WDFW Q & A Thread - Questions for Stacie Kelsey, WDFW

[Stacie Kelsey]

No problem! If I can be of further help, just let me know!

[YellowBear]

Good morning Stacie.
Last year some of the seep lakes were suposed to get rehabed but with the economy the way it is, this was put on hold. This year it is going to happen. My question is, were did they find the money to kill these lakes off?

[YellowBear]

My wife and I took a drive down to Windmill and Heart yesterday to see if they had been treated yet.
The deed had been done.
I was expecting to see more fish than we did.
Bluegill and Punkinseeds from 1 to 5 inches were most of what we saw.
There were some Perch and Largemouth but not many.
I counted 6 Trout in a half mile of bank.
I did find 7 Largemouth over 2 pounds but most of the fish would have made good bait, 1 to 3 inches.
We stopped at heart lake and the numbers of fish were fewer and smaller than windmill.
As we walked around the lakes it seems that what was killed with Rotnone good have been utilized.

Question.
Has the WDFW ever used Trips as a control species?

[Marc Martyn]

No problem! If I can be of further help, just let me know!

Stacie, you have to poke your head in the door from time to time and say howdy. A couple of members are missing your posts.

[racfish]

Me being one of them.

[Stacie Kelsey]

Hey guys!

Sorry I dropped off the planet for a bit - things have just been getting crazier here!

I will have to check about the funding for the lake rehabs. I think it could be from withing the warmwater program but it may be from somewhere else.

Not all fish float to the top when they die, so there could have been a lot more fish dead than what was seen. I know the last rehab I did a few years ago on the eastside we saw quite a bit on the bottom of the lake.

As far as control species, we have been experimenting with Tiger Muskies on stunted eastern brook in some of our high lakes. Are you talking about a specific control species?

I'll try and get the answers and again, my apologies for not checking in more!

stace

[8theB8]

[Stacie Kelsey]

To answer your first question about year round lakes it all depends on the management strategy by the bio in the area. We had the majority of our lakes as seasonal lakes here in southwest Washington until a group of people submitted a petition with a few hundred signatures wanting one of the popular local lakes open year round.

After taking a look, we determined there really wasn't any reason not to make it year round. Then we started looking at a few other lakes and moved them to year round as well. So now, a good portion of our lakes are year round.

But, there are some problems with that. While it offers anglers more time to fish, the lakes have no time to 'rest'. A lot of pressure can be a lot of strain on a lake. And in some of the areas I think it'd be smart of us to reconsider their year round status and go back to an opener, even if it was a short closure.

There's a lol of things to take into consideration for changing a lake from year round to seasonal or seasonal to year round.

Access - is it a park that is only open certain months of the year? Who manages the lake? Is it a county, city or state park? Do they want to deal with the additional pressure of going from seasonal to year round, if they are open year round? It would mean they would have to have to provide maintenance (people to clean the grounds etc.).

Fish availability - what is the stocking program for the lake? If the numbers are low - it might not be beneficial to have the lake year round because an angler would go and have no opportunity to catch anything. If the numbers are fair (like most of our Clark County lakes) then it might be beneficial because the chances of fish being around longer are higher.

Management - what is the lake managed for? Is it a fingerling lake? If so, it would not be beneficial to have a year round lake. The closure provides the time needed for those fish to get to size. If it's a catchable lake, then chances are better.

I would recommend contacting your local Inland Fish person and talk with them about lakes you have in mind and ask them about their management objectives and see if season changes are within those objectives.

Your second question is a bit trickier to answer. Some homeowners own a portion of the lake bottom but not the water. We have this issue with people that live along streams and don't want people boating in that area. They may own the bottom but not the water, so there isn't anything to prevent someone from boating - but the boaters could not get out and fish on the homeowner's property.

Then you have people who rope off an area on a lake shore and have no right to do so. They don't own the lake bottom but still don't want people in front of their properties. I've gotten this question a lot and what I do is to contact the county offices and find out what the lake bottom rights are. I think many times you'll find just what you experienced, they have no rights, but it's always a good thing to check!

Hope this answers some of your questions - let me know!

stace

[Anonymous]

Welcome Back Stacie.Im writing a letter to the Govenor about us needing you here more then in the field.Just kidding of course. My question to you is "What with all the Snagging " and very lil enforcement.Cant fisherpeople be deputized (sp) to report or photograph snaggers and report them in . I guess my real question is "what can we do as civillians to curtail the snagging?"No offense but calling the state patrol is a total waste of time. I even call Mill Creek Dept of Game and its as good as the state patrol.

[Anonymous]

Yellowbear - the funding for the lake rehab is federal - if you would like, I can check further into what the specific funding is. Just let me know!

Racfish - thanks for the comment, I really appreciate it and am glad to help all of you out!

As far as your question, you need to contact Enforcement by way of text/email/phone listed on the following site:

http://wdfw.wa.gov/enforcement/

I spoke with Enforcement and the best thing you can do is be very detailed when you call in. Don't call in and say, there are people snagging at such and such place. They need to know the following:

Detailed description of person: hair color, skin color, height, weight, clothing.
What are you calling 'snagging'?
Where are the fish now? At their feet? Buried? In the Bushes? At the car?
How many fish?
Are they snagging and releasing or keeping the fish?

The more detail the better information you give to the Officer. What they would not like to see is people taking pictures, confronting others or following people to their vehicles. That is just a recipe for disaster. Keep yourself safe. Monitor what is going on and report what you see. Detail! Detail! Detail!

Let me know if this answers your question!

stace

[8theB8]

[Bill G]

Racfish, check into the Eyes in the Woods program that the WDFW has. Bill and I went to a meeting, listened to a couple WDFW enforcement guys from our local regional office talk about the problems out in the field, watched a PC presentation, took a little test and now know what they would like reported and how and where to report things that aren't as they should be.
Good luck!
Rosann

[YellowBear]

Stacie, can you tell me how many wildlife Bios does the WDFW have in the field?
What is being studied?

[Stacie Kelsey]

YellowBear - We have a lot! I don't know the numbers for the other Regions but I can give you an estimate for us. This list includes Bio and Tech positions.

Fish Program - 65+
Species - White sturgeon, green sturgeon, coho, chum, steelhead, chinook, trout, warmwater, grass carp, smelt.

Duties - spawning surveys, carcass surveys, redd counts, young of the year surveys, warmwater surveys, stream surveys, creel surveys, alternative gear surveys, beach seining.

I think that covers the basics.

If you were looking for something more specific, let me know.

stace

[Gringo Pescador]

Stacie,

In another thread the subject came up about why WDFW stock lakes right before opening day instead of just after season's end so the fish can wise up and grow a little before the next season. You mentioned that you all are working on problem of the Comerants getting so many of the stockers.

Can you tell us what you are trying?

How big do the fish have to be before they are too big for the Comerants?

[Stacie Kelsey]

A fish needs to be about 14" so that it cannot be eaten by most cormorants. So, if we do less fish stocked but larger size fish, we can alleviate predation on the fish, still have the same poundage of fish stocked but less fish.

I passed on the suggestion of lower the limit from 5 to 3 fish which I saw in the thread and that would spread the ability to catch the larger fish out even more.

The problem with raising the same number of fish but larger is room. We just wouldn't have the room at the hatcheris to do that. But, less, but larger fish would work. So far I've heard positive responses from anglers.

Especially the ones that see their fish getting eaten by the birds right in front of them. We've counted upwards of 400 bird on a given lake at a time. That's a lot of fish.

Let me know if you have any other questions!

stace

[Amx]

A couple/few years ago I heard the cormorants were taken off the protected/whatever list they were/might have been on, and could be killed. What about that? They seem to be worthless so why not put them on open/year around season?

[Gringo Pescador]

Thanks Stacie,

IMHO the WDFW trout stocking program is a free for all. Especially here on the west side. People waiting for the tanker trucks then the stocked lake gets hammered until all the fish are gone.

I would love to see the WDFW try to change that mentality to a more "traditional" one as far a fishing goes. When I grew up you needed patience to catch fish, if you had it, you were rewarded if you didn't then you played in the sand. I grew up trout fishing and loved it, but as far as lake fishing goes, except for a few lakes I have pretty much given it up for bass since with bass at least you have a chance at a lunker.

A couple years ago WDFW put a small #s of big fish in lakes in Greys Harbor County. I live in King county and drove all the way out there for the chance to catch one, even though I could drive 10 minutes to Greenlake and be guaranteed to catch as many as I wanted. Never caught one of those fish, but would still prefer to go that far for the chance at one than C&R 10" stockers all day long.

I would definitely vote for a less-but-bigger fish scenario. I would also love to see the releases be in the off season and an expansion of the selective gear lakes. Any of that being considered?

[Anglinarcher]

Gringo,

I understand where you are coming from, but I wonder..............

If everyone that fished was a member of this site, then we would get a representative response to the question of quality verses quantity. Unfortunately, I suspect that only the more avid anglers are frequent visitors.

Several states have done surveys regarding the question of quantity verses quality, and as a result may do provide trophy waters with special rules, but the masses, the numbers that buy a license and fish once or twice a year, the money for the State, will always favor quantity over quality.

AMX, I doubt that those miserable things were taken off the protected species list. THAT WOULD BE FAR TOO SMART, and I would have a sore shoulder from all of the shotgun shells I would be shooting.

[Amx]

And to think I sold my shotgun the other week if they ever do come off the protected list.

I also have 3 hunting rifles for sale, some day I should post an ad. :-)