7-14-16 There was a Bite today, Just not the Fish

[Ham]

It seems like they are spread from one end of the lake to the other (and down the White River), but no one seems to catch them in any number. I was told by a diver that he saw swarms of them in the lower mid lake area, but that has not translated to bites for me. It's been a more than a little while since I have caught one. Been a little while since I caught a gizzard shad too (just saving Super Dave the trouble of pointing that last part out).

 

[Rob P]

Giving away my crank colors..
only hooked one trolling for walleye.

[Ham]

Very Nice Rob

[Johnsfolly]

Ham

Did not realize that BSL had yellow perch. Do you know of any other lakes that have a perch population?

[Ham]

49 minutes ago, Johnsfolly said:

Ham

Did not realize that BSL had yellow perch. Do you know of any other lakes that have a perch population?

The yellow perch were Illegally introduced to BSL. I do not know of any more local lakes that have them. I caught one in the White River BELOW the mouth of the Buffalo River and almost caught one at White Hole on the White River. They were flushed into the White River when the flood gates were opened. Will they establish a breeding population?

[Johnsfolly]

 Ham

How long go were they released into the lake? If it was several years ago, then they are likely have a breeding population to still be catching them. They are pretty prolific breeders. Does Bull Shoals go anoxic in the deep water during the summer? If not, the perch probably have a comfortable temp range throughout the year.

[Ham]

Hey John, They are forever established in BSL. I wonder if they established themselves in the Buffalo River or in the White River. I personally saw multiple fish in the White, but its been a while. There is no way in hades that I saw the both of the only two Yellow Perch that made it into the White. How many washed into it? How many are still swimming in it.

[rps]

One of my favorite memories involves a yellow perch.

Those of you who hate my anecdotes can skip to the next post.

Nancy and I lived in London for about two years. No car. A flat near the underground. No daughters, and no friends when we arrived. We found things to do. One of those things was walking tours of London and surrounding areas. Some were guided - I highly recommend London Walks - and for some we used walking guide books. In the two years there together, we walked every mile of the Thames River from source to mouth. One Saturday during the second summer we picked a walk that included the river and some canals on the outskirts of London. As we walked the river path under a road bridge we came upon a young man of perhaps 12. He had just caught a rather good yellow perch, maybe 11 or 12 inches. He was very excited and very happy we came upon him so he could show it off. Because I fish I listened to the entire story and asked questions. What had he used to catch the fish and so on. My interest caused him to tell all in detail. My poor wife had to listen to this very long story told in an interesting accent with words that meant nothing unless you fished in England. We finally walked on, and Nancy turned to me after we were out of the young man's hearing. She kissed me and said, "You just made a special moment for that young man. And me."

[Johnsfolly]

RPS - Great story. Did he bait the swim before he caught that perch?

The only fish that I caught in 19 months of living in Northern Ireland was a perch. Their fishing laws and fees were just too high for me to pay and fish a whole lot. Even the one pay trout lake would not let me fish because I could not convince them that a spinning rod casting flies was not bait fishing when they only allowed fly fishing. We regularly caught perch when we lived in PA. In most public lakes these fish were really overfished and in turn most were really small. One of the lakes we were researching in grad school had not been fished in decades. We were able to convince the board to do a fish survey study of the lake. That entailed catching as many species of fish, pumping their stomach contents, weights and lengths, plus removing scales for aging the animals then release back into the lake. My wife and I fished in the same boat (at the time she was just my girlfriend). We were catching perch that were 16 to 18" in length and almost 1.5 to 2 lbs. They fought like smallmouth bass. I didn't get to fish much. I had to process every fish. So once I was done processing a fish, she would hand me the next one that she just caught. I have a picture on my desk at work of each of us holding a 17 and 18" perch. That was a great time. The smallmouth bass in that lake were all relatively old (7-8 years old) and all about the same size, 18 to 22" and about 2- 2.5 lbs. I know that there are some big perch in the northern plains states. I would love to find some more local.

[rps]

Johnsfolly - he caught the fish on a larvae of some sort. I never did figure out what the larvae was. He used one of those elaborate English long poles and a fixed line.