Release more crappie with eggs!

[abkeenan]

They should start stocking Stripers in the Rock. Stripers could help the enconomy right along with the bass, walleye and crappie. They will eat the large shad that barely any other fish can eat.

Oh boy. As if this thread needed more ammo to pit one side vs the other. Yikes.

[MOPanfisher]

I am going to ask a question again, primarily for the guys that fish the Rock a lot. I kow on Truman, and Pomme especially in the fall the schools of young of the year shad are phenomenal, unbelievable large school after school of them. Is it that way on TR as well. Definitely no lake ever suffered from having some brood/raising cover added to the lake in the form of sunken cedars or whatever, if I had a dock on any lake, everyone would be afraid to swim around it due to the cover I would have place there. Also every lake, especially large ones will easily sustain an amount of harvest without any problems what so ever, unfortunately its not like the crab fishing shows where a quota is set and once you reach it all harvest stops. I do believe that the MDC tries very hard to not have any more of a variety of regs that differ from lake to lake than they really have to, it would be tough for normal fisherman to have to memorize and follow the differert rules and also make enforcement tough.

[dtrs5kprs]

Chief and Dave------- I know more than the average about how septic systems work But it would be interesting if Terriman or some expert could really post on here exactly how septic system work and what happens to the affleunts after they enter the ground. Here on LOZ there is a push to sewer systems. Morgan County serwer district has done has done seversl hundered on the west side of the gravois. On the other side. The Miller County sewers district just started on installing sewers to 1600 homes. I have had them myself on the west side going on 2 yrs now. It is really the only answer. Treatment plants must be state of the art as well and return water is 100 precent bacteria free. In other words it is sterile.

I think the lower part of TR is suffering from affuents because of all the post i see on here about moss. There was a discussion about it and there were post saying it was from people fertalizing their yards. Maybe in part but you really need to have some expert some expert on here post about Quafers and how they work with ground water. This water quality is a nation wide issue.

It impacts the fishery without question. I do not know enough about how it impacts to speculate on it. There is a level of fertility that is required for lakes to thrive. Not sure how the sewage issue impacts that.

[dtrs5kprs]

There is a ton of truth in this. I guess I live in a blissful ignorance telling myself that ALL the fish I release survived. Part of me knows that this is not true, but I'm happy that I don't know how many actually die.

It is fundamentally a bloodsport. No way around it. Makes it even more critical that anglers are taught C and R, fish handling, resource impacts, and develop ethics that guide behavior.

[dtrs5kprs]

It was because I posted a picture of a northern that my boss ate. Reasonable folks huh?

In a thread that was largely about exercising decision making, moderation, and selective harvest. Shocking that it did not go over well.

[Terrierman]

I blame most of it on social media. Everybody feels a need I guess to show everyone else what great fisherman they are. And I think it proves more of this was happening than we thought.

I do have to, with the utmost respect, disagree with the premise that TR is a million times better now. As far as crappie are concerned anyway.

There was by far better quality crappie coming out of there back then. Limits of 30 fish all easily exceeding 1 pound was the norm. Lots and lots of 1.5 - 2 pound were taken daily every spring. Nobody every kept a fish under 12 inches. You didn't have too.

But things changed.

One thing that changed is there are a lot more people now taking fish out. Another thing that changed is what cover in the form of standing timber that was left when the lake was flooded is now for the most part, gone. Taken together, the impact is obvious to anyone who has been paying attention.

[Ham]

A couple of more thoughts then.

How many times do we catch "keeper" fish that have recent hookmarks? I know I am catching a lot of fish that have been caught before. I would catch a significantly smaller number of fish if all the legal keepers had been kept. It also shows that while there certainly is post release mortality, that catch and release does work and makes a positve difference in our fish populations. We should understand though that some fish are going to be injured and/or die no matter how well intentioned we are. It seems that sometimes fish are hooked in highly vascular areas and bleed out internally. No blood in the water, but they struggle for a while and roll over and die a few minutes later. Sucks. All the more reason to treat the fish as well and carefully as you can. I hate for them to die for my entertainment.

"I don't bed fish because of the impact on the spawn". I don't bed fish because I don't think it is the best use of my time on the water. I KNOW that I am catching spawning fish. Most of them are going to be in some stage of the spawn during March thru early June. I'm just staying off of them and covering more water than the guys locking down on a bed fish.

IF you fish from March thru June, you are catching some spawning fish and pulling them off of their beds for those critical seconds regardless of your good intentions. If you want to pat yourself on the back about not catching spawners, you should fish from August thru Janurary only or stay out in 30 plus foot of water. I don't mean to pick on anyone in particular about this, but it seems poorly thought out at best to throw that line out there.

[Codywskeeter1521]

I agree 100%....this is the point that i have been trying to make for a while now....I dont fish the lake 300 days a year, and keep all the fish i catch. I fish the lake 4-7 days a year, pretty sure babler puts a few more hours on the ol drink than me.

All this came from people posting pictures of people with a stringer with 9 fish on it.

I don't know what to call it other then common courtesy. We all know there's ton of C and R guys on here. If everyone of the knifers would just post reports and take pictures of the fish right after the catch and not brag about beenin full of egg ect.. I wouldnt think this would of happened. But we all know common courtesy is a thing of the past and people don't even know what I means anymore expecially on the lake and now on this site.

[Codywskeeter1521]

A couple of more thoughts then.

How many times do we catch "keeper" fish that have recent hookmarks? I know I am catching a lot of fish that have been caught before. I would catch a significantly smaller number of fish if all the legal keepers had been kept. It also shows that while there certainly is post release mortality, that catch and release does work and makes a positve difference in our fish populations. We should understand though that some fish are going to be injured and/or die no matter how well intentioned we are. It seems that sometimes fish are hooked in highly vascular areas and bleed out internally. No blood in the water, but they struggle for a while and roll over and die a few minutes later. Sucks. All the more reason to treat the fish as well and carefully as you can. I hate for them to die for my entertainment.

"I don't bed fish because of the impact on the spawn". I don't bed fish because I don't think it is the best use of my time on the water. I KNOW that I am catching spawning fish. Most of them are going to be in some stage of the spawn during March thru early June. I'm just staying off of them and covering more water than the guys locking down on a bed fish.

IF you fish from March thru June, you are catching some spawning fish and pulling them off of their beds for those critical seconds regardless of your good intentions. If you want to pat yourself on the back about not catching spawners, you should fish from August thru Janurary only or stay out in 30 plus foot of water. I don't mean to pick on anyone in particular about this, but it seems poorly thought out at best to throw that line out there.

Yes sir catching more and more fish with old hook marks myself.

[5bites]

In a thread that was largely about exercising decision making, moderation, and selective harvest. Shocking that it did not go over well.

I think even the folks that do keep bass etc are in complete agreement everything you just said. On this board anyway. It's the narrow minded extremist that say you can't keep any of "this" species because I like it more that have the bigger issue. That's how I see it anyway. Again c&r guy talking but I'm not one with a narrow mind on what is acceptable harvest and definitely don't want to chastise someone for exercising that right ESPECIALLY when the lake is in good shape. If table rock has a bass shortage in the future the guys filleting fish will not be a contributing factor. Moderation is great on both sides of the fence.