Buffalo can live 100 years!

[MtneerMan]

Doesn’t Missouri have a limit on buffalo? Saw another article where a buffalo taken from just across the state line that was a lot bigger than the one aged in this article and it was only 25 years old.

[MoCarp]

2 hours ago, MtneerMan said:

Doesn’t Missouri have a limit on buffalo? Saw another article where a buffalo taken from just across the state line that was a lot bigger than the one aged in this article and it was only 25 years old.

Yes 20 rough fish in total, that used to include common carp yet they got lumped in with true Asian carp a number of years ago. In Oklahoma black Buffalo are a species of concern with a one fish limit and it’s supposed to reported to the state, both the Missouri limit and Oklahoma regs are violated every-night with little enforcement. 

I used to catch big buff below Truman dam in the 40-50# range every trip but those sizes have been crashing since the 90s. Years ago non/ gamefish was 50# plus one fish. Ironically most fish entered in bfer tournaments are natives

[MtneerMan]

Why would there be a decline below Truman dam? There is no bowfishing from the bouys to the dam. You can look over at the spillway and see thousands of common carp and buffalo. When the buffalo spawned last month you could count tens of thousands of fish on the flats ranging from 5-50+ lbs. 

[MoCarp]

1 hour ago, MtneerMan said:

Why would there be a decline below Truman dam? There is no bowfishing from the bouys to the dam. You can look over at the spillway and see thousands of common carp and buffalo. When the buffalo spawned last month you could count tens of thousands of fish on the flats ranging from 5-50+ lbs. 

The buff make a spawning run there from LOZ, it’s like salmon vast shoals of fish all packed into a vulnerable situation, till one day the run is gone, buff it now seems get very very old, the recent study suggests poor recruitment because all the fish aged showed no young fish. 

I have fished below Truman since the early 80s and up until the 90s you could catch several fish in the 50# class per trip, and diversity is off now...in the past we caught all species of buff. Some on OAF have said they don’t see the numbers from a few years back, how many get shot then “released” that way you never get you limit... a VERY common practice, one many swear their local game warden tells them to do. Wanton waste laws don’t get enforced much ether, no-one is eating fish that ride in a barrel with no ice

[MoCarp]

 

[MoCarp]

1 hour ago, MtneerMan said:

Why would there be a decline below Truman dam? There is no bowfishing from the bouys to the dam. 

There no fishing of any kind from the  Buoys to the dam, and bow “fishing” should be called fish HUNTING! Push back on that term can be read on the MDC fb when the recent alt methods “catch” was announced,  

[MtneerMan]

So what’s your solution? Ban bowfishing? Limits? Just curious...

[tjm]

6 minutes ago, MtneerMan said:

So what’s your solution? Ban bowfishing? Limits? Just curious...

Banning  tournaments would be a start, enforcing wanton waste laws couldn't hurt. Unpopular truth is that as long as we allow tournament taking of fish we can not call ourselves conservationists  at all.

I don't really believe all Mocarp's dumpsters of fish are filled by Mo. bow fishers, but contests obviously generate more pressure on a fishery than killing all you can eat does, the bass relocation that comes up so often would mostly end with the end of tournaments. The problem lies in the money that such contests create. Conservation and monetary contests don't exist together. I'm visualizing all these guys in head gear playing virtual fishing games with virtual boats that exceed the speed of sound and bows that shoot 100' deep killing and relocating thousands of virtual bass and carp.

It still won't matter if the dams and/or other environmental issues have prevented recruitment for 80 years as suggested,  we probably can't do anything to save the species at this late date. We probably won't even figure out the cause before the existing fish are too old to reproduce.

[MoCarp]

I don’t have a solution, unlimited harvesting isn’t an answer... the old if you kill it eat it, is a good guideline. wanton waste is a reg violation in most states, when most of this happens at 2am when few of any people see what happens....  anonymity  breeds bad behavior...stricter limits, perhaps push harvesting towards bighead and silvers, in some places grass carp...it seems areas with strong common carp and native (buffalo) suckers populations resist Asian carp getting out of hand