Anyone seen anything like this? Posted from:
http://www.bassresource.com/bass-fis...-local-waters/
Posted October 28 2013 - 10:13 AM
About 15 years ago my club had a panfish tournament on our local lake and between my partner and I we brought in over
70 pounds of only white perch, average size 5-6". This year I've noticed a population explosion of WP with the largest average size up to 12".
WP are fun to catch - being of the bass family, they go after many bass lures , but after checking out their biology stats and checking with different state DNRs that have problems with them, I'm concerned for the other species in the lake. The reasons are as follows:
1. One female is capable of laying 300,000 eggs that are fertilized by many males. The eggs are dropped while the female swims and the eggs stick to vegetation - no nest for sunfish or WP to raid.
2. WP invade the nests of all species any time of year - this includes sport fish and forage species such as yellow perch, crappie and sunfish.
3. WP compete with all other species for forage which includes fingerlings of all other species and minnows as a usual part of their diet. The schools can hold over a thousand fish that sweep areas clean of forage that can be swallowed.
4. Once WP reach a certain size, they don't have enough large predators to control their population and they eat larger fish as they get bigger, not just fingerlings or fry.
One state, Kansas, recommends they never be released when caught and another state has seen the destruction of walleye populations due to WP over populations. My own local DEC fisheries biologist told me recently that WP were not native to one of our largest reservoirs and that the large population increase could be a problem for the native fish such as different species of trout, bass and walleye.
Fortunately I haven't heard too much on any site regarding WP, but having caught over 500 in all sizes this year, prompted me to report it to my fishing club which owns a launch on the lake. Hopefully the club will have a few targeted WP tournaments and restore balance. Otherwise, only larger bass will survive but only as long as their forage bases holds up to get that large.