Steve's Question on Telemetry in the River

[John Jarosz]

Steve..EXCELLENT question so I'll lay out as much as I can. I will say that the Telemetry Group will be meeting with the DEC in Feb to talk everything over & this will be one of the topics. We'll also get ideas from our Feb Conservation meeting.

First, there are 2 objectives to the Telemetry study

 1. To determine if migration exists between the Harbor/Lake & the Upper (both back & forth). This is really being done for long term management of the 2 systems. Does it get managed as one system (lots of back & forth) or does it get managed as 2 separate ecosystems (none or a little back and forth)? A little back & forth doesn't necessarily mean there's any significant migration.

2. To determine the migration patterns in the Bflo Harbor so we can get another grant to get spawning habitat built. Good habitat has been decimated in the Harbor (& the River). If we want to ensure a healthy population of these fish well into the future (10 to 40 yrs) and more, the opportunity to do that is now. The attitudes are there, the money is there and the momentum is there to get some good work done, not just study where they're going, but to get actual work done.

That being said, the decision was made, for this year, to tag all fish from the Harbor, primarily to look at their spawning patterns. BTW, we already have the grant money for an engineering firm to map the bottom & make drawings of the area we pick to get developed. We just need to pick the area.  We'll be putting in 20 transmitters total but decided to go with 10 this year instead of putting all our eggs in one basket. For next year, we could reserve some for River fish, if it meets the objectives. There's nothing keeping us from doing that & we'll have to make a decision.

As you know, 2 spots were picked in the Upper to spot receivers; Nicholls & Buoy 11 or 13(?) off Strawberry. The USCG is pulling them Dec 14th. Those were picked as the best spots to detect fish if they came down from the Lake. The speed of current, ease of spotting & retrieving, boat traffic & angling pressure were taken into consideration. 5M & 5F were tagged this year. The females were BIG (~50")! What are the chances of any of them being the ones to go into the River? With many of the big fish being caught near Strawberry, the Nav buoy has a good chance of picking it up if it's a tagged fish.

Our tags will show there's a tagged fish in the area. Fish & Wildlife  started using a GPS type of system to also track their direction of movement. We might be able to figure out from that if they moved down but weren't picked up by a receiver.

The last point is scheduling with the DEC. They had 4 people to do the job on each fish. They have to schedule 2 boats, 4 people, get the anesthetic (which doesn't work good in the cold) & hope the weather cooperates when they're scheduled. And they've already done the scheduling, etc for the spring. I don't know if they have the resources to schedule twice in one year.

So, it brings up a few questions I have. If muskies migrate from the Lake into the River to over-winter, then back into the lake for the summer to feed, does it make a difference to us as far as the objectives? Their winter habitat seems to be good because they're already spending it somewhere. We just might not know where. Do we need to know if they go from the River to the Lake?
Where do those big fish that you guys are catching now spawn?

Could they be spending the summer near Navy Island or some other place north and not in the lake?

I don't think that answered everything but those are the main points with a lot of questions. Ask away & I'll try to cover your questions. Also, this is only the first year of the study & we don't have any data yet. The muskies were implanted 6 months ago. Once the data comes in, things will get interesting.

Hope all my jibber-jabber helped. Thx

[John Pensyl]

Good write up JJ. Itll be cool to see where the fattys hung out all summer. I know where some are now. Just need the weather to let me get to them. Lol. Harbor hunt in am with Joe Dolan. Hoping to bring a transducer carrying giant aboard for a photoshoot.

[John Jarosz]

Best of luck to both of you guys out there. Be easy on Joe, though. He might be a little out of practice. That sure would be hot stuff; to get a musky that was tagged with a transmitter. Being only six months old, the belly scar might still be visible when you lay her on the board. What would be even hotter would be to get a musky with a spaghetti tag that was tagged in the River. That would be news! Hope you each get a couple of biggies.

[Scott McKee]

John, I am a night owl. You are a normal, respectable human. What the hell are you doing up posting responses at 3:38 in the morning? I hope your answer involves going fishing ugly early.

[John Jarosz]

Haha...another excellent question. They keep rolling in. Tuesday I went in to have a kidney stone ultrasonic blasted. It's never ever bothered me and is a large leftover piece from another blasting 4 years ago. That never bothered me either. I didn't even know I had one. The nurses all say it's going to be "pulverized." Pulverized is a bad word. When I think "pulverized", I think "powder." It's more like tiny pieces of ground glass moving down from the kidney all while I'm hoping no sharp little corners snag on anything. It's like having sediment in your outboard's fuel system. The motor groans.

The back was acting up a little last night, hence the mid-nite ramblings. Four years ago, on New Year's Eve, my wife & I were going to go out for dinner. The night before the Eve, I get up, go to go to the bathroom & double over as one of the corners snagged. She helped me back into bed. had soup at home for New Year's. This time I have the pain meds & some meds to loosen up the tract.

Calling me "normal & respectable" is pushing it. The procedure was originally planned for the 27th but they had an opening on the 14th, so I jumped at the chance (just to get it over with). After it was all over, it dawned on me that my fishing might be done for the rest of Nov. "Dumb idea" is a better description.

But now I have an article in my head for our next newsletter. It's called The Fable of the Fox and the Fish. I also have some pics taken from shore of boats in the Wittek. Need to get those to you at Tino's.

Make mine a lemon & water, barkeep. And thx for asking, Scott. It's always appreciated.

PS: I talked with Justin B yesterday. the DEC has reserved the week of 11/27 to remove the Bflo Harbor receivers. They're figuring 2 days. First 2 nice days, they'll be out there. We should have GLATOS data back by late Jan.