What Would You Have Said

[DonAndersen]

Last summer I headed to Crimson Lake to whack a bunch of illegally stocked perch. Did well and had 15 on a stringer when arriving at the shore.

Looking down on me were 1/2 dozen Fish Cops and Park Officers who had been on a training course. Well, one headed over and asked how I had done. Got 15 I said. Well, he counted them twice to make sure I hadn't exceeded my limit.

I asked him " why am I allowed to benefit from an illegal act? If I was keeping a stolen car what would your reaction be? Check the tires.

Things went downhill from there.

 

So, should we be allowed to benefit from others illegal acts?

 

 

Don

[Dangus]

I don't think they look at it as you as benefiting, they look at you as a means to control it.

I'm not sure why they don't take a hardline on cases like that. If people knew they'd just nuke any lake with introduced species, maybe they'd stop. Then again, I don't think the asshats doing the illegal stocking are capable of thinking that far ahead.

[DonAndersen]

But shouldn't the limit be a pickup box load and you can't leave till it is FULL !

 

Don

[BrianR]

Don; Your lucky that the lake wasn't stocked with trout.

Bron; Ironic isn't it,if there was stocked trout in there .The officers might have laid a charge.What the govt. is doing is 2 edged .If the lake has stocked trout & you keep those illegally stocked perch.Your breaking the law.Now the real brain fart.Perch in a stocked trout lake,can't keep the perch.Once the govt identifies the lake has perch in it they remove it from the stocking list.Resulting in pissed off trout guys & perch guys.Perch over populate & eat themselves outa house & home,get stunted.Trouble is nothing is being done to stop.Either retention of the perch from a stocked lake.Or eradicating the perch from a trout lake,as soon as possible....

[Sparkplug]

If I go and pick bottles and cans from a ditch where people have littered, and then cash my pickings in at the local bottle depot, should I feel guilty about benefiting from someone else's illegal act?

 

I like the thought of the "pickup box full" limit on such waters, on the illegally introduced species. I seem to recall the Brookie removal project on the Elbow system being relatively effective.

 

But to build on Don's original Crimson Lake adventure, why don't we organize a perch fishing derby at one (or more) of these lakes some time? Get as many people out as we can, to pull as many perch out of such lake in one day as we can (of course, working within the 15 fish limit). Or - even better - maybe we could get a waiver on the limit for this one-time event? Could be a great awareness building thing, especially if you got a whole slew of people out on the lake on a given day, all bonking perch. Volunteer filleters, donate the fillets to a food bank or something.

[DonAndersen]

Spark plug,

 

Do the bottle thing already.

 

Great idea in the perch thing but we're two years too late. Max size is now maybe 6". Tough to fillet sardines.

 

Mind you - a thousand feet of mist net would work and we could hype perch as the greatest thing to put into gardens as fertilizer.

 

Maybe sell the perch for pig/chicken feed.

 

Lots of possibilities.

 

By the way, perch were illegally stocked in Phyllis lake about 40 years ago. Too date, nothing has been done. Govt at it's best.

 

Don

[Sparkplug]

I like the net idea, a lot less work than catching them one at a time. Clearly waiting for/expecting the gov't only to do something is Waiting for Godot.

 

Years ago I helped out on a volunteer effort to remove suckers from a creek in which they spawned that flowed into Beauvais Lake. The suckers were put into drums and sent off to some animal food processing destination.

 

Probably wouldn't have much trouble finding takers for the perch, whether they be for fertilizer, animal feed or otherwise. I wonder if a perch netting/removal pilot or demonstration at one of these lakes is something that various interests could get behind (TU? ACA? Yes, even AEP?). Can't see it being harmful, and could at least generate some publicity and awareness on this issue.

[angler]

Don: Grew up eating your sardine sized perch, and sun fish, and blue gill. Filet? What for? We gutted them removed head, dorsal and pectoral fins, dipped in egg and then flour and fried till golden. Stand them upright on the rib cage and peel the meat off the skeleton. YUM!!! those are some of the tastiest fish i've eaten. Same method works great for smaller trout too.

[DonAndersen]

Angler,

 

I skinned them too. But fillet a 6" fish. Tough to do.

Why don't you and a couple of thousand others give Crimson, Cow, Twin, Phyllis, Tay + another 25 lakes in the province a go. Eat them all.

 

 

Don