning but the little ones got eaten before they could join the spawning population.
Then, one winter there was a huge perch dieoff. After that time the population was never able to grow to former sizes. The chubless smallies now had to rely on perch as their main forage base and there weren't enough perch to spawn enough food both for the smallies and themselves. Past the tipping point...like Deer Creek.
With less food available, the bigger smallies died out and the survivors just did not grow as big or as fast. SOME pseudo-biologists try to blame it on DWR changing regulations and anglers taking home all the big bass. Bullfeathers. Very few knowledgeable anglers even bother with Jordanelle these days and the bass still remain small. Very few reports of any over about 15 inches.
There are still a few schools of perch hanging in there around the lake. But the lake is not overrun with them as before. A lucky few anglers are able to find some decent sized perch but nobody seems able to score numbers of larger perch on every trip.
With less food in the lake the big browns are fewer too. But there are some hefty ones still left. They dine on what perch they can find and then glut on the footlong rainbows planted in the fall each year. Once the browns get big enough to eat at the rainbow buffet they can reach double digit weight classes.
For a while DWR was not planting as many rainbows each year either. In former years I enjoyed fishing the late fall rainbow bonanza near the mouth of the Provo. Days of at least 20 fish with most over 16 inches were common. And seeing a few over 5# was not all that uncommon. I understand they will be increasing the plantings.
As also mentioned, the steady increase in summertime recreational boating has made Jordanelle less attractive to anglers as well. The doofii (plural of doofus) with big wakeboard boats, water skiers, and PWC are seemingly oblivious to the 150' proximity law...and completely unaware of anything related to sportsmanlike conduct. Makes it downright dangerous as well as aggravation for someone trying to enjoy some fishing tranquility.
Factor in the extremely low water levels for the past few years and you get poor spawning along with less water for more people to fight over. Jordanelle may someday come back from the terminally ill, but there are other waters more hospitable to serious anglers.
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Now that is a awesome reply to my question, so glad I asked although the news is not great, thanks!!!!
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[#0000FF]Didn't think to mention that Jordanelle is likely to be even more heavily used this year. Since Deer Creek is now on the quagga mussel list a lot of boaters won't want to launch there...and have to get decontaminated. Plus, Utah Lake is likely to be unusable by large boats by mid summer because the water in the harbors will be too low. That adds up to a lot more activity on Jordanelle.
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In your opinion Pat what would need to happen to bring Jordanelle back from the dead? It sounds like a new prey species needs to be introduced. Would moving some perch from fish lake help? What about putting in sone Gizzard shad?
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[#0000FF]There is a saying that "Desperate men do desperate deeds." Must have had deprived Utah fishermen in mind. We do get a bit reckless and desperate when trying to deal with what the fickle weather and water patterns give us.
There is no question that a diversified forage base would help Jordanelle...and other Utah waters. Most of the famous fishing holes of the midwest, south and eastern states are either natural lakes that do not fluctuate much...or impoundments on big rivers that seldom drop very low. And they almost always have a wide variety of food sources that will feed fish at all sizes and stages of development.
That does not describe most of the favorite fishing holes in our state. Most of our lakes are dammed up flows that were created to hold water for agriculture...and some for municipal or power use. But they are all subject to cycles of varying rains and snow runoff. Often drier than wetter.
The water that flows into our desert reservoirs is largely sterile, with not much in the way of nutrients to build a food chain. And there are very few reliable food resources for introduced fish species. Some reservoirs develop good populations of crawdads and other invertebrates. Very few have chubs, shiners, fathead minnows, sculpins or other mini fishes in numbers that will support larger predator species. And without food there can be no large populations of healthy fish.
Jordanelle was a prime example of the fertility and fish holding potential of a new lake...for a time after it was first filled. The vegetation left behind in the lake provided cover for spawning and nurseries for young fish. And as the vegetation decayed it added nutrients to the water to build a healthy soup of zooplankton and other bitty bites. The rainbow trout could live on that but the overabundant chubs competed with the trout for that resource. On the flip side, smallmouth bass and brown trout slurped up the chubs. Yellow perch came on strong and had plenty of their own young to eat, along with various invertebrates.
Then came the crash. As mentioned, smallies boomed in both numbers and size. And they feasted heavily on the chubs. There is no big population of crawdads in Jordanelle...a condition usually deemed vital for a healthy smallmouth population. When the chubs thinned out and the perch had a big dieoff the smallies no longer had a full grocery store...and there was a plunge in size and numbers.
Large plantings of new perch might help. Ditto for planting chubs...BUT NOT IN UTAH. DWR tries to get rid of chubs...not plant them.
Planting gizzard shad in Jordanelle? It is more likely to see them deliberately plant quagga mussels there. Gizzard shad have become a good food source for wipers and other predators in Willard Bay, but that is pretty much a "closed system". Any shad escaping "downstream" will die in Salt Lake. Shad going down the Provo from Jordanelle could end up in Deer Creek and/or Utah Lake. Highly unlikely any of the three waters would ever get local, state or federal approval for shad.
You asked for my personal opinion. I would like to see wholesale planting of crawdads, chubs and perch in Jordanelle. Many other states include the planting of forage species as well as "hatchery pets" in their overall management programs. But with the advent of all the new fish diseases and invasive species our fish and game departments are running scared. They would rather make NO decision than make a wrong decision. Can't say as I blame them. If you are in a politically run position, dependent on top down decisions on your duties and compensation, you really can't afford to call unnecessary attention to yourself by making radical suggestions...even if it should improve fishing for the license buyers.
Oh yeah, and while I am wishing, let's go for a big snowpack and heavy runoff for a few years. Much better for spawning, recruitment, lake fertility and overall fish populations and recreational fishing. Nothing else really matters if the lakes go dry.
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The planting of chubs from waters like Strawberry and Schofield has been suggested to the DWR in the past. In fact, before the last treatment of Strawberry our old Bass Club, High Country Bass Masters, built a trap that would fit into the barge that they use to stock fish at Strawberry. Charlie Thompson was the Central Region Biologist at the time. Charlie was very good about trying to enhance Warm Water fisheries when the DWR was solely focused on stocking trout. I believe that he put his career in jeopardy because of it.
Anyway, we suggested to him to trap chubs at Strawberry and move them to Utah Lake, as they are a native fish and would not interfere with the June Sucker. It seemed a real waste to kill them rather than move them. Still feel that way. The hatchery trucks go up loaded and come back empty. Why not trap chubs, load em into the trucks for the return to where ever, Jordanelle, Deer Creek, Utah lake, etc. still something to look at !!!
[#0000FF]Heresy and blasphemy! Careful or you will be burned at the stake (center).
I gave up on trying to suggest the "obvious" solution to food problems long ago. Whenever I naively asked someone from DWR about the possibility of transplanting chubs all I got was rolling of eyes and foaming at the mouth.
"We don't care if it works in other states. This is Utah...land of the trout and home of the June sucker."
"Our minds are made up. Don't confuse us with logic."
"Damn the speed. Full rotenone ahead."
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[quote MBM1969] What about putting in sone Gizzard shad?[/quote]
With the endangered June sucker directly downstream, gizzard shad is not likely to happen. Both are open water plankton feeders and introduced gizzards would probably pose as big a threat as the current challenges already facing the Junies.
I did pretty well there last year (and the year(s) before), including finding jumbo perch, which seem to be in short supply everywhere else around here. I will say only one additional thing. This will be the 4th consecutive year that Jordanelle hasn't completely filled. (2012-2015) Take a drive into Rock Cliffs and look into the shallow inlet area where the lake used to be. What do you see? A ton of weeds and new vegetation growing there. What do you think will happen if/when the lake finally returns to full pool? All of that stuff will be flooded and the fish will go into it. Perch/baitfish spawning will improve and the smallies will finally have some decent forage. While it won't be like it was when it was originally built, (older lakes never are) Jordanelle will have a nice resurgence when it happens.
We just need to hope/pray for rain and snow next winter.
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