Fish Kill Rumors

[Tokyo Tony]

The whole situation makes me want to vomit.

Aside from the perception of BASS, it just pains me to think of all those huge bass that were killed. What a waste.

By the way, is this the first time such a significant kill has ever happened? That would surprise me...

[Matt Fly]

 Theres not one shread of evidence to point out that over 7000+ lbs would cross the scale.   Reports of 45+ lbs sacks in prefishing.    Wouldn't you think you would save some of those fish for the tourney?   Yet Pros bragged about their huge sacks during practice.

218 BASS anglers on Falcon is small potatoes.    Check out the 300 teams from Bass Champs, partners.    Although locals, Falcon didn't start spitting those stringers out until she filled back in late 2004.   FLW Stren series with 400 angler field didn't amass anything close to BASS numbers.  

  Have we not forgot about Amistad the year before.    Greatest lake ever, and we didn't see these types weights.    Good enough for pros to buy land.    

       There was no crystal ball to look into, who knew that the 122 lb record would be broken numerous times?     Theres enough blame to go around.      

       What happened can't be changed unless we learn from our mistakes.  

        How would the state know?   There has never been a tournament that produced like that.   Strens series is capable of 200 boaterss and 200 co's, dont know the total entries, but they sure didn't give any clues to forseeing this happening with 218 anglers.

When the FLW released those smallies in the shallow part of the river in Wisconsin, I never thought of blaming the state, but only how they would prevent it from ever happening again.  

    City Council of Zapata approached the BASS with contract for two years.    They saw dollars signs.   One of the biggest boost in their little economy.      I'd be willing to bet that the same City Council that is quoted in the article never called the States Biologists and asked their opinion.      They got paid, and will get paid again next year.      City Politics in a small south Tx town playing both sides of the fence.

   Nobody could predict what happened, Nobody!  

[WRB]

The people who predicted that 30 to 40 pound daily sacks would be common were the pro's who pre fished the tournament and they knew, so did BASS. The Falcon tournament...Elite Series.. with 110 top pro's in the country would catch a lot of big bass during pre to post spawn. BASS was not prepared and should have been.

This fish kill isn't the issue, Falcon lake allows gill netting for example on the Mexican side, the issue is BASS and how they handled this tournament. Now it's up to BASS to make the needed chsanges.

WRB

[Lane]

Matt,

It WAS PREDICTED!  Don't forget these pros prefished! The issue of

livewell space, demands placed on pros by co-anglers, WAS ADDRESSED BEFORE Falcon. I can't get into the details, so don't ask.

Our area of expertise is fish health and disease in captive conditions.

I have consulted with biologists with expertise in populations, sustainable habitat for large bass,etc. They all stated that a mortality

of this size, that consisted largely of post spawn broodstock was detrimental to the fishery. I am not the only biologist that is upset

about this.

You are right, the Zapata Chamber put up the money to bring ESPN/BASS to town. They definately did not predict that things would

go wrong like this. I am not making excuses for them, but none of

them are really anglers. What is MOST DISTURBING is that large

bass were released to die without being fizzed or allowed any recovery time. Wasting of game is VERY ILLEGAL in TEXAS as it is

in most states and there are FEDERAL laws as well. They knew darned

well that many of these fish would expire without help!

There is nothing that can be done to change what has already happened, but they better MAKE darned sure do things different next time! The format needs to be changed along with the time of year!

Several pros have mentioned doing a day with the pro while prefishing instead of having co-anglers during the event. Spending a day with a pro to learn more about lures, presentation and techniques should be attractive to most anglers. It could also draw more anglers, and make for one heck of a BONAFIDE fishing show. What do yall think?

[Lane]

Matt,

I have the Wisconsin mortality study, I would be most happy to e-mail it to you. You might be surprised which trail had the highest DELAYED mortality on smallmouth. The LMVB was present so you really can't include the largemouth mortality. There were definately problems with confinement. The smallmouth were not placed in areas with good conditions, mortality was above average for the control group with both trails. Let's just put it this way, I was shocked!

[Matt Fly]

We have seen the large sacks before, but never 4 days straight.     Look at all tournaments across the country.   Good first day catches, some on the second, but pressure normally curtails the weights as evident by the majority of tournies results from every year.   Few anglers are on them,  key word, a few anglers are on the them,

There was not one fact to show that Falcon would substain those numbers for 4 days straight.       Not one shread of evidence to say that all 12 anglers would threaten 122 lbs.    

Big sacks have been caught in prefishing before, but weights have always tappered off for the majority of all anglers.

Even the FLW pros during spawnthis year  didn't come close to those numbers.   Some of the same pre fishing sacks there had the same rumors.

Those rumors didn't pan out.    New record was set on the FLW.    110 pounds.

As for using citycouncil members to quote one day, then to saying they aren't fishermen the next is very convienent.     I took what they were the first day you mentioned them, politicians!

    Common sense will tell us that there are no numbers set in stone on the numbers of dead fish floating.    How many pictures have flooded the web on the dead fish.   Fishermen on that lake would have cameras.    Politicians would want pictures.    

    The only thing we have is a bunch of fishermen and fishermen like to tell tales, politicians that willl say anything for a story, and a bunch of experts that relied on others for their info that are speculated at best.

There will never be any hard numbers, as with most storiers, the numbers will be inflated to assist in selling the story.    

WRB,

    AS for predictions,   most of the country predicted the Patriots to win the SuperBowl, and howed that work for them?

    I live in Texas, heard the storyies before the first BASS tourney showed up.    Never lived up to that hype.  Heard it for many years.  Its like crying wolf for years and she finally got it right once.

    Same was said about Amistad first time  by the pros.   And we didn't see it happen.   Good enough to make pros buy land, but the predictions didn't come close, and those are the same guys who said it this time too!

So if your gonna give credit to when it holds true, you should mention how many times they have mentioned records "could fall" that never did.      According to rumors, they have been wrong alot more than they were correct..

Time to educate the pros on fish care.     They had possesion of those fish longer than a BASS biologist' did.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure!!!

   

   

[Lane]

Prevention is simple, adjust format, host event in February, INCREASE

DEAD FISH PENALTY to 1lb. It is amazing what increasing dead fish

penalites will do to reduce mortality.

[WRB]

Lane, thank you for taking the time out of your busy schedule to try and answer some of the questions profesionally, without bias.

Matt, the fact that this fish kill occured in Texas isn't the issue, it could of happened anywhere large bass of this magnitude were caught and that is the issue.

The current tournament set up is 2 holding tanks for the fisherman to wait at before going onto the stage where the bass are weighed, displayed and photographed, the taken to 2 similar holding tanks, then bagged and released directly inot the lake at the marina site. This set up works well form tournaments where a few large bass, like 1 kicker in a limit of average 3 lb bass. Lakes like Amistad, Falcon, Clear Lake and the California delta can easily produce several limit where the bass average over 7 lbs with a kicker over 10 lbs. For big bass, the tournament organizations need to recognize thay need to handle these bass differently.

The anglers should not try to hold the big bass in their small livewells for several hours, then weighin with the 4 tank system with immediate release. The big bass become over stressed when handled in this manner and that leads to delayed high motality rates.

As far as accurate predictions are concerned, all the tournament organization needs to know is the lake and seasonal period to predict in advance that big bass may be caught, the exact numbers are not the issue. If you prepare in advance to handle big bass correctly and the big bass don't show up at the weighin's, the smaller bass will be handled better as a result.

WRB

[Lane]

WRB, You are most welcome. Just maybe some good can come from

all of this.  I invite everyone interested in this topic to view the link

that I posted in my first response. The blog was updated this morning

and addresses the issue. Furthermore it was written by a tackle store

owner that has a vested interest in the industry and the fishery.

We also recieved the stats this morning from the Zapata Chamber of

Commerce on the dead fish brought to the scales by the top 12 anglers including co-anglers. The co-anglers did weigh in more dead fish than the pros. Changing to format next year would help.

[WRB]

Lane, the real problem is in the education of the tournament anglers. Most will argue that they achieve 100% survival rates and that is nearly impossible if any number of bass are caught.

Few tournament anglers are familiar with their livewells and don't understand the basics; how many gallons of water doest it hold? You can't proplerly maintain the livewell without knowing that basic fact.

What is the top end temperature the water can be in the livewell and still keep the bass from being over stressed? Most tournament anglers don't own a digital livewell thermometer or even have a simple swimmng pool thermometer to check the livewell water temperatures.

Gene Gilliland suggests to keep the live well water below 70 degrees, the mid 60's(65 to 68) being ideal.

Your C & R formula requires knowledge of the livewell capacity to properly mix the chemical.

Nearly every tournament fisherman loads the livewell with water at the marina and they shouldn't do that. Clean water is essential.

Education is a big part of catch and release and handling the bass properly. Thank you for all you have done in this regard.

WRB

[Lane]

WRB,

We have been educating anglers for 25 years now. Instructions for

determining livewell capacity has been printed on labels for years,

along with basic tips. We have recently stepped up our efforts with

the fish care document for large bass under extreme conditions.

That is posted on our homepage for everyone to use. The YouTube

of the fish care DVD is finished, and will be uploaded to our website

in the next month.

We also support reducing daily bag limits on Falcon from five fish per

angler to three fish per anglers. Modern livewells are not able to support a five fish limit per livewell on Falcon Lake. The fishery must

come first. Most tournament trails operating down at Falcon have

already gone to a three fish limit.

[WRB]

The tournament TD's should be handing out simple easy to read livewell operating instructions that you have developed. I'm sure the tournaments that you are directly involved with, the contestants have the needed information. Your Catch & Release product has been around a long time and is the best IMO, however Please Release Me and others are also being used in weekend and club tournaments.

BASS should print the instructions in Bassmaster magazine for those who don't know that their livewells need some special care for the bass to survive in them. A lot of weekend bass fisherman catch bass all day long and copy the tournament pro's by filling the livewells with warm surface water and keeping the best 5 bass, then release them at the marina after showing off their catch. The bass appear to be OK as they swim away and about 1/3 may not make it during the summer months. The more information available, the better it is for our sport.

You are doing a great job, thank you.

WRB

[roadwarrior]

A lot of weekend bass fisherman catch bass all day long and copy the tournament pro's by filling the livewells with warm surface water and keeping the best 5 bass, then release them at the marina after showing off their catch.

WRB

I have never observed this, never heard of anyone doing this and know of no one who intends to release their catch to have ever held fish for an extended period of time. We sometimes hold fish for a short time in order to get a picture of a double, but "all day"?

No, never.

This whole problem involves tournament fisherman, not recreational

C&R guys. We care about the health of our fish as much or more than

we care about catching them. I don't appreciate tournament guys

killing my fish.

[Cajun1977]

i also see weekend guys holding fish, do you even fish tournaments roadwarrior? how do you know enough to speak for the majority?

[Glenn]

This is getting off topic now.