Red sided Shinners

[utfishguy31]

Is the red sided shinner in Strawberry a native fish or planted fish by the DWR. I Thought it was a native fish to the lake.Could someone clarify this??
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[fuzzyfisher]

[#330099]Source: Utah Division of Wildlife Resources..

the red side shiner is native to Utah in many places..but if they were to servive the great can of fix a lake in 91 i would not know..so i'm sure they would have had to replant after..



The redside shiner, Richardsonius balteatus, is minnow native to southwestern Canada and the western (especially northwestern) United States. In Utah, this common species is native to the Bonneville Basin, and has been introduced to the upper Colorado River drainage. The redside shiner prefers heavily vegetated areas of slow-moving water with sand or mud substrate, and members of the species are often found in large schools within such habitat.
Redside shiners are opportunistic feeders, eating insects, mollusks, zooplankton, small fishes, fish eggs, and even algae. The species spawns during the spring and summer over gravel substrate or submerged vegetation. Adhesive eggs are broadcast into the water, fertilized, and then stick to plants, rocks, detritus, or the substrate. Eggs hatch in about two weeks; no care is given to eggs or young.
Although redside shiners are often consumed by sport fishes, they compete with young trout for food and space, and are therefore not as valuable a forage fish as they might otherwise be. [/#330099]
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[utfishguy31]

Thanks for the nice report,I never new that much about red shinners.How big do they get? The only ones I have seen are about 3-5 inches.Do they do much damage like chubs?
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[fuzzyfisher]

i trap alot of shiners throughout the year.. i have had shiners so big they would not fit into hole of my traps before.. about 1 inch round.. i have seen shiners up at E-lake top out at 8" long.. but most the time shiners are in the 3 to 5 inchs long range..

as to the damage they do? they are not as destructive as carp or chub.. do not grow to a size that could effect most trout fishery's here in utah.. given that most fishery's are planted with fish that are allready big enough to eat them.. they will however eat the egg's of the other fish..but then all the other fish in the lake will eat the other fish's egg's as well.. so not much damage there..

i'm still thinking the cutt's in the berry have got to size they are now from eating the shiners more so than the chub..seeing the sharp decline in shiners this year over last year..
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[Coldfooter]

Hey Ron ol' buddy. Maybe the reason the mags population in the Berry might be down from last year is,, to many of us were introducing the Cutties to mags through the ice last hard top season and now they (the cutts) simply wont eat that second rate chow (like chubs). [laugh]
I'm getting low on supplies so I need to make another meat eaters chow run before the big chill in your neck of the woods..
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[fuzzyfisher]

yeah my buddy said he wants to do some fishing up there this weekend as well .. so i'm thinking i would take the traps up and throw them in E-lake then hit huntington in the tube and catch some tigers..
if we dont go chaseing the other kind of tigers insted..

i would rather hit E-lake but he dose not like to fish there because of the small size of the cutt's..

finley got the ok to get a new frezer some time next week so now i can have my old frezer back and use it just for bait..so now i can finley stock up proper this fall for the up comeing ice.. need to get to the secret sucker hole and see if can get sucker meat for my stock as well..
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[Coldfooter]

Cool, load that puppy up! I suppose some folks dont realize just how many mags we go through in a years time. I hope mega mags in the form of chubs are on your list of needed supplies for you know where, you know when []

Best of luck where ever you end up. If its chasing mega Tigs string a jaw for me too!! Sorta wish I was going that direction this weekend..
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[utfishguy31]

Thanks Ron for the info! Have you been down to fishlake lately? I was trying to plan a trip in october.Have you heard any reports about fishlake?
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[fuzzyfisher]

i have not been to fish lake in about two months.. i do how ever keep a ear out for anything i can on the lake.. my good friend lives in kishierm and go's to fish lake at lest once a week.. he say's the splake fishing has been great this year but most are small..jigging is his thing on the splake.. the mac's have been doing alot better this year than in the past years and some nice ones are being cought.. i my self am still looking for that 10 lbs + mac out of fish lake but as of yet have not found it.. the best one i have cought from there was this summer trolling a big perch flatfish along the weed line and it was 7 1/2 lbs pup..

i like fish lake for ice fishing more than open water and spend alot more time there in the winter and any other time..
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[Bigfishrule]

The reason the big can fix was not totally effective was the water that comes in at the ladders. Comes from the West Fork of the Duchense thru Current Creek. These waters were not poisoned in the big fix. So if you read the even the earliest articles, the DWR knew the chubbs and shiners would make thier way back to the Berry, even without bucket biology. They were hoping to have enough big cutts by the time they started showing up. But with to liberal of limits that did'nt work out. Should of had the slot limit from the get go.
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[utfishguy31]

Thats what I have been preaching about on my soap box!!!..LOL..
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[utfishguy31]

Do you know why the DWR has let this long time Mack fishery sputter the last 15yrs??? They dont even manage it for lake trout anymore,why is this?? I catch a few here and there but its mostly small bows and decent splake (which I am not complianing about) Is there a way to get fishlake back to a trophy Mack lake??
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[fuzzyfisher]

well i'm by no means a fish biologist and dont know all of what is going on in fish lake.. but i'm sure it has alot to do with the fact that Eurasian Watermilfoil A plant that is not native to fish lake or even utah for that mater.. that is what is makeing that great weed line that we all enjoy fishing in todays fish lake.. combined that with the perch that have found there way into the lake and you have a problem that the lake did not have 20 years ago..

i think that the big lake trout are still in fish lake they just have alot more places to hide and dont have to look as hard to find food.. as with the old day's they had to try and get there food in open water.. now they can get into the weeds and wait for there food to come to them.. going from a open water predetor to and ambush predeter has made them alittle harded to find and catch..
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[utfishguy31]

Do you think planting to much splake have hurt the mack fishing? Is there a nice number of macks still in the lake? That weed line has been there at least 30+ yrs I grew up on that lake and my grandparents were down there 3-4 times a year,and my grandpa would always tell me how they would troll the old mack runs and the weed line..so it has been in there a LONG time..
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