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Gaston Striped Bass survey discussed
By Patrick Love at www.lLakeGastonGazette-Observer.com | February 14, 2013
N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission fisheries biologist Kirk Rundle made his annual visit to the Lake Gaston Striper Club last Wednesday to talk about fish sampling in Lake Gaston.
While Rundle geared his presentation toward his audience, talking extensively about striped bass sampling that took place in December, he also spoke on largemouth bass sampling that took place last March and touched on blue catfish. Walleye and crappie will be sampled this spring and fall, respectively, he said.
“We sample numbers, lengths and weights, and normally we get age data,” said Rundle.
Striped bass do not reproduce naturally in Lake Gaston and are stocked each year. The Wildlife Resources Commission’s Division of Inland Fisheries samples striped bass in Lake Gaston once a year during the winter using gill nets that are 200 feet long and eight feet tall.
This year, gill nets were set up in Pea Hill Creak, Lizard Creek, Big Stonehouse Creek and Songbird Creek, yielding 113 stripers.
“That’s pretty good. The year before that we got half that many,” said Rundle, noting the goal is to catch about 100 fish.
The N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission took over stocking striped bass in Lake Gaston from the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries during the early 1990s, Rundle said. Around 2000, the commission increased the number of striped bass stocked in Lake Gaston above 400,000, which has been the approximate rate ever since.
“Around the late 1990s, we stopped stocking stripers in Falls Lake, so that provided us some surplus or some hatching room for more fish,” said Rundle. “We decided at that time that since the demand was so high and the habitat was pretty good at Gaston, we were going to go ahead and put those fish into Gaston. We brought the rate up to 20 fish per acre, which still is the highest stocking rate of stripers in the state. That equates to about 406,000 fingerlings each year stocked into Gaston.”
Last summer, about 466,000 striped bass fingerlings were stocked in Lake Gaston.
“What is the fate of those fish? That’s the question we’re always trying to find out,” said Rundle. “What are the obstacles in the way of that little one and a half inch fish becoming a 20-pound fish?”
Rundle said many of the fingerlings are eaten by largemouth bass and blue catfish, while the ones that make it through the first year have a better chance of survival.
Rundle said data at Lake Gaston and similar reservoirs such as Kerr Lake and Smith Mountain Lake indicates that stocked stripers have a mortality rate somewhere in the neighborhood of 80 percent during the first year of life. For stripers one year old and above, the mortality rate is more like 60 percent.
While a telemetry study performed by N.C. State University in 1997 indicated that the natural mortality rate for aged striped bass in Lake Gaston was relatively low, it also showed the angling mortality rate was much higher. Rundle noted a 2008 creel survey of Lake Gaston found there are hundreds of thousands of hours of angler pressure on the lake each year.
The creel survey estimated that 13,500 stripers are caught in the day during a one-year period, with 1,800 greater than 20 inches.
Rundle showed a survival rate model that indicated of 400,000 stocked stripers, 80,000 live through the first winter, 32,000 through the second winter and 12,000 through the third winter. By the time the fish put into the model in the beginning are age seven or above, there are fewer than 500 in the lake, which equates to about one per 40 acres.
“That’s just my way of visualizing what happens to all those fish and why it’s so hard to go out there and catch a 20-pound striped bass,” said Rundle. “It does happen; we hear about it. But there’s a lot of pressure out there, and survival isn’t great.”
Rundle noted the state record freshwater striped bass was caught in Leesville Lake and weighed 54 pounds, a fish that was determined to be 26 years old. In Lake Gaston, he said the average life expectancy is around five years.
When evaluating the stocking rates, Rundle said there are several things the commission looks at — relative weight, age and growth.
“Looking at relative weight and growth, our goal is to match the fish we stock to the prey that’s available,” he said. “So far it looks pretty good with the number we’re stocking. We do stock at about two or three locations, and the key there is to get the fish as big as possible into the water as early as possible so they can immediately start feeding on young shad.”
Relative weight is a formula that measures the wellbeing, or plumpness, of a fish. Rundle said biologists are looking for relative weight to be in the range of 85 to 95.
“If it’s above 100, the reservoir could probably support more fish,” he said. “Below 85, we start getting concerned that those fish are pretty skinny looking and not eating very well.”
In Lake Gaston, Rundle said the average relative weight over the last few samplings has been around 90.
“That’s good,” he said. “It shows those fish are eating well, they’re healthy and there’s fish and forage available.”
Rundle said the stomach contents of stripers sampled this past December were mostly shad, with some sunfish. Bill Collart, another fisheries biologist with the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission who was in attendance at the Striper Club meeting, said during a major shad die-off in the late 1990s, striped bass switched to preying on sunfish almost exclusively.
“The stripers didn’t mind, although you could tell their preferred diet when the shad came back,” said Collart.
Rundle said about 3,000 threadpin shad were stocked in Lake Gaston last March.
“Threadpin shad are excellent to have out there, but they’re not native this far north,” he said. “Usually they’ll go four or five years and then we’ll have a bad winter and we’ll have to start over, but putting some in there is always something helpful.”
By Patrick Love at www.lLakeGastonGazette-Observer.com | February 14, 2013
N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission fisheries biologist Kirk Rundle made his annual visit to the Lake Gaston Striper Club last Wednesday to talk about fish sampling in Lake Gaston.
While Rundle geared his presentation toward his audience, talking extensively about striped bass sampling that took place in December, he also spoke on largemouth bass sampling that took place last March and touched on blue catfish. Walleye and crappie will be sampled this spring and fall, respectively, he said.
“We sample numbers, lengths and weights, and normally we get age data,” said Rundle.
Striped bass do not reproduce naturally in Lake Gaston and are stocked each year. The Wildlife Resources Commission’s Division of Inland Fisheries samples striped bass in Lake Gaston once a year during the winter using gill nets that are 200 feet long and eight feet tall.
This year, gill nets were set up in Pea Hill Creak, Lizard Creek, Big Stonehouse Creek and Songbird Creek, yielding 113 stripers.
“That’s pretty good. The year before that we got half that many,” said Rundle, noting the goal is to catch about 100 fish.
The N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission took over stocking striped bass in Lake Gaston from the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries during the early 1990s, Rundle said. Around 2000, the commission increased the number of striped bass stocked in Lake Gaston above 400,000, which has been the approximate rate ever since.
“Around the late 1990s, we stopped stocking stripers in Falls Lake, so that provided us some surplus or some hatching room for more fish,” said Rundle. “We decided at that time that since the demand was so high and the habitat was pretty good at Gaston, we were going to go ahead and put those fish into Gaston. We brought the rate up to 20 fish per acre, which still is the highest stocking rate of stripers in the state. That equates to about 406,000 fingerlings each year stocked into Gaston.”
Last summer, about 466,000 striped bass fingerlings were stocked in Lake Gaston.
“What is the fate of those fish? That’s the question we’re always trying to find out,” said Rundle. “What are the obstacles in the way of that little one and a half inch fish becoming a 20-pound fish?”
Rundle said many of the fingerlings are eaten by largemouth bass and blue catfish, while the ones that make it through the first year have a better chance of survival.
Rundle said data at Lake Gaston and similar reservoirs such as Kerr Lake and Smith Mountain Lake indicates that stocked stripers have a mortality rate somewhere in the neighborhood of 80 percent during the first year of life. For stripers one year old and above, the mortality rate is more like 60 percent.
While a telemetry study performed by N.C. State University in 1997 indicated that the natural mortality rate for aged striped bass in Lake Gaston was relatively low, it also showed the angling mortality rate was much higher. Rundle noted a 2008 creel survey of Lake Gaston found there are hundreds of thousands of hours of angler pressure on the lake each year.
The creel survey estimated that 13,500 stripers are caught in the day during a one-year period, with 1,800 greater than 20 inches.
Rundle showed a survival rate model that indicated of 400,000 stocked stripers, 80,000 live through the first winter, 32,000 through the second winter and 12,000 through the third winter. By the time the fish put into the model in the beginning are age seven or above, there are fewer than 500 in the lake, which equates to about one per 40 acres.
“That’s just my way of visualizing what happens to all those fish and why it’s so hard to go out there and catch a 20-pound striped bass,” said Rundle. “It does happen; we hear about it. But there’s a lot of pressure out there, and survival isn’t great.”
Rundle noted the state record freshwater striped bass was caught in Leesville Lake and weighed 54 pounds, a fish that was determined to be 26 years old. In Lake Gaston, he said the average life expectancy is around five years.
When evaluating the stocking rates, Rundle said there are several things the commission looks at — relative weight, age and growth.
“Looking at relative weight and growth, our goal is to match the fish we stock to the prey that’s available,” he said. “So far it looks pretty good with the number we’re stocking. We do stock at about two or three locations, and the key there is to get the fish as big as possible into the water as early as possible so they can immediately start feeding on young shad.”
Relative weight is a formula that measures the wellbeing, or plumpness, of a fish. Rundle said biologists are looking for relative weight to be in the range of 85 to 95.
“If it’s above 100, the reservoir could probably support more fish,” he said. “Below 85, we start getting concerned that those fish are pretty skinny looking and not eating very well.”
In Lake Gaston, Rundle said the average relative weight over the last few samplings has been around 90.
“That’s good,” he said. “It shows those fish are eating well, they’re healthy and there’s fish and forage available.”
Rundle said the stomach contents of stripers sampled this past December were mostly shad, with some sunfish. Bill Collart, another fisheries biologist with the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission who was in attendance at the Striper Club meeting, said during a major shad die-off in the late 1990s, striped bass switched to preying on sunfish almost exclusively.
“The stripers didn’t mind, although you could tell their preferred diet when the shad came back,” said Collart.
Rundle said about 3,000 threadpin shad were stocked in Lake Gaston last March.
“Threadpin shad are excellent to have out there, but they’re not native this far north,” he said. “Usually they’ll go four or five years and then we’ll have a bad winter and we’ll have to start over, but putting some in there is always something helpful.”