Concerns about fishing conditions.
Is anyone else getting concerned about what seems to be deteriorating fishing conditions on the Lake. I grew up fishing up here on weekends and remember how great the walleye fishing was all summer long, then came the zebra mussels and things really changed. It seems to me that within the last 4 years it is getting harder and harder to boat a limit of walleye and even perch. Not sure if the whatever has been causing the algae problem is linked or what, and the spring walleye kill really got me thinking. I surely hope that our ODNR is really looking into all this and not just writing it off as due to the muddy water this spring.
Lake conditions seem to be changing too me also
Have had a family fishing boat on the lake since the sixties. In the sixties there were not that many walleyes caught. At least we did not catch that many. Then a lot of sewage was being dumped into the rivers. So towns were ordered to stop dumping and build sewage treatment plants. And commercial fisherman took a lot of walleye. Not sure exactly when walleye netting was stopped but then in the seventies the walleye fishing went ballistic. And it stayed that way until as you mentioned the zebra mussels showed up. In the mean time we lived through the white perch invasion and the goby invasion. In the seventies and until the zebras showed up it was not unusual to not be able see your lure more than 2 or 3 feet under the water. I think the fish used their lateral lines to sense prey by vibration more so than sight.
Now with clear water the fish seem more wary. I think they sight feed more now. The lures we used to use do not work as well as they once did. Remember the gold nugget? We used that for many a limit catch. But try to catch something on it now. When you went out and got your limit time after time years ago the fish size average was considerably smaller than it is today. Of course this changes with hatch survival. Today if there is a good hatch who knows how many will be eaten by the gobys and then if they get too large for the gobys then the big walleyes will eat them. The gobys live on the reefs where the walleye eggs are layed who knows how many eggs they eat. Have not got to the lake much due to the weather but the fish we caught were all fat and healthy. The lake has been constantly changing. Back in the seventies there were not the number of charters here are today and the walleye seemed to school more.
So back to your question am I concerned? YES I am concerned this year about the time it takes the lake to clear after a storm. I am thinking that possibly some new contaminant is keeping particles suspended longer than they were suspended previously. Could be a new type of fertilizer or simply farmers using magnitudes more fertilizer which runs off with big rains like we had this spring. Or could just be the weather this year. On the modis imagry pictures of the lake the Maumee river and Sandusky bay look like pure mud.
A little more time will be needed to see if there is a new problem.