Northwest Fishing Reports

i have noticed when i look at pictures of the huge tigers that some of you lucky few have caught, there tails are all shredded almost like a small guppy in a aquarium of larger more predatiuos fish. i find it hard to believe a large musky gets picked on by the regular fish in our lakes. so whats the deal?

Hello Max,
Good question..according to the WDFW its kind of a birth defect.They cant explain it either.It just happens. It doesnt seem to effect the fishes ability to swim or anything. Something unexplainable. And it only seems to happen to these hybrids. Hope this helps.

Hello again,
We as avid musky hunters try to use the knotless nets. Such as the Frabills and the Beckmans as examples. The knotless nets are very helpful in that they wont tear into the the tail fins and tear them more. And less damage done to the fish in general. I would reccomend a knotless net. Or maybe if you chose a cradle type. A little more cumbersome but are a option too.I believe this state is moving to the knotless for the salmon fishery soon.

Most of the fish I catch have split tails. It's not the nets that are splitting them, because they're that way before they come into the net. It's probably a result of swimming around in the concrete tanks of the hatchery.

Don Wittenberger wrote:Most of the fish I catch have split tails. It's not the nets that are splitting them, because they're that way before they come into the net. It's probably a result of swimming around in the concrete tanks of the hatchery.

yea i think that would be a good explanation. but then why would stocker trout not have split tails? there may be something else at work here.

Hey,
I know its not the nets!! Bruce has said in his presentation that for some odd reason it happened only to the Musky fry. He doesn't know why. He's a biologist.Its some kind of genetic thing going on..I really don't think it has anything to do with the concrete tanks.
So if you can afford a knotless net buy one and use it. Less stress on the fish.Keep the net in the water as much as possible and properly pick the fish up out of the water. For photos or what have you. And get it back in the water quickly and safely. And stocker trout are what they are... see yah

If they're like that in all the lakes, then it's gotta be either genetics or something that happens in the hatchery.

Great question. If memory serves me well (and most of the time it doesn't) all the fish we've caught out of Mayfield have looked great, no split tails or other marks. On the other hand, most of the pictures I've seen of fish taken out of Tapps, although beautiful, look pretty beat up.

The reason the fins on the tiger muskies gets split and deformed is due to overcrowding in the rearing vessels. Very important to keep the densities down or it happens, and rather quickly. Probably a week of overcrowding will cause it and unfortunately, the fish don't ever recover from the damage. Effects on survival are unknown but could be significant. It is not genetic, it is rearing density. Trout also get deformed fins when reared in raceways, although the fins usually do not split.

A couple of the 5 pound broodstock trout dumped in Beaver Lake had half a tail or no tail at all. There were 5,000 of them so overcrowding was probably rampant.