Fishery Management

[Scott Kitchen]

Greetings,

 

After reading through a lot of the discussion from my Dec 5^th fishing report post I decided to chime in as I was specifically mentioned by at least one other member.  Just to clarify I am still one of the Conservation Directors, as well as Treasurer.  

 

Musky fishing is an interesting paradox, which I think Marc Arena noted once in a newsletter article.  If we were really totally committed to protecting musky, we would not fish for them at all, but if we did not fish for them would we even care about them?  With all the damage that we have done to the fish (muskellunge as well as all other species) and their habitat here in the Lake Eire and Niagara River watershed would there even be any musky left if there weren’t some dedicated musky fishermen, (like Tony Scime and the other founders of the NMA) who saw the need to start a conservation movement?

 

There needs to be a balance.  Unfortunately the limited amount of research on the species makes it difficult to know exactly what is the best balance, especially in a pressured fishery like ours.  What we do know is this, “treating the ladies nice” is one of the most important things.  Case in point, in their report from the mid 1990’s, Assessing Sustainability of Trophy Muskellunge Fishers, John M. Casselman, E.J Crossman and C.J Robison noted the following:

 

“Harvest reduction and catch-and-release procedures, which reduce mortality, are easier and more effective ways of sustaining or increasing the numbers of trophy muskellunge than trying to supplement recruitment through stocking.”

 

The authors go on to state that a 2% increase in mortality of older trophy fish would require twice as many musky making it to maturity to maintain the same number of trophy fish in the future.  

 

With all this in mind we are really talking about is fishery management, which is the topic I am hoping to discuss as the speaker at the February monthly meeting.

 

I would like to encourage all of you to come to the meeting so we can have a quality discussion and all work together for the betterment of our fishery.

[jojo wilczewski]

Good Day

Well said Scotty and Marc.

ALA BALA BALA jojoout