Tim Smith

I suppose I'm past the first wave of posts here but since most of you apparently don't believe I fish, I thought I would go ahead and dispell that rumor. These are from Illinois. 20, 19, 18. The Japanese kid is Takauki, an exchange student I taught to river fish when he lived with us. These came from a river in Central Illinois that had 3 species of fish in it during the 50s-70s. Now it has 30 and it's a trophy smallmouth fishery thanks to improvements at a sewage treatment plant and the Clean Water Act. And here's one to proove there are still smallmouth in the White River. And here's the biggest one my son caught before I lost him to video games and dating Had a great time catching 13-17 inch spotted bass in a particular river over the last 5 years. 0.9 pound warmouth. Closest to a record I ever came. First fish caught out of my kayak. 13 pounds on a John Graham jig. Towed me around quite a while. We were just talking about stocker trout. This year they got crazy in Illinois and dumped the brood stock...ragged fins and all. And a few Belize fish. This snook was over 20 pounds. Not sure I want to admit how I caught it. But it was fair chase and I did catch it. 4' barracuda. Biggest fish in a long, long time. ....and the biggest thing I ever helped pull out of the water. Antillean Manatee. Around 400 pounds (not super big). Helped out with a tagging project with Mote Marine Lab.

The bottom line is that towns shouldn't be in the flood plain. A total of ONE town took the Feds up on their offer to move them out of the Mississippi flood plain free of cost after the '93 flood. It is just as crazy for Cairo to be at that confluence as it is for New Orleans to rebuild below sea level. It's hard to have an out-pouring of sympathy for Cairo in that light, but homes trump farm land every time. If they think it'll do any good at all, they'll probably blow the levee.

Will definitely have to check that one out when it comes around again. Pike minnow (formerly squawfish) and birds are hardly the brunt of the problem though. About 10% are lost to smallmouth bass and even more than that disappear down walleye gullets. Classic case of a native fishery suffering at the hands of an introduced one.

The shoe goes on all feet, including mine, yes.

I really enjoyed this. If you can be patient with it, you might too. It's a psych researcher talking about a theory of how "reason" came to be (to win arguments, convince others to do what we want, and to keep others from influencing us too much). It goes on to discuss how our natural tendancy to "reason" with each other requires some modification if we want to actually arrive at objective facts. He goes on to point out that we are pretty good at arriving at technical truths (that don't involve a personal stake in issues), but very bad at seeing objective truths about ourselves. It also includes a nice selection about the tendancy people have to think "we" know what we're talking about and how becomes less and less true as we fail to take in input from others around us. In a conservation forum, where we apply technical knowledge to our personal situations as citizens, anglers, and conservationists, this kind of perspective could be helpful, I believe. In my opinion it's also great support for Phil's approach to letting topics thrash out here as long as we avoid personal attacks and maintain respect for each other and the forum.

That should be a terrific show but I'm going to have to miss it. Could someone post the content and their impressions afterward?

I think Oneshot is right about the specific problems here. On average the silt from flooding adds to soil fertility. If you happen to get sand instead of silt in your particular spot...you're screwed.

If conditions are wrong, they'll wait. Broadcast spawners are going to have a heyday in all of this flooded timber. Look for incredible numbers of shad and carp and suckers to recruit this year. Not sure about white bass, but maybe them too.

Exactly. Armadillo is a favorite dish in Belize as is oppossum and raccoon (and iguana and manatee and conch and parrots and coati and dolphin and tapir and hicatee and sea turtles and peccary and...). On that list the only (cooked) thing it's unhealthy to eat (leaving ethics aside) is dolphin since its high on the food chain and loaded with mercury. If armadillo had been around when the Cajuns first came to Louisiana, they would have made it into a local delicacy.

I might be able to swing some time to help over the weekend. My 7 year old daughter would be with me so I'm a bit limited. Could bring a canoe and waders.

Sounds like a great idea. You might need to add some "disclaimers" to deal with the seedier side of volunteer help ("...at your own risk, blah blah blah") but this could be a great addition not only for disaster relief but for anyone who needs help. Not sure if you want a whole section set aside, but other forums run a "Volunteer Opportunities" section.

Ouch. Hang tough, Phil. Wondering if there is anything we can do?

You did fine, P.O. I agree the discussion was off topic and for that reason alone I feel a little dirty for having posted. Still, it was reasonably civil overall. As for not talking about conservation because there is trouble in the world...under those conditions no one would ever post anything. Unless you're out picking up rubble that's a false choice. Just keep it civil and don't give Phil and Dano headaches.

You could be right that it's an overwinter hold over. Here's a picture of the broodstock from Norfork from a few years back and it seems similar in wear to the one in the photo above. This one's a male and probably amped up on sex hormones and sporting a really ridiculously outsized kype so it might be less active and less damaged. They vary. Hard to know for sure.

No, but in the same chapter he said to sell your possessions and give them to charity. Elsehwere he told the man who has 2 cloaks to give one away. So you're about in the right ball park with that 50% number. Interesting. When shown a Roman coin and asked if we should pay taxes, Jesus also said "Give to Ceasar what is Ceasar's" and the Romans were famous for (corrupt) charities. Are you suggesting Jesus didn't know about the bread and circuses? Even though it is convenient to pretend the world runs on single drivers, it is in fact much more complex than that. Your government has provided education, infrastructure, physical protection and administration of public resources for what has been referred to many times as the greatest country on earth. In that sense, yes, the government has helped me in my buisness and it helps others in their business as well. I could stand up and pretend I built the roads I use and the research that made the computers I use possible...or the theoretical foundations of statistics and chemical analysis and population biology. But in fact, the government paid for most of that. You need individual capacity to succeed, but the "self made man" is mostly myth, yes. It requires great arroagance to claim you've gotten where you are all on your own. Interesting turn toward personal statements here. Feeling a bit cornered? Another good sign the thread is about to crash and burn. We have taken too much latitude from the conservation theme here.

No, that quote comes from Chinese folk wisdom, not the Bible. Maybe a good way to have political discussions here would be to require people to read the New Testament first. Callin' people "Stalin" is skating close to the big X.

Sorry TF, shouldn't have left your quote in there. The original article suggested it might have been a hold-over.

If a lake has depth and a rock bottom with high oxygen, rainbows can make it oversummer. They're ok up to 25C and they can even handle that if they're getting enough food. But in this case, I question the hold-over theory. That fish is way over-weight for a wild fish and the tail looks like it has spent time in a concrete raceway recently. In the quarries I fished put and take trout with my kids, we caught fish with shaggy rounded fins like this one, and fish with sharp, healed fins. I would have expected this fish to look "wilder" than this over the course of a year in a lake. It just looks like a brood-stock fish to me.

I'm glad you're ambitious and good at calculus. Unfortunately, the median income in the US is 36K and most people don't have any chance at 100K. The flat tax is horribly unjust to the average US citizen. Interesting that Marx always gets whipped out during these conversations. The quote "To him whom much is given, much is expected." came from the Bible and was said by Jesus. Somehow that idealogical influence always gets passed over here. That's about all I have to say about that except to point out that sales tax is the same as a flat tax as it is regressive and affects lower income families more. You can take up the rest with Jesus. I like how any mention of fairness these days is immediately portrayed as class warfare and linked to Marx. Being fair or kind is an act of war? Interesting. Read your New Testament and try again. Higher income individuals who got more from the system owe more back to the system that helped them up the ladder, that's why. The "self-made" individual is an elitist myth. Individual capacity, drive and initiative are only one component of success and on their own are not sufficient. Everyone gets a hand up from somewhere and more than a little luck is involved in financial success. I won't argue a specific tax rate here because those are in flux and for the purposes of this argument any number could be said to be too high or too low. Heh. Not going to respond much to a hypothetical "global tax code" or things I didn't say about lying and cheating being necessary to make income. I will point out that your argument is naive about the cost of living and the standard of living in the places you mention. Costs of living in the US are vastly higher than those in developing nations and as a result, standards of living for low income individuals are often comparable to those in 3rd world countries. A 20,000 US salary in Central America puts you solidly in the middle class with a high percentage of disposable income. As a small business owner I can tell you that taxes are the least of my worries. My success is based on contracts won and if I spend any reasonable income at all reinvesting into my business or applying my normal deductions, my taxes are virtually non-existant. In fact, even large corporations are able to avoid paying any taxes at all this way. If you want to make the argument that less of those deductions should be applied, then you would have a point (in the current debt climate). Linking that to an argument against progressive taxes is a non-sequiter. Focusing on the middle class also evades the argument. Tax relief for lower income brackets gets spent here (because they have to spend more of their money to meet day to day needs). Tax relief for upper income tax brackets has been going overseas. ...and with that I'll leave the argument to others. This has been civil and I don't think Phil would object to the content so far, but we're off topic for the forum and this is where things usually fall apart. I'll leave my input there.

Fully agreed here. Ethanol's only benefit is that it isn't from somewhere else. It's a money and energy sink and biofuels will have to perform better than this to be a real solution in the alternative energy markets. Fully disagree here. The flat tax is the worst idea every to be conceived by anyone anyhwhere. Surely there are "bad" tax incentives that can be removed, but much of the charitable giving that is done in the country comes from tax breaks. The country most certainly has an interest in picking winners when those winners benefit the nation as a whole (i.e. in conservation funding). Furthermore, there are huge ethical differences in taxing 10% from the income of a person who is struggling to feed their family vs. 10% from a person with unlimited disposable income. From those to whom much is given, much is expected. Also dubious about the fundamentalist free market ideas that reducing tax rates produces more taxes. Smells pretty much the same as the "trickle down" theory that assumes benefits to the top will reach the bottom. Clearly what happens instead is that the benefits STAY at the top (and go overseas to cheap labor markets).

I am sure this is true to an extent. I was interested to see that the president's budget for 2012 restored much of the funding from 2011 and even added some funds. Don't know how much of that will fly. One major concern on the other side of the aisle is that environmental enforcement is being targeted for deeper cuts because they are seen as an impediment to business. In other words, business wants to pollute more and they want the EPA out of the way so they can do it. The EPA is already going at environmental enforcement with half measures. Cutting them back more would show up in more miles of impaired streams. Another aspect of this was touched on by Al in another thread. For the most part, conservation funding amounts to little more than nickles and dimes compared to things like entitlements and defense. Finishing the engagement in Afghanistan and avoiding a broad military commitment in the Arab uprisings will save more money than all the conservation funding combined. Reducing SS benefits to people who don't need them and raising the retirement age could produce the same effect.

These guys seem to have it down....(warning for the nude cartoon on top of the blog page). http://www.trashonthefly.com/2010/06/07/the-young-jedi/

Same thing applies to long nose (which can top 5 feet). I think gar get a worse rap than they deserve because of the habitat issue (the bass wouldn't perfer site where gar are thick anyway), but they do take some bass. Not much different than pike/muskie issues except that gar can live places where bass can't.

Any large piscivore will take some bass but most of the habitats alligator gar prefer aren't going to have especially good bass populations in the first place and even where they overlap significantly, gar will take what's most abundant (primarily shad and rough fish). If there were ever a species that begged for catch and release, it is the aligator gar. Topping out well over 7 feet and 200 pounds, they have the potential to be an international tourism draw (with appropriate marketing and safeguards). It's one of the few freshwater fish in North America that puts the angler on an even playing field with the fish. The Trinity River (just the kind of low-gradient, low oxygen, soft-bottomed river that tends to be a poor bass producer) in Texas now has several guides that specialize in alligator gar and that state is just beginning to wake up to the need for management. But none of the potential of that fishery is realized unless they reach an age where that enormous size is possible. As has been mentioned already, aligator gar are not common anymore. You can overfish them in a heartbeat. This one needs to go back into the water.

Exactly. Phil has said things similar to this many times.