White Bass control needed

[olfishead]

I went fishing on Stockton Saturday to try the walleye and crappie. Not much luck on those two. But, the white bass were going nuts! In an hour or so I limited out on 12-17 inch W. bass with several smaller ones released, and I had a blast doing it! Seems like I was the only one who took advantage of the fishing bonanza. Several boats came by that I'm sure saw the acres of surfacing WB but no-one stopped and joined in on the fun. I know that WB are not quite the table fare that walleye and crappie are, but with a little trimming of the fillets they can be pretty tasty and make excellent fish fry material for a neighborhood or work place fish fry. All you guys and gals out there who like to catch crappie and walleye should step back and think about how much the WB compete with crappie and walleye for food. While I was catching fish, one of the 12" WB threw up about 20 silver side minnows and shad that could have been eaten by the other two more desirable species. Consider the zillions of WB that are in the lake and the tons of forage fish they eat, (not to mention small crappie and walleye they eat) and you can see that these voracious predators can have a negative impact on the growth rates and densities of other sport fish species. Back in the early seventies when Stockton Lake was new, the MDC Fisheries Biologist pleaded with people to not bring WB in from other lakes because of the increased competition between species. His favorite saying was: "there are only so many groceries to go around".  So, I encourage you when you are out there fishing, especially on a slow day, and the WB give you the opportunity to help manage your preferred fish population..................Take it!  

[MOPanfisher]

Summertime white bass can be fast and furious.  Used to get into them on Truman like that.  Like schools of pirahana.  They are pretry good eating too, never had a single worry abuUT them being too numerous and too much competition for other fish, still dont.

[olfishead]

Probably not that much of a concern until the lake experiences a poor production year  of shad/forage fishes. And, by the way Truman is is a totally different beast than Stockton from the standpoint of fertility, turbidity(which affects the effectiveness of sight feeders and survival of offspring) and resultant productivity.

 

 

[MOPanfisher]

1 hour ago, olfishead said:

Probably not that much of a concern until the lake experiences a poor production year  of shad/forage fishes. And, by the way Truman is is a totally different beast than Stockton from the standpoint of fertility, turbidity(which affects the effectiveness of sight feeders and survival of offspring) and resultant productivity.

 

 

Yep I am well aware of the differences, but when one prey base has a bad year fish do well at shifting to a more available one.  Shad which are the main prey of white bass seem to be pretry reliable in their reproductive efforts.  I can't remember a bad year, some unbelievably good years but no bad one I recall.  What I have never been able to figure out is why Pommes white bass seem to have a tough road the last 15 years or so but Stockton, truman, and LOZ seem to chug along just fine.

[Rootman]

Sounds like a fun day, white bass hit and fight as hard as any fish.  Just curious where did u run into them at?  I have found them like that up above Roark and in coves above old state park before.  I’ll take catching them any time!

[Dutch]

The numbers at Stockton have been down the last few years.  There are still lots of them around but not as plentiful as in the past.  However, Stockton has not had the severe die off that Bull Shoals and Pomme de Terre lake have seen.

[olfishead]

8 hours ago, MOPanfisher said:

Yep I am well aware of the differences, but when one prey base has a bad year fish do well at shifting to a more available one.  Shad which are the main prey of white bass seem to be pretry reliable in their reproductive efforts.  I can't remember a bad year, some unbelievably good years but no bad one I recall.  What I have never been able to figure out is why Pommes white bass seem to have a tough road the last 15 years or so but Stockton, truman, and LOZ seem to chug along just fine.

Stockton actually went thru a few years that very poor shad production in the 90s. For what reason, no-one knows! I see you are from the Pomme area and you know what controls the WB #s in that lake.  Bacterial infection hits there every 5-10 years and is usually associated with poor water quality (D.O) and fish stress due to influx of nutrients from a rainfall event. 

[jimalert3]

16 hours ago, olfishead said:

I went fishing on Stockton Saturday to try the walleye and crappie. Not much luck on those two. But, the white bass were going nuts! In an hour or so I limited out on 12-17 inch W. bass with several smaller ones released, and I had a blast doing it! Seems like I was the only one who took advantage of the fishing bonanza. Several boats came by that I'm sure saw the acres of surfacing WB but no-one stopped and joined in on the fun. I know that WB are not quite the table fare that walleye and crappie are, but with a little trimming of the fillets they can be pretty tasty and make excellent fish fry material for a neighborhood or work place fish fry. All you guys and gals out there who like to catch crappie and walleye should step back and think about how much the WB compete with crappie and walleye for food. While I was catching fish, one of the 12" WB threw up about 20 silver side minnows and shad that could have been eaten by the other two more desirable species. Consider the zillions of WB that are in the lake and the tons of forage fish they eat, (not to mention small crappie and walleye they eat) and you can see that these voracious predators can have a negative impact on the growth rates and densities of other sport fish species. Back in the early seventies when Stockton Lake was new, the MDC Fisheries Biologist pleaded with people to not bring WB in from other lakes because of the increased competition between species. His favorite saying was: "there are only so many groceries to go around".  So, I encourage you when you are out there fishing, especially on a slow day, and the WB give you the opportunity to help manage your preferred fish population..................Take it!  

I can remember several years ago,   few miles south of Stockon a large pond was take over by WB and they were very small.

[Hunter91]

My son and I went yesterday evening. We got into the whites on the Mutton Creek flats. Caught 50 plus. We only kept a few. With the cloud cover they stayed up for hours. It finally got pretty windy before dark and they quit busting. Lots of fun!

[shrapnel]

I would not consider Crappie a "more desirable table fare"  Not even close, white bass is much better in my opinion, I just with they would show themselves on LOTO.