05-17-2015, 03:12 PM
[#0000FF]Water temps play a big role in how active the white bass are during the spawn period. I have had a lot of days when there was not a whiff of a whitie in the cooler water temps of morning. Then in the afternoon, after a few degrees improvement, it got wide open again.
This tends to spread out the spawn and some fish may not spawn until late May or early June...or not at all. I have caught egg carrying females long after the main spawn was over. All species are subject to disrupted spawns that leaves some fish with unexpended eggs. Those are usually reabsorbed but sometimes they just let 'em fly any old place and they contribute to the food base for smaller species...or bigger species like carp.
Because of low water and reduced spawning habitat there has been a relatively poor spawn the past couple of years. I hope enough of them get in a successful spawn this year to at least generate a decent year class for the next few years. Otherwise there will be a big gap in the sizes...with hardly any fish available in a couple of years.
But Utah Lake has been through a lot of up and down cycles. At the end of the last big drought, in 2004 there were very few white bass left and all the walleyes were skinny. Many walleyes died of starvation that winter. Then there was a big runoff that refilled Utah Lake in 2005 and the remaining few white bass brought off a great spawn. Within a couple of years we were loading up on them again.
Love that great line from Jurassic Park: "Nature will find a way."
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This tends to spread out the spawn and some fish may not spawn until late May or early June...or not at all. I have caught egg carrying females long after the main spawn was over. All species are subject to disrupted spawns that leaves some fish with unexpended eggs. Those are usually reabsorbed but sometimes they just let 'em fly any old place and they contribute to the food base for smaller species...or bigger species like carp.
Because of low water and reduced spawning habitat there has been a relatively poor spawn the past couple of years. I hope enough of them get in a successful spawn this year to at least generate a decent year class for the next few years. Otherwise there will be a big gap in the sizes...with hardly any fish available in a couple of years.
But Utah Lake has been through a lot of up and down cycles. At the end of the last big drought, in 2004 there were very few white bass left and all the walleyes were skinny. Many walleyes died of starvation that winter. Then there was a big runoff that refilled Utah Lake in 2005 and the remaining few white bass brought off a great spawn. Within a couple of years we were loading up on them again.
Love that great line from Jurassic Park: "Nature will find a way."
[/#0000FF]
[signature]