Thread Rating:
  • 0 Vote(s) - 0 Average
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
Starvation hard deck report
#21
2013, has it been that long ago now, wow, that time has flown by. That was the best Winter I can ever remember fishing there. I think I made three trips there that Winter, good times.
Reply
#22
(01-21-2022, 04:13 PM)dubob Wrote: Here's a flashback for you Mike - Feb 1, 2013.

You!
[Image: ZkJyWAP.jpg]

Me!
[Image: Oa5RKM2.jpg]

Joe!
[Image: aTGn8Ia.jpg]

Gary!
[Image: 5eyU4T3.jpg]

Curtis!
[Image: PbfCm01.jpg]

Big Earl!
[Image: iFgGHjM.jpg]

My haul!
[Image: lQXfeSH.jpg]

Good times; good eats - for sure!   Big Grin
If memory is still serving me right, each of us got a little 'glutenous' that day with our 50 perch limit...no wonder it's taken so long for Starvy to recover!! I think someone made us a pretty good perch chowder that day, in between the action...good memory, good pics Bob...
Reply
#23
I think Mike made the chowder, not sure about Bob but I wasn't one that keep 50, I stopped at 30, I believe, that was a lot of work just doing that many. Wish I had taken a pic of my fish finder, if I remember correctly we had 10 ft of perch stacked off the bottom most of the time we were in that second location, closer to where we unloaded the snow mobiles.
Reply
#24
The winter of 2013 was about the last time any of us really had good perch fishing in Starvation.  There were reports in early 2014...as the ice came off the lake...of large numbers of dead perch washing up all around the lake.  And the dead fish were of all sizes and age classes...so there was something besides spawn mortality involved.  But, because it was not observed or studied by qualified biologists, there was never a definitive reason given for the dieoff.  Although we have seen the aftermath and have lamented the lack of perch since. 

In the attached PDF file there is a picture of a few guys from DWR who had a successful outing on Starvy just prior to the crash.  This is a brief excerpt from the larger piece I put together on "FISHING STARVY".  I have spoken with several folks from DWR and most of them have been unable to provide any further insight.


Attached Files
.pdf   STARVATION PERCH CRASH.pdf (Size: 488.14 KB / Downloads: 5)
Reply
#25
(01-21-2022, 09:33 PM)TubeDude Wrote: The winter of 2013 was about the last time any of us really had good perch fishing in Starvation.  There were reports in early 2014...as the ice came off the lake...of large numbers of dead perch washing up all around the lake.  
 Even so, unless ALL the perch died somehow, and even given some of the terrible water years, I would have thought a population recovery (if not a size recovery) would have been well under way.   I wonder why not? 

Perch are prolific.  It took only a 3-4 years after PV perch crashed for a bunch of 10.5" fish to show up all of a sudden one year, and by the next year we were back to standard, even classic PV perch.  In the meantime, while the perch were gone, the crappie started growing, but topped out about 10".
Reply
#26
(01-21-2022, 10:44 PM)Springbuck1 Wrote:
(01-21-2022, 09:33 PM)TubeDude Wrote: The winter of 2013 was about the last time any of us really had good perch fishing in Starvation.  There were reports in early 2014...as the ice came off the lake...of large numbers of dead perch washing up all around the lake.  
 Even so, unless ALL the perch died somehow, and even given some of the terrible water years, I would have thought a population recovery (if not a size recovery) would have been well under way.   I wonder why not? 

Perch are prolific.  It took only a 3-4 years after PV perch crashed for a bunch of 10.5" fish to show up all of a sudden one year, and by the next year we were back to standard, even classic PV perch.  In the meantime, while the perch were gone, the crappie started growing, but topped out about 10".
That's the big question.  Perch were supposedly never planted in Starvation...knowingly and legally.  But their population exploded and within a short time they were everywhere in the lake...in big numbers...and growing to good sizes (over 14").  But since the dieoff they have never made a big comeback. 

A couple of possibles.  When the perch first showed up in Starvy there were still a lot of chubs in the biomass.  But perch have done well in a lot of lakes where they had only their own young as a primary food source. So that is not likely a cause.  Secondly, there is a large population of perch-eating walleyes in Starvy.  It is possible that they eat enough of the perch to keep the perch population low. 

A more likely limiting predator might be smallmouths.  They were a major cause of the decline in perch in Deer Creek.  There were always a lot of perch in Deer Creek until smallies were introduced.  Young smallies take a major toll on newly hatched perchlets every year...slurping up thousands before they ever have a chance to grow.  And Starvy has a big population of both small smallies and seegar wallies.  Those two species eat lots of perchlets at all stages of their life cycle. 

Before the big crash there was a major harvest of perch by anglers...both from open water and through the ice.  But angling pressure has never been proven as a cause of major perch declines.  Natural predation always counts for a much greater toll on perch numbers.  In Yuba reservoir there was a study that projected that walleyes ate at least 10 times more perch than anglers ever harvested. 

About two or three years before the crash at Starvy, there was a similar dieoff at Jordanelle.  But that was supposedly the result of a virus or parasite attack.  Results...the same.  It has been slow to recover, but it has done better than Starvation. 

I don't claim to know all the answers.  Heck, I'm not even sure what the questions are sometimes.
Reply


Forum Jump:


Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)