What Factors influence the Smallmouth population

[Chief Grey Bear]

21 hours ago, Al Agnew said:

Yep, PLEASE keep every one you catch up to the limit within the Meramec river system!  The regs on virtually all of Big River are a big step in the right direction, but if people don't keep the spots the regs are doomed to fail.  (And if there isn't better enforcement of the 1 fish, 15 inch limit on smallmouth, they are doomed to fail as well, and I know of guys who either don't know or ignore those smallmouth regs.)

I can't believe what Jennifer told Hog Wally.  Before spotted bass invaded the Meramec, the stretch from St. Clair to the mouth of the Bourbeuse was probably the finest big smallmouth water in Missouri, and had plenty of numbers as well.  I fished the river from Steelville to the Bourbeuse a lot during the late 1970s and early 1980s, and there were just as many, if not more, smallmouth from St. Clair to the Bourbeuse as there was anywhere else on the river.  I believe that there are several factors that have caused the decline in smallmouth on the lower portions of the river, but the spotted bass invasion is far and away the BIGGEST factor.  Just look at the river between Sand Ford and the Bourbeuse, and you'll a LOT of excellent smallmouth habitat, plenty of habitat to produce big numbers and big fish.  But the numbers just aren't there like they were pre-spotted bass.

Tjm, according to one MDC biologist I talked to years ago who DID know what he was talking about (at least it seemed so to me), gradient might be the deciding factor in whether a stream section is hospitable to spotted bass or not.  He said they did best in sections with less than 3.5 feet per mile of gradient.  But they also don't like really cool water in the summer, nor do they seem to do well in very clear water.  So the faster, cooler, and clearer the water, the worse they do.  Pflieger said that they don't seem to hybridize with smallmouth in the streams where both are native, but do hybridize readily in streams where the spots are invading.

The situation, even in streams where both are native, varies considerably.  Many streams, like the Current and Eleven Point, are all smallmouth until pretty far downstream, where the water is slower, murkier, and warmer, and then spotted bass gradually become more numerous and smallmouth less so.  Others, like Castor River, are very sharply divided between spotted bass water and smallmouth water.  Above Highway 34 on Castor, it's pretty much all smallmouth, but in just a couple miles below Highway 34, the spots almost completely take over.  This may have a lot to do with the way the habitat changes...it does get slower and slightly murky below Highway 34, but still looks like smallmouth water.

And then there's the St. Francis River, where spots and smallmouth seem to coexist in nearly equal numbers over much of the river, although in my experience, the spotted bass have actually declined a little over the years and the smallmouth have gotten a bit more numerous.  Chief might chime in, but as I understand it, the Southwest Missouri streams of the Spring River system seem to have much the same situation.

And then there are the streams that are affected by dams.  Spotted bass are definitely a LOT more numerous in the James River and Bryant Creek than they were before Table Rock and Norfork Dam were constructed.  Seems the lakes provided a great breeding ground for spotted bass, and then they moved up into the streams above them.  And Black River BELOW Clearwater Dam has a lot more spotted bass and fewer smallmouth than it did before the dam was built, but that's because the water comes off the top of Clearwater Lake and made the river downstream a lot warmer and murkier in the summer than it was previously, changing it to perfect spotted bass habitat.

I was not going to enter into this discussion as I saw no value in my participation. It was obvious of the agenda and the direction that this would take and I was not disappointed. 

But since Al did mention my name, the name that I hide behind on this forum, and since he did it with respect,  I thought I would oblige and give my thoughts and opinions. 

 

Over the years we have had many many discussions on this very subject. Some points we may agree on some points we may not. That is the nature of the beast. I am just going to briefly skim over points of fact and not get into a deep explanation.

 

First let us address why there are spotted bass in the Meramec system. This will be one of the areas where Al and I somewhat possibly disagree. I say that because from where the spotted bass came from nobody truly knows. They're only thoughts, opinions and theories.

 

 Spotted bass may have come from where Al thinks they may have come from as he pointed out in his previous post. But do not forget that spotted bass are native to the Mississippi and Ohio river systems and some of its tributaries. It is completely possible that those spotted bass came from those river systems. 

 

The question is why now have they sought to occupy the Meramec River system? Since the 1970s we have started to experience changes in our climate where it appears to be getting warmer. And that is one advantage for the spotted bass. We are now seeing many species of animals, birds, and fish thriving outside of their historical native ranges. 

 

Some areas are also experiencing a major shift in land use practices. And it is my understanding that the lower sections of the Meramec River system has experienced what could almost be classified as catastrophic land use practices. Just because the water looks great and the habitat appears to be there does not mean it is hospitable for all species. 

 

Over the years I have read many population density reports on stream bass from the MDC. In everyone of those reports the Spotted bass was a distant third in stream bass population densities. If I recollect correctly I think about the highest density I can recall seeing it was 20%. Obviously I have not read every density report and I can't even recall what stream reports I have read at this point. Some reports would show a high density a smallmouth over largemouth and others were just opposite. But that also had a lot to do with what section of stream they were doing such as upper versus middle or lower. But in every section the spotted bass was very low, relatively, on the list. I don't know if there has been a population density study on the lower Meramac. I'm sure it has been and that would be interesting to read. 

 

Electroshocking surveys are not the end-all to learning the exact populations of any stream section. But it is the best method of sampling we have to date. It is exactly what it says it is, a sampling to give you somewhat of an idea. Many fish, especially the larger fish, are able to escape the electronic field. The times that I have participated in this, we were only able to get about 10% of the population in any given pool that we were sampling. 

 

It is my consensus that electroshocking is far more accurate than angling. Being that I can fish the same section of river once each week for month and get different results every time. Some days you have a better smallmouth bite others you may have a better largemouth bite. Some days you have a really good mix of both. I've had days where I didn't catch anything but spotted bass. And then I can go for months in 

that exact same stretch and not catch one and only catch largemouth and smallmouth. It's really just the luck of the day on what your prevalent species will be. 

 

But when you do electroshocking sampling it doesn't matter what kind of mood they are in. If they get caught in the field they get caught. 

 

So for a small recap here's what we know. Something has changed the lower end of the Meramec River. Something has made it more hospitable to spotted bass then smallmouth. 

There are many factors at work here. Not just the Spot showing up.

Now, I'm ready to discuss.

[Al Agnew]

Yep, Chief, we always somewhat disagree on this subject.  Partly it's because of where we come from.  I've fished these rivers more than any other streams anywhere, all my life, and certainly have fished them with some awareness of the fish species composition since about 1970.  And since that's also about the time I became somewhat of a student of Ozark streams and their ecological issues, I think I have a pretty good handle on the changes that have occurred on the streams of the Meramec river system since 1970.

First of all, there HAVE been changes, I don't deny that.  And your point about climate change probably making the water temps a bit warmer and more hospitable to spotted bass is valid, in my opinion.  But in my very strong opinion, the lower portions of all three streams were basically perfect habitat for spotted bass LONG before the spots showed up.  Bourbeuse is near perfect habitat for spotted bass (and has been at least ever since the valley was settled) for nearly its entire length.  It's slow.  It's murky.  And it isn't heavily spring fed so it's warm.  Always has been, at least since the valley was settled and farmed.  And yet, NO spotted bass until they invaded the lower Meramec.  The Meramec below the mouth of the Bourbeuse is just as good spotted bass habitat, being slow, murky, and warm as well.  And the lower one third of Big River is the same.  To any smallmouth angler who is used to fishing the streams of the deep Ozarks, these river sections wouldn't look like they'd even harbor smallmouth--they are not classic smallmouth water by any stretch of the imagination.  But before the spotted bass invasion, they had thriving smallmouth populations, with plenty of big fish.  

Maybe there have been changes we don't understand that suddenly made these streams hospitable to spotted bass when they weren't before, but I don't see how.  They were perfect spotted bass habitat by all measures we know of.  And yet, they never had spotted bass, with the extremely few exceptions in the 1970s that I mentioned, until the invasion beginning in the 1980s.  NOR were the streams between the mouth of the Meramec and either native spot populations, or previously introduced spot populations, until just prior to the Meramec invasion.  It's not like spots were present in the next river system over.  So apparently the connections that allowed spots to move into the Meramec from their native range, or even from that early introduction into the Osage system, just weren't there until the time period of the 1970-1980s.  SOMETHING opened up the connection at that point.  And...although the possibility exists that land use changes in all those connecting streams changed, or global warming made them better spotted bass habitat, the 1970-1980 time period was prior to the real impacts of global warming began to be felt, and it was also a period where the rivers became less polluted and land use practices actually began to get smarter, along with the long cut-over timber in the watersheds maturing.

Your assertions about relative population densities between spotted bass, smallmouth, and largemouth may hold true in your streams, and in some other streams.  But they don't hold true on most of the streams with which I'm familiar.  Big River below Morse Mill is AT LEAST 90/10 compared to smallmouth, and the largemouth population in that stretch isn't all that strong, either.  I would have to guess at the relative density if largemouth are included...maybe 70% spots, 25% largemouth, and 5% smallmouth.  I know you'll say it's JUST a guess.  But I and others have fished it enough to KNOW the smallmouth aren't there, the spots are, and largemouth are far less common that spots.  Between Washington State Park and Morse Mill, I'd guess spots outnumber both smallmouth and largemouth, but not by nearly as much...maybe 40% spots and 30% largemouth and smallmouth.  From Leadwood Access to Washington State Park, I'd say the proportions of spots to smallmouth flip--45% smallmouth, 35% spots, 20% largemouth. (I edited those figures after thinking about the relative density of largemouth.) Above the low water bridge at Leadwood, which still forms something of a barrier to spotted bass spread, the spotted bass are practically non-existent--I've only caught one above there.  And yet right below the bridge, they become nearly as common as smallmouth--and actually the habitat above the bridge is certainly no worse for spots than below it.

Yes, you can go one day and catch mostly smallmouth, and another day mostly spotted bass.  But if you fish it a LOT over a period of several years, the swings even out and you get a pretty darned good picture of what's in there.  I'm not basing my "guesses" on one or a few days of fishing, I'm basing them on many days over many years.

For spotted bass, either in their native range or where they have invaded, habitat is of major importance on population densities.  Castor River isn't the only stream I know of over on this side of the state where the population densities flip suddenly from nearly all smallmouth to nearly all spotted bass.  Forget those ratios you mentioned when it comes to these streams.  The South Fork Saline Creek is the most spectacular.  It has about a ten mile stretch that's big enough to hold a good smallmouth population before it gets too small to hold many bass.  That ten mile section is mostly bedrock bottom, rock ledges, clear, fast water...and all smallmouth.  Then you leave the bedrock bottom section.  The river is no bigger, it's still quite clear, and still LOOKS like a smallmouth stream, with fast riffles, short, deep pools, big gravel bars, but as SOON as you leave the bedrock stretch, it's suddenly at least 80% spotted bass.  From virtually 0% spots to 80% spots in about a half-mile of stream!

[Wart 57]

On 12/11/2017 at 6:01 AM, Hog Wally said:

I'm certified color blind so these hybrids look different through my eyes but i clearly see the spot pattern on a Smallie backdrop.  I've only caught s handful and I removed them all from the river.  As I do nearly every spot I catch.  A little spotted bass makes the best fish taco 🌮 I've ever ate 

Caught a ton of them on Table Rock.  They are Meanmouth Bass .  Cross between a Smallie and Kentucky Spotted bass. Great Fighters and don't need to be removing or Killing them. PB  23.5  inches and 5.78 lbs in Cape Fair Area

 

[Al Agnew]

1 minute ago, Wart 57 said:

Caught a ton of them on Table Rock.  They are Meanmouth Bass .  Cross between a Smallie and Kentucky Spotted bass. Great Fighters and don't need to be removing or Killing them. PB  23.5  inches and 5.78 lbs in Cape Fair Area

 

Wart, we KNOW all that stuff.  But please understand, what is fine in some waters is NOT fine in others.  Spotted bass were native to the White River system, which includes Table Rock.  So although they were a minor species in the White before Table Rock and have thrived in the lake, thus making the hybrids more likely to occur, they were NOT native to the streams we are talking about.  They are an invasive species in those streams, and they have had a horrifically bad impact on smallmouth populations in them.  The MDC biologists agree with this.  So why kill "meanmouths" in these streams?  Because they interbreed with smallmouth as well as spotted bass, thus producing more "meanmouths" and fewer pure smallmouth.  They dilute the smallmouth gene pool.  (And by the way,  these guys didn't kill the big hybrid, they relocated it to a place where it can't dilute the smallie gene pool.)

Also by the way, "meanmouth" originally was the name given to a laboratory cross between a smallmouth and a largemouth, not the naturally occurring cross between spotted bass and smallmouth.  The term and the cross had a brief period of notoriety back in the 1970s or 1980s, written up in Bassmaster magazine and lots of other places.  It was called a meanmouth because it was unnaturally aggressive, even reputedly attacking fingers and feet if they were dipped in the water where the "meanmouths' were being held, and running the other bass species ragged.  Fortunately, the hybrids seemed to be sterile, and the experiment was soon abandoned.  At that time, few anglers even knew that naturally occurring hybrids between smallmouth and spotted bass existed, but soon afterwards they began to be noticed and publicized, and eventually the term "meanmouth" was transferred to them.  Personally, I don't like to use the term "meanmouth", because it made sense with the super aggressive largemouth/spot hybrids, but doesn't make much sense with the smallie/spot hybrids...they aren't any better fighters than pure smallmouth or spots.

[Smalliebigs]

Thanks Al ☺ breaking off knowledge and handing it out like cookies. 

I need to be diligent about taking a bucket or stringer on my morning floats on the L M

[MoCarp]

1st global warming..over the last 10 years or so our winters have been milder/shorter and summers hotter/longer.....its cyclic as has been so ever since the end of the last ice age..this summer we didn't break 100 and was one of the coolest wettest summers I can remember......warm years spots populations pulse higher...a few colder years it prob would pulse more smallmouths ebb and flow is what happens in nature..

as far as sampling..usually wet behind the ears grad students get the nod to help in many states....even some state people are not as river rat as the could be...I will tell you a stretch of elk have huge bronze backs but you will never shock one up..why?..they hang round under ledge rocks like some mini grouper crushing what swims in front of them...you might stun one but he won't float up to the net.

spots as well as LMB can hang pretty deep around brush they are not getting deep enough to shock up more spots. I think it may skew the numbers some what

I still think stocking a few more smallmouths while removing spots is a good thing for ozark streams

[joeD]

Everything that has been said is correct.

The problem is our myopic and questionable dissatisfaction with our streams. 

Always thinking things could be better.

Maybe this is as good as it gets, and we’re barking up the proverbial wrong tree.

Love the one we’re with, instead of constantly comparing and erroneously thinking we’re somehow falling short.

[Gavin]

Settle and it's all you get. Take the pig with lipstick home, or keep looking? Ancient question.

[Chief Grey Bear]

6 hours ago, Al Agnew said:

Yep, Chief, we always somewhat disagree on this subject.  Partly it's because of where we come from.  I've fished these rivers more than any other streams anywhere, all my life, and certainly have fished them with some awareness of the fish species composition since about 1970.  And since that's also about the time I became somewhat of a student of Ozark streams and their ecological issues, I think I have a pretty good handle on the changes that have occurred on the streams of the Meramec river system since 1970.

First of all, there HAVE been changes, I don't deny that.  And your point about climate change probably making the water temps a bit warmer and more hospitable to spotted bass is valid, in my opinion.  But in my very strong opinion, the lower portions of all three streams were basically perfect habitat for spotted bass LONG before the spots showed up.  Bourbeuse is near perfect habitat for spotted bass (and has been at least ever since the valley was settled) for nearly its entire length.  It's slow.  It's murky.  And it isn't heavily spring fed so it's warm.  Always has been, at least since the valley was settled and farmed.  And yet, NO spotted bass until they invaded the lower Meramec.  The Meramec below the mouth of the Bourbeuse is just as good spotted bass habitat, being slow, murky, and warm as well.  And the lower one third of Big River is the same.  To any smallmouth angler who is used to fishing the streams of the deep Ozarks, these river sections wouldn't look like they'd even harbor smallmouth--they are not classic smallmouth water by any stretch of the imagination.  But before the spotted bass invasion, they had thriving smallmouth populations, with plenty of big fish.  

Maybe there have been changes we don't understand that suddenly made these streams hospitable to spotted bass when they weren't before, but I don't see how.  They were perfect spotted bass habitat by all measures we know of.  And yet, they never had spotted bass, with the extremely few exceptions in the 1970s that I mentioned, until the invasion beginning in the 1980s.  NOR were the streams between the mouth of the Meramec and either native spot populations, or previously introduced spot populations, until just prior to the Meramec invasion.  It's not like spots were present in the next river system over.  So apparently the connections that allowed spots to move into the Meramec from their native range, or even from that early introduction into the Osage system, just weren't there until the time period of the 1970-1980s.  SOMETHING opened up the connection at that point.  And...although the possibility exists that land use changes in all those connecting streams changed, or global warming made them better spotted bass habitat, the 1970-1980 time period was prior to the real impacts of global warming began to be felt, and it was also a period where the rivers became less polluted and land use practices actually began to get smarter, along with the long cut-over timber in the watersheds maturing.

Your assertions about relative population densities between spotted bass, smallmouth, and largemouth may hold true in your streams, and in some other streams.  But they don't hold true on most of the streams with which I'm familiar.  Big River below Morse Mill is AT LEAST 90/10 compared to smallmouth, and the largemouth population in that stretch isn't all that strong, either.  I would have to guess at the relative density if largemouth are included...maybe 70% spots, 25% largemouth, and 5% smallmouth.  I know you'll say it's JUST a guess.  But I and others have fished it enough to KNOW the smallmouth aren't there, the spots are, and largemouth are far less common that spots.  Between Washington State Park and Morse Mill, I'd guess spots outnumber both smallmouth and largemouth, but not by nearly as much...maybe 40% spots and 30% largemouth and smallmouth.  From Leadwood Access to Washington State Park, I'd say the proportions of spots to smallmouth flip--45% smallmouth, 35% spots, 20% largemouth. (I edited those figures after thinking about the relative density of largemouth.) Above the low water bridge at Leadwood, which still forms something of a barrier to spotted bass spread, the spotted bass are practically non-existent--I've only caught one above there.  And yet right below the bridge, they become nearly as common as smallmouth--and actually the habitat above the bridge is certainly no worse for spots than below it.

Yes, you can go one day and catch mostly smallmouth, and another day mostly spotted bass.  But if you fish it a LOT over a period of several years, the swings even out and you get a pretty darned good picture of what's in there.  I'm not basing my "guesses" on one or a few days of fishing, I'm basing them on many days over many years.

For spotted bass, either in their native range or where they have invaded, habitat is of major importance on population densities.  Castor River isn't the only stream I know of over on this side of the state where the population densities flip suddenly from nearly all smallmouth to nearly all spotted bass.  Forget those ratios you mentioned when it comes to these streams.  The South Fork Saline Creek is the most spectacular.  It has about a ten mile stretch that's big enough to hold a good smallmouth population before it gets too small to hold many bass.  That ten mile section is mostly bedrock bottom, rock ledges, clear, fast water...and all smallmouth.  Then you leave the bedrock bottom section.  The river is no bigger, it's still quite clear, and still LOOKS like a smallmouth stream, with fast riffles, short, deep pools, big gravel bars, but as SOON as you leave the bedrock stretch, it's suddenly at least 80% spotted bass.  From virtually 0% spots to 80% spots in about a half-mile of stream!

I knew it was a waste of time. 

[Wart 57]

9 hours ago, Al Agnew said:

Wart, we KNOW all that stuff.  But please understand, what is fine in some waters is NOT fine in others.  Spotted bass were native to the White River system, which includes Table Rock.  So although they were a minor species in the White before Table Rock and have thrived in the lake, thus making the hybrids more likely to occur, they were NOT native to the streams we are talking about.  They are an invasive species in those streams, and they have had a horrifically bad impact on smallmouth populations in them.  The MDC biologists agree with this.  So why kill "meanmouths" in these streams?  Because they interbreed with smallmouth as well as spotted bass, thus producing more "meanmouths" and fewer pure smallmouth.  They dilute the smallmouth gene pool.  (And by the way,  these guys didn't kill the big hybrid, they relocated it to a place where it can't dilute the smallie gene pool.)

Also by the way, "meanmouth" originally was the name given to a laboratory cross between a smallmouth and a largemouth, not the naturally occurring cross between spotted bass and smallmouth.  The term and the cross had a brief period of notoriety back in the 1970s or 1980s, written up in Bassmaster magazine and lots of other places.  It was called a meanmouth because it was unnaturally aggressive, even reputedly attacking fingers and feet if they were dipped in the water where the "meanmouths' were being held, and running the other bass species ragged.  Fortunately, the hybrids seemed to be sterile, and the experiment was soon abandoned.  At that time, few anglers even knew that naturally occurring hybrids between smallmouth and spotted bass existed, but soon afterwards they began to be noticed and publicized, and eventually the term "meanmouth" was transferred to them.  Personally, I don't like to use the term "meanmouth", because it made sense with the super aggressive largemouth/spot hybrids, but doesn't make much sense with the smallie/spot hybrids...they aren't any better fighters than pure smallmouth or spots.

Thanks Al.  I plan on fishing the rivers more around St Louis and from now on will remove those I catch. Enjoy reading your articles.