Fish caught with tag in it

[Josh Ketry]

A friend of mine who does not report with the club caught a tagged fish today.  Wasn't sure where he was supposed to report it but passed the info on to me.

UN2   (about) 40"  yellowish floy tag number 09-015

[John Jarosz]

Funny guy you are, Josh but I think I got it now. I studied Mike Fretthold's two pics and figured it out..LOL

All very neat stuff.

Tony...how many have been tagged so far this year?

[Tony Scime]

Kevin tagged 117 muskies from 2007 to 2009. Harbor, upper river, lower river (10). Including the most recent, there were 8 recaptures. No cross-overs (other than one which crossed over the falls -  I've been told that smaller fish might actually be able to survive travelling through the power authority turbines). He combined his data with ours: 872 total tagged, 63 recaptures. That's a 7.2% recapture rate. Reported recapture rate on all these studies have always been low, can be many reasons. 

[jojo wilczewski]

Good day brothers
Tony with our two hundred something recaptures
And Kevin's 8 do you know if the Muskies Inc had any?
What is the total number of recaptures without any crossing the Peace Bridge ?
Thanks jojoout

[Tony Scime]

Joe, 

Our number of recaptures is closer to 57 of 768 tagged. The rate is about the same (7.4% and 7.2%) for both studies. I have some paper documents for MI and Buff State (Adrian). I'll have to scan those in. There is one documented cross-over, from the MI study. 

Tony

[John Pensyl]

Jojo when you go through thr data there are actually more than 1 of the recaptures that show evidence of crossover. 2 fish were tagged in the harbor and later recaptured in the west river. For the limited number of overall recaptures that took place I'd say that's more than enough evidence that migration to and from takes place. I keep hearing that we never had any evidence of cross over with the tagging studies, but now looking at it these fish moved everywhere throughout the upper river, lower river and buffalo harbor.

[John Pensyl]

Tony I'm seeing bh2 tagged fish that was recaught twice in the west river and a bh9 tagged fish later caught in un2. Am I reading the data correct?

[John Jarosz]

I found a document dated 2008(?) from the Corps for a grant proposal they put in to do work in the Bell Slip. Back then they theorized that the head of the river (under the Peace Bridge) might act like a one-way gate because of the fast current, that is they would migrate downstream in one direction but wouldn't be able to make it up the other.

It wasn't pursued any further & just kept as an idea.

[John Pensyl]

John jaroz steelhead and lake trout make it in and out every fall/winter and spring. Pods of gizzard shad move in and out at will. That current is nothing to a fish. If fish can make it through the whirlpool rapids to reach the base of niagara falls they can make it back to lake erie.

[John Jarosz]

Yeah, I thought the same thing that you're thinking but that was the ACE's theory back then. They never did any studies to prove that, that I know of.
What made me think of that was your post about BH to the Niagara. Have you found any tagging in the spreadsheet that was done in the Niagara & recaptured in BH? I'm still looking.
Great stuff to study.

[John Pensyl]

Nothing on the spreadsheet but I remember Tony talking about a fish years ago tagged in the river and then caught out in front of sturgeon point by walleye anglers. Am i remembering this right Tony?

Talking to the Clair guys who have been doing the telemetry studies they have fish covering 20 miles across the lake in a day, hanging for a month, swimming through the detroit to lake erie and then disappearing for 3 months. Who knows where these migrants are going. Really cool stuff. These fish are going to follow food and with today's electronics I can definitely tell you there are times when these fish are mia and times when I have 100s of them stacked in a tight area.

[John Pensyl]

I put a lot more faith in fisherman that do it every day and their feedback than I do in what some of these scientists come up with. Look at lake ontario for example. The last 3 years they've been telling us the alwive population has crashed and we are missing 2 year classes due to the 2 extreme winters. They reduce king stocking numbers this season and the entire time fisherman who know better are telling them the bait is stacked out deep and the north shore has been insane with bait. Then the kaho goes out this spring and stumbles into the missing baitfish and has record hauls trawling right in front of Olcott. I agree better safe than sorry but you can't always expect things to be the same every year and then apply that to a whole fishery.

[Tony Scime]

John,

You are reading the data correctly. I double checked all my electronic records. I have cross-overs on tag 101 and 843. I'm a bit shocked, to say the least, since I had these particular lines highlighted on most of my data sheets and somehow forgot about them (I can use the age excuse, but that's a bit scary). 

I do have some concerns about the accuracy with 101 (tagged in BH on 6/15/96, 46"). I have it being recaptured in BH on 6/28/97 and recaptured a second time on 11/13/99 in UN2. The most recent spreadsheet has both recaptures in UNW.

There is a tag 1018, also 46", tagged in UN2 and recaptured on 11/13/99 in UNW (west river), the same date/size as 101. Sometimes spreadsheets (or us humans) screw up when you sort common numbers. So there are some inconsistencies and concerns for 101 (they both begin with 101), although I do have its' second recapture in UN2 (originally tagged in BH4). 

I see no discrepancies or concerns with Tag 843. Consistently tagged in BH9 and recaptured in UN2.

So I believe that we may have at least 2 or 3 documented incidents of cross-over, and that is significant.

Thank you for reviewing the data.

Tony