Time to start watching DO charts

[Gavin]

Here's a question. If a 5.0 D.O. level is considered suitable for raising trout, whats the D.O. level at which you would stop fishing for trout?

[Phil Lilley]

You will see DO levels drop way past 5 to 4 and even below 3 this fall. My question has always been where is the gage located? If the water flowing thru the turbines into the lake is <3, trout should be dying according to material I've read. But we haven't had a fish kill in a number of years. So I don't take the gage 'at it's word' but treat it as an indicator of sorts. Later in the fall, you will see the levels plummet at night and peak mid afternoon.

We go thru this every fall. Some are nailbiters. This should be a normal season. It's gets really bad if we have a wet, warm spring, dumping alot of warm rain water into the system, thus raising the water temps in the fall in Taney. That's when it could get bad for our trout.

[Gavin]

Good point Phil, the guage location would matter a lot. If the measured DO level is <3 and fish arent dying, my guess is that the guage is at the turbine and that the fish are getting additional DO from another source, probably the hatchery outlets, dam leakage, or springs in the river bed..I wonder anyone has one a study on that?

[Robert]

It was my understanding that the O2 has been way down. The people at the hatchery have been trying to keep the level at 4ppm. It is my understanding that 4ppm is just bearly enough. Trout like the O2 level to be 6ppm or better. It might take a fountain to aireate the water to a proper level of O2. The fish this year have been of the no fight kind, but if fish are starved of the proper amount of O2 that would account for the poor fight in the fish. When the thermal inversion takes place Taney will the good fishery that it could and shoud be.

[J.E.]

Don,

I'm located just out of Clever to wards Billings, where are you?