Introduced species drive out trout
Times have changed irrevocably for anglers at the Little Pend Oreille chain of lakes east of Colville.
Traditionally a hot spot for cutthroat trout fishing, the connected lakes – Gillette, Heritage, Leo, Sherry and Thomas – have been plagued with illegal introductions of perch, bass, sunfish and other species, said Curt Vail, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife district fish biologist.
The number of people living around the lakes nearly eliminates the possibility of fishery rehabilitation using chemicals such as rotenone.
Starting last year, the state stopped stocking cutthroat and went to plants of larger rainbow trout and tiger trout, a species that should feed on the growing population of small sunfish.
“It’s going to take a few years to see whether this works,” Vail said. “The tiger trout are voracious and they could put on some good growth.”
The ice was late coming off the lakes, so anglers likely will beat Vail to sampling the fisheries this year.
He wishes them all the best on Saturday if they chose to spend the opening day of the fishing season at the Little Pend Oreille chain.
“There hasn’t been much of a trout fishery there for three or four years,” he said.
Sign up the kids: Trout will be plentiful, however, at an upcoming fishing event just for kids.
Friday is the deadline to register youngsters ages 5-14 for an hour of trout fishing during the May 6 Fishing Kids event at Clear Lake.
For a preregistration fee of $5, each participant will get a Zebco rod and reel and a Fishing Kids T-shirt, plus help in baiting a hook, casting and catching one the hundreds of trout stocked in a confined area.
Entry is limited to the first 1,000 who register. Call 477-2638. Details and registration form are at www.spokanekids.wsu.edu.
Opening daze: In case you were confused by an inconsistency in last week’s special section, Fishing 2006, let me clarify the little twist in Washington’s fishing seasons:
“ Lakes, ponds and reservoirs are open for fishing year-round, unless they are specifically mentioned in the Washington fishing regulations pamphlet.
“Rivers, streams and beaver ponds are open to fishing June 1–Oct. 31, unless noted otherwise in the special rules section of the pamphlet.
The bottom line: Get a copy of the current regulations, keep them in your fishing rig and check the seasons and rules before casting a line.
Turkeys top list: I was lucky to catch a word with Byron Johnson on Tuesday. With the turkey hunting seasons underway, the retired Spokane physician is packing away wild poultry as though he were Col. Sanders.
He’s a long way from finished this season, yet he’s already bagged a total of five turkeys, starting with an early hunt in Oklahoma then to Montana and Idaho followed by successful hunts in the northeast and southeast corners of Washington.
He gave his shotgun a brief break on Tuesday to follow up on a blurb I wrote in last week’s fishing section regarding the nice trout waiting for flyfishers at Dusty Lake in the Quincy Wildlife Area near George, Wash.
“It’s not a place for everybody,” he reported, describing his hike down through the basalt and into the bowl where the deep lake sits.
He said the fishing was “so-so,” but in a few hours he caught “seven or eight rainbows running 16-18 inches.” (Johnson’s clearly in a different fishing league than I’m in if that’s “so-so” fishing.)
Then he raced home to get ready for the next turkey hunts, in Oregon today before heading back into Idaho in May.
For a sportsman who has numerous interests such as skiing, bicycling, hunting pheasants and chukars with a passion and flyfishing around the world, Johnson’s relatively recent love affair with turkeys is a significant testimonial to the hunt.
“If I had to give up everything except for just one of the things I love to do, I’d hold on to turkey hunting,” he said. “I love the way calling in a gobbler can seem so easy one day and be so difficult the next time you go out. It’s that uncertainty that keeps it exciting.”
Speaking of turkeys: Who needs PETA? Hunters are pretty good at shooting themselves in the foot.
Half the nation has heard about the old man who shot the turkey they called Rufus on opening day next to a café near Culdesac, Idaho.
The endings are usually sad when people feed and try to tame wild critters, especially near a highway where they’re likely to become roadkill.
But just because the shooter was technically legal because he was out of his vehicle and off the road, doesn’t mean his actions were ethical or condonable.
And so what if he was an old man? Shooting game near a restaurant parking lot is an indication he needs to grow up.
Similarly, Idaho law did not hold accountable the hunters who made news in March for shooting coyotes while chasing them from snowmobiles within sight of rural homeowners. To make things worse, the hunters skinned several coyotes and left the carcasses in a pile where the rural families would see them every time they drove down the road.
All of that is technically legal in Idaho, since coyotes are not a game species. But it’s all blatantly insensitive and a black eye for sportsmen everywhere.