Buffalo can live 100 years!

[MoCarp]

https://kfgo.com/podcasts/the-drive/955/suckers-live-longer-big-mouth-buffalo-fish-live-a-hundred-years/

[MOPanfisher]

Hmmm, interesting article.  They used a completely different method of  aging them.  Would be interesting to see why the difference was so drastic and if the study holds up to scientific scrutiny.  New methods often have unknown glitches but can also provide some amazing results.

[MoCarp]

They even carbon dated the onliths   

And checked they were as shocked as anyone 

this will be a game changer

[tjm]

So if they haven't reproduced since the 1930s, how does the $1million commercial fishery still happen? I'll wait for the other two independent studies to confirm this. Are the fish now deaf?

[Johnsfolly]

Not sure what is new about the aging procedures. Otolith aging has been done for decades. Maybe just pairing the otolith and the carbon dating. It is a concern that the population has not reproduced well over an 80 year period. That brings up a lot of questions about what may be going on in those lakes and river systems.

7 hours ago, tjm said:

 Are the fish now deaf?

More likely dead. Unless they found a way to extract otoliths from live fish and return them, these fish were sacrificed before the otolith was removed.

[MoCarp]

10 hours ago, tjm said:

So if they haven't reproduced since the 1930s, how does the $1million commercial fishery still happen? I'll wait for the other two independent studies to confirm this. Are the fish now deaf?

At one time the Missouri and Mississippi River supported huge fish historical records of blue cats commonly over 150 

as far as buffalo fish they said the same thing about bison

3 hours ago, Johnsfolly said:

Not sure what is new about the aging procedures. Otolith aging has been done for decades. Maybe just pairing the otolith and the carbon dating. It is a concern that the population has not reproduced well over an 80 year period. That brings up a lot of questions about what may be going on in those lakes and river systems.

More likely dead. Unless they found a way to extract otoliths from live fish and return them, these fish were sacrificed before the otolith was removed.

Yes you kill the fish extracting that ear bone, you can expect some limits on harvest because of these studies, black buffalo are a species of concern in Oklahoma yet they get pounded by the bfers, they will be gone there before it gets fixed,

 

[MOPanfisher]

The probe I saw is that the short article.did state whether the otolith sections, carbon dating, and isotope dating all agreed.  I have seen studies of river sediments that had traces of many isotopes from early atom tests, so if buffalo or other fish or even floods are distubring the silt with the isotopes then I can see where it would be easy for fish to accumulate some of them in the otoliths.  Maybe the concentrations might be lower than direct contact from being alive during those tests.  I am not anti buffalo, they are a native fish and fed many a poor county family during tough times or maybe just served as an added food supply after floods.  I have seen them trapped in sloughs in hay fields after the water receded by the hundreds.  We're I a settler living on what I could grow or find, and a flood had just happened I certainly would be trying to can or salt them to preserve.

[tjm]

So they killed (actually I suspected they had killed the fish)  how many fish to find 200  that are 80+ yo ? Is that poor reproduction limited to the lake/river where those ?thousnds of buffalo were captured and the buffalo in the $million harvest area is reproducing at such pace that fishing doesn't affect it?  My question above is, if that is true about the harvest and has been ongoing during the  80 years of no new fish, why hasn't the harvest suffered?

I understood the "new " part of the testing was the bomb radiation part, and that assumes that only at one particular time was the fish exposed to radiation. I see this as raising more question than it answers, and while to talk about verification of their findings, it appears as though they said "hey we done good" to them selves- I saw no outside reviews or verification. Granted, I just read the article and it tells nothing really, reads like a typical press release; should go to the published study itself. When time allows.

[MoCarp]

Just find a bfer dump or two and you can get plenty of fish to sample, granted the reports are  anecdotal, but buff numbers on LOZ seem to be down since the growth of bfing, there are some studies that show a  correlation of fished down populations being more  susceptible to the Asian carp invasion, ( bighead, silver, grass, black) when buffalo and common carp Blue catfish garfish populations are reduced. A void develops... nature abhors a void and will fill it

[MoCarp]

Here is the published abstract 

 

”A valued food-fish for centuries, they are now a prized sportfish as night bowfishing has become a million-dollar industry in the past decade. All harvest is virtually unregulated”

 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-019-0452-0