Post by yihunt on Jun 27, 2010 15:49:20 GMT -4
Pickerel population picking up at High Point
By Bob Frye, TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, June 27, 2010
High Point Lake is not the kind of place you get to by accident.
Located far off the beaten track in Somerset County, near Mt. Davis, the highest point in the state, it's a remote, high elevation, tucked-away lake that - despite all of that - regularly attracts anglers from Pittsburgh, Greensburg, Uniontown and other points on the map, say officials with the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission, which owns the 338-acre waterway.
"It's definitely got a following as a destination lake," said Rick Lorson, the commission's area 8 biologist based in Somerset.
That's a testament to its fishing, he said. Visitors to the lake can catch northern pike, largemouth and smallmouth bass, bullhead catfish, bluegills, yellow perch and even the occasional walleye.
There's another species of fish thriving in the lakes these days, too, though. Suddenly, chain pickerel have taken up residence in High Point.
"I'd say that it was about 2005 when I started seeing them," said Dan McGuire, the commission's waterways conservation officers in Somerset County whose jurisdiction takes in High Point. "I came to this district in 2002 and I never saw one then. But it's taken off since."
"The pickerel population is really picking up. They are definitely established in there," Lorson said.
That's not necessarily a good thing, he said.
Pickerel are a member of the same fish family that includes northern pike and muskies.
"They fight very much like a pike, if you hook one," said Tom Qualters, assistant regional supervisor of the commission's southwest region office. "And they're toothy."
Pickerel are smaller than pike and muskies, though, with a trophy pickerel going 25 inches and perhaps 5 pounds to a pike's 40 inches and 20 pounds, according to information from the Fish and Boat Commission. They are not native to the Ohio River drainage either, Lorson said. In fact, information from the commission says chain pickerel "are restricted to the Delaware, Susquehanna and Potomac river watersheds. They are most common in the glaciated Pocono northeast."
A listing on the Fish and Boat Commission's website of all the waters in the state known to have chain pickerel includes just one west of Centre County, that being Yough Dam, on the Fayette/Somerset county border, though McGuire said he's not seen or heard of any being caught there.
High Point can definitely be added to the list, however.
How that came to be is a mystery. Scott Gates, owner of S&S Bait and Tackle in Chalk Hill, said nearby Deep Creek Lake in Maryland is full of pickerel, so "it wouldn't have taken much for someone to carry a few up in a live well and dump them in there."
Lorson, too, suspects the fish were introduced by an angler.
"How they got there, well, somebody probably brought them in there from somewhere else, unfortunately," he said.
The problem is that they are, in all likelihood, messing up High Point's fishing, he added.
For years, the commission has been trying to improve the fishing at the lake, through stocking, the creation of fish habitat and drawdowns designed to reduce weed cover. That's worked in some cases.
On the good side of the ledger, when last surveyed in 2007, the lake's population of northern pike had been reduced by half, but the number of legal fish had just about tripled. The surface weed cover of the lake had been reduced from 46 percent to 4 percent, too, Lorson said.
One negative has been that panfish-enhancement regulations designed to produce more large yellow perch have not worked.
But it's where the lake's walleyes are concerned that the pickerel may be a real problem, Lorson said. The commission stocks the lake heavily with walleye fingerlings annually, and has been doing so for years in an attempt to restore that fishery.
That's not been totally successful just yet. Walleye numbers were strong in the lake from the late 1970s to the mid 1990s, then began a slow decline. They bottomed out between 1998 and 2003, and surveys done since have continued to show low walleye numbers.
There are some to be caught. McGuire said he hears tales of some anglers doing well on walleyes on the lake, often by fishing at night.
There's little doubt most anglers would prefer to have more walleyes - and fewer pickerel -- to catch, too, Gates said.
"I hear stories at Deep Creek of guys throwing pickerel up on the bank or banging them off the side of the boat because they think they'll eat all the young walleyes," he said.
But any lake only has the potential to raise so many pounds of fish, Lorson said. And adding pickerel to the mix potentially means fewer walleyes. Lorson would like to avoid that, but the presence of non-native pickerel will be a challenge.
"That's really our goal because the walleyes are just so much more popular with anglers," Lorson said. "That's why we're so heavily invested in stocking them there."
By Bob Frye, TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, June 27, 2010
High Point Lake is not the kind of place you get to by accident.
Located far off the beaten track in Somerset County, near Mt. Davis, the highest point in the state, it's a remote, high elevation, tucked-away lake that - despite all of that - regularly attracts anglers from Pittsburgh, Greensburg, Uniontown and other points on the map, say officials with the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission, which owns the 338-acre waterway.
"It's definitely got a following as a destination lake," said Rick Lorson, the commission's area 8 biologist based in Somerset.
That's a testament to its fishing, he said. Visitors to the lake can catch northern pike, largemouth and smallmouth bass, bullhead catfish, bluegills, yellow perch and even the occasional walleye.
There's another species of fish thriving in the lakes these days, too, though. Suddenly, chain pickerel have taken up residence in High Point.
"I'd say that it was about 2005 when I started seeing them," said Dan McGuire, the commission's waterways conservation officers in Somerset County whose jurisdiction takes in High Point. "I came to this district in 2002 and I never saw one then. But it's taken off since."
"The pickerel population is really picking up. They are definitely established in there," Lorson said.
That's not necessarily a good thing, he said.
Pickerel are a member of the same fish family that includes northern pike and muskies.
"They fight very much like a pike, if you hook one," said Tom Qualters, assistant regional supervisor of the commission's southwest region office. "And they're toothy."
Pickerel are smaller than pike and muskies, though, with a trophy pickerel going 25 inches and perhaps 5 pounds to a pike's 40 inches and 20 pounds, according to information from the Fish and Boat Commission. They are not native to the Ohio River drainage either, Lorson said. In fact, information from the commission says chain pickerel "are restricted to the Delaware, Susquehanna and Potomac river watersheds. They are most common in the glaciated Pocono northeast."
A listing on the Fish and Boat Commission's website of all the waters in the state known to have chain pickerel includes just one west of Centre County, that being Yough Dam, on the Fayette/Somerset county border, though McGuire said he's not seen or heard of any being caught there.
High Point can definitely be added to the list, however.
How that came to be is a mystery. Scott Gates, owner of S&S Bait and Tackle in Chalk Hill, said nearby Deep Creek Lake in Maryland is full of pickerel, so "it wouldn't have taken much for someone to carry a few up in a live well and dump them in there."
Lorson, too, suspects the fish were introduced by an angler.
"How they got there, well, somebody probably brought them in there from somewhere else, unfortunately," he said.
The problem is that they are, in all likelihood, messing up High Point's fishing, he added.
For years, the commission has been trying to improve the fishing at the lake, through stocking, the creation of fish habitat and drawdowns designed to reduce weed cover. That's worked in some cases.
On the good side of the ledger, when last surveyed in 2007, the lake's population of northern pike had been reduced by half, but the number of legal fish had just about tripled. The surface weed cover of the lake had been reduced from 46 percent to 4 percent, too, Lorson said.
One negative has been that panfish-enhancement regulations designed to produce more large yellow perch have not worked.
But it's where the lake's walleyes are concerned that the pickerel may be a real problem, Lorson said. The commission stocks the lake heavily with walleye fingerlings annually, and has been doing so for years in an attempt to restore that fishery.
That's not been totally successful just yet. Walleye numbers were strong in the lake from the late 1970s to the mid 1990s, then began a slow decline. They bottomed out between 1998 and 2003, and surveys done since have continued to show low walleye numbers.
There are some to be caught. McGuire said he hears tales of some anglers doing well on walleyes on the lake, often by fishing at night.
There's little doubt most anglers would prefer to have more walleyes - and fewer pickerel -- to catch, too, Gates said.
"I hear stories at Deep Creek of guys throwing pickerel up on the bank or banging them off the side of the boat because they think they'll eat all the young walleyes," he said.
But any lake only has the potential to raise so many pounds of fish, Lorson said. And adding pickerel to the mix potentially means fewer walleyes. Lorson would like to avoid that, but the presence of non-native pickerel will be a challenge.
"That's really our goal because the walleyes are just so much more popular with anglers," Lorson said. "That's why we're so heavily invested in stocking them there."