Alum Creek Spillway Rescue Part Two - July 18-19

[Rob VanGorder]

The Division of Wildlife District 1 will be attempting to return as many muskies (and other sport fish) to the lake as possible, on July 18th and 19th when the Corps of Engineers dewaters the stilling basin for maintenance.

This effort will begin on Monday July 18th at 9:30 AM. To assist the DOW, you will have to sign a release form. They are bringing a big crew, but would be happy to see people willing to help haul the fish up the hill to the waiting tanks, and experienced muskie people at the ramp helping to revive and release struggling fish. Members and muskie enthusiasts alike are encourage to come out and help if you can.

I will attempt to post a series of emails I exchanged today with the biologist in charge of this effort. I've re-ordered the messages so you can read them top to bottom and they should answer any questions people have. I'm not sure how it will show pasted to the message board, but I'll give it a shot.

While this effort is a great thing, we all need to recognize the DOW can't run down there everytime some fish get out. I was really encouraged to hear the message Scott Hale from DOW delivered at our meeting last night regarding long term plans for study so that preventative measures can be proposed based on solid data. Everyone who attended heard me pledge the full support and assistance the chapter can give, but I would encourage everyone to understand that this study and any proposals that result will take time. There is no quick fix, so in the mean time let's be thankful they are doing what they can for this year's conditions.

[Rob VanGorder]

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From: Radabaugh, Nick [mailto:Nick.Radabaugh@dnr.state.oh.us]
Sent: Wednesday, July 13, 2011 3:50 PM
To: Robert C. VanGorder
Cc: Hale, Scott; Carter, Rich
Subject: RE: July 19 Alum Creek tailwater dewatering

Hi Rob,

I’ve been tasked with organizing round two of the Alum muskie rescue, so this email was forwarded to me today. Even though we weren’t as prepared as possible last time, with everyone chipping in a little we were able to successfully transfer approximately 140 muskies back to the lake. It’s still hard to believe there were that many fish in that small of space.

I’m hoping that this was the majority of fish, but we do know there are quite a few left and would like to get as many out of there as possible before they start draining the stilling basin. That is why we are planning on electrofishing on Monday the 18th, the day before they start dewatering. It will be a similar operation as last time with us electrofishing 3-4 muskies at a time, bringing them over to the wall, walking them up the hill in nets and dropping them in a truck. This time however, we have enlisted help from our Hebron State Hatchery. They will have two trucks there; one as the truck we will drop the fish into and the other as a recuperation truck that will hold muskies until we have enough to take over to the lake. Hopefully this recuperation time will cut down on stress and any subsequent mortality we may have.

So, we should be covered as far as vehicles and tanks are considered. We will have quite a few workers there but could always use assistance hiking those big fish up the hill to the trucks. There were also muskie guys helping revive fish at the New Galena release point last time, which I think really helped. We will be getting started around 9:30am on Monday for whoever would like to come and watch/assist. All I ask is that anyone assisting sign one of our release forms before the do any work with the fish.

Hopefully we can get as many muskies as possible Monday, so that Tuesday will not be as bad. On Tuesday we will not be able to get in there and start getting fish until the Corps has the water level down to a couple feet or less. They plan to start draining between 8-9am and have it completely drained by noon, so we’re aiming to get started late that morning. We will have some seines and dip nets to try and capture whatever sport fish are left. Again we will have two hatchery trucks for recuperation and transport, but could always use a hand transferring fish from spillway to truck.

If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to give me a call or shoot me an email. I will be out of the office the next two days, but could be reached on my cell phone xxx-xxx-xxxx. We appreciate your assistance with this effort and hopefully with your help we can get as many muskies back into the reservoir as possible.

Thanks,

Nick Radabaugh
Fisheries Biologist II
ODNR Division of Wildlife - District 1
1500 Dublin Rd.
Columbus, OH 43215
p: (614) 644-3925
f: (614) 644-3931
nick.radabaugh@dnr.state.oh.us
Keep the Wild in Ohio, learn how you can help @ wildohiostamp.com

MY RESPONSE TO NICK:
Nick,

With your permission, I would like to copy and paste a good portion of your email “plan” to our Muskies Inc. chapter website (I will exclude your contact information unless you want that posted as well) and we will put out a call to all members to get you as much help as possible on the 18th and 19th. I need to get this out quickly because we had been telling people the 19th and some may have to rearrange their schedules to assist on the 18th which looks to be the busier day.

In our outreach to our members, we will ask that they meet you at the spillway just prior to start to sign a release. Able bodied candidates can help haul them up the hill. Some of our members who want to help aren’t able bodied enough to run up and down the hill all day, but we’ll encourage their participation at the ramp in the revive and release area.

Let me know, and thank you for what you guys all do.

Rob VanGorder
President, Central Ohio Chapter Muskies, Inc.
740-225-1152

NICK’S REPLY:

Rob,

Feel free to post the information. You can leave my office contact information, but should probably take out my cell phone number since that is not a state phone. We appreciate your help and your group’s passion for the fishery. I just want to make sure that your guys don’t feel pressured to change plans or totally rearrange their schedules just to be there. We should have plenty of hands to get the job done, at the same time plenty of opportunities for you to help. I look forward to seeing you next week.

Thanks,

Nick Radabaugh
Fisheries Biologist II
ODNR Division of Wildlife - District 1

MY REPLY:

Nick,

Thanks. That helps me not having to para-phrase and re-type it all. I’ll drop the cell number for sure. Nobody that shows up will feel pressured to help. Guys are energized about this rescue and genuinely want to assist. I will surely stop by, but it’s a Monday-Tuesday, and like many of our members I will have to work. I suspect we’ll get a good showing of assistance regardless, particularly at the ramp release area where help may be needed getting them to go down in the hot water. Surface temps on the lake are getting high. Thanks again.

Rob

[Rob VanGorder]

Good luck today to all who can go down there and help.

[Mark Steinert]

Hello all. I just got back from the seemingly all day rescue. 4 more fish were released today. Yesterday 28 fish were released. I did not see any more in the basin. The corps lowered it low enough to have a bobcat down there all the way against the dam at the end. I want to send a big thank you to all the people who took part in this. I really think we saved alot of fish from certain death. I cannot say enough good things about the folks from the dnr. Hats off to you all. It was great talking to them and you could tell that they were really enjoying just doing there jobs. Who knows, Maybe we can all catch one of the lucky ones that have a new lease on life.

[alleycatlures]

Went by at lunch today and took these pics...





Cliff

[Mark Steinert]

Great pics Cliff. They had the bobcat all the way to the last pic.

[cmhjohn]

I've got some pictures from the first day (18th). Unable to load to this forum but if someone can give me an email address I'll try to send to them and they can add to this forum.

[alleycatlures]

You can email to me at alleycatlures@yahoo.com and I will post them for you.
Cliff