09-03-2011, 06:20 AM
First off, it is disappointing to hear your report. I haven't been up there since last ice season and it didn't look too great then, unless you liked fat chubs and a bunch of emaciated bows and cutts. We have discussed this before, and I agree with you that treating the lake and starting over is probably the best. However, what has transpired down there raises a few interesting questions.
1. Why have the tigers and cutts failed so miserably in chub control at Scofield while cutts worked nicely at Strawberry? Do trout predators work more poorly in a shallow weedy lake as opposed to a big deep lake like the Berry? Almost from the onset of the slot, it seemed to me that most of the cutts I caught were extremely thin and unhealthy. As you know, the tigers were fat and robust, but maybe they are not effective chub controllers as a population. We may have overrated them as a predator?
2. Would an ambush predator like a Tiger musky wipe out an open water fish like chubs? I increasingly doubt it. I might maintain that TM may work better controlling weed hugging fish like perch.
3. What should the new regs be if they treat Scofield? You can bet a lot of people will line up to return it to general regs. Since the likelihood of the chubs returning is moderately high, I would favor a slot like you do for at least the predatory trout, but it would be interesting to see more data on which predator would work best at keeping the chubs down in the future.
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1. Why have the tigers and cutts failed so miserably in chub control at Scofield while cutts worked nicely at Strawberry? Do trout predators work more poorly in a shallow weedy lake as opposed to a big deep lake like the Berry? Almost from the onset of the slot, it seemed to me that most of the cutts I caught were extremely thin and unhealthy. As you know, the tigers were fat and robust, but maybe they are not effective chub controllers as a population. We may have overrated them as a predator?
2. Would an ambush predator like a Tiger musky wipe out an open water fish like chubs? I increasingly doubt it. I might maintain that TM may work better controlling weed hugging fish like perch.
3. What should the new regs be if they treat Scofield? You can bet a lot of people will line up to return it to general regs. Since the likelihood of the chubs returning is moderately high, I would favor a slot like you do for at least the predatory trout, but it would be interesting to see more data on which predator would work best at keeping the chubs down in the future.
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