What Fish Would You Like To Se Stocked And Where.

[Feathers and Fins]

Hmmm maybe not Great Whites but Bulls would survive

Now if you want absurd. MAKO... When a 5 to 800 pound barrel comes flying 20ft out of water its better than the 4th of july.

[Tim Smith]

You're right, of course, Tim. I was joking about the peacock bass, since I know they won't survive in our winters. And from what I understand, they go dormant when the water temps get down to our spring and autumn levels, even.

Thanks, Al. Having tried hard to keep peacock bass out of a place that REALLY doesn't need them, I have less of a sense of humor about that than I probably should.

I think what a lot of people don't realize is that stocking exotics is often a PERMANENT decision. You often can't undo it and often the results (such as with common carp) hurt the species we already have.

Making decisions about what what fish to put where based on what you'd like to catch close to home or how much money you might make off them in the short term is probably the worst way possible to manage a resource.

[Addicted to Creeks]

I gotta say I think we put a lot of unfair blame on the common carp. We introduced them, then trashed the waters to where only they could thrive and then turn around and blame the carp for ruining the water. I may be wrong but that's how I always saw it

[Wayne SW/MO]

I gotta say I think we put a lot of unfair blame on the common carp. We introduced them, then trashed the waters to where only they could thrive and then turn around and blame the carp for ruining the water. I may be wrong but that's how I always saw it

I tend to agree. There's also the old "water under the bridge" saying that probably applies. No one living today has seen our waters without the common carp. There is also the fact that in hard bottom lakes there is no evidence of them affecting clarity.

It is often all to easy to look at some factor that can cause a problem and then lay all of the problems on it. The salmon/smallmouth relationship in the John Day is a prime example. The two biggest predators of salmon smolts are the hydro dams and the squawfish, AKA the Northern Pikeminnow. the smolts from the John Day start high up in cold waters well above the smallies range, but then must travel through their range to get to the ocean. In the travels they pass by the squawfish and two dams. The squawfish is not only notorious for feeding on them in the river, but also for waiting in ambush at the dams. Another factor is that during many spring migrations the river is blown out, which historicaly helped the smolts pass the native predators, but the dams stopped that. Without smallies there would be more salmon reaching the ocean, but not enough to make a difference in light of the other manmade obstacles.

[Wayne SW/MO]

I saw a Koi in TR a couple of years ago, it was about 16"-18". I've often wondered if he came from a flooded pond or if someone dumped him and hoped he would survive.

[oneshot]

More Common Carp state wide,get Big and very Hard Fighters.

Wait I believe been cover.

Carry On!

oneshot

[oneshot]

I gotta say I think we put a lot of unfair blame on the common carp. We introduced them, then trashed the waters to where only they could thrive and then turn around and blame the carp for ruining the water. I may be wrong but that's how I always saw it

Got to agree.

oneshot

[Tim Smith]

I gotta say I think we put a lot of unfair blame on the common carp. We introduced them, then trashed the waters to where only they could thrive and then turn around and blame the carp for ruining the water. I may be wrong but that's how I always saw it

I've worked in some of the labs looking at carp effects and the science is pretty clear that carp are responsible for a huge percentage of the cloudiness in our modern waters (in soft bottomed systems such as in most of Illinois). If you want to defend them ecologically, your best best is to point out that by re-suspending all that muck it screens out the light lowers the amount of algae and the algae blooms. The rest of the story is pretty miserable.

In a clean system with low nutrients they probably don't do much damage because their numbers never get that high.

But where they do become abundant they reduce plant growth and habitat for juvenile sportfish. When their populations explode in lakes they turn them into mud holes. We can only speculate how much they might have affected native suckers which are generally in decline.

From the narrow perspective of having something else to fish for, carp might be excusable. In terms of their impact on the overall fishery (which is what really matters) they were a huge mistake.

[jdmidwest]

Hmm...I'm not sure I'd want to see any new exotics stocked. There's a part of me that would like to see the Akers to Pulltite stretch stocked with trout, but in the end I think they should just leave it be; there's already 20 miles of trout water, which is plenty. Even as it is, the lower half of that doesn't get used all that much, except by locals who want some stocker trout for dinner.

But if I had to come up with something, I'd like to see cutthroats stocked in the Blue Ribbon stretch of the Current.

Trout and Musky are exotics, and we love to play with them. Tilapia are coming up thru Ark due to their stocking program, they may become an invasive species.

JD last yearI talked to the guy at AGF involved in the stocking of Tilapia in eastern Arkansas and was told that they had stopped stocking them as the cost was too much. I agree with catching and tasty, as a side story when they were early in the stocking program it seemed like different members of the same family every couple of weeks were breaking the state record. Unfortunatly they had to be restocked every year but they would grow to unbelivable size in one growing season and right now that is the fish on our dinner plates when I choose not to kill the fish I catch. My bride gets a parmesan encrusted Tilapia that bakes up real crisp in the oven. Opps didn"t mean to hijack the thread

I quess our winters are too long for them. It is a shame, some research and genetic manipulation, maybe we can create a bluegill that gets the size of a Tilapia and can withstand our climate.

The first time I had Tilapia was at a bar in Carbondale, Il. They were on the menu as bluegill fillets, but when I saw them on the plate I knew they were not bluegill. I quizzed the waitress and found where they were coming from, it was a fish farm near Murphysboro that was raising them as a part of a Ill. Ag. project. I have been hooked on them since, but have never wet a line for them.

[laker67]

Would love to see triploid rainbows and seaforellen browns in taney.