Walleye status on the flowage

[sureshot612]

slot limits and size limits work. If not the walleyes will be the size of smelt. What happened to the jumbo perch. As far as the guides go they should be supporting it to insure the future of there livelihood .And a 50 grand boat well the flowage is not the only water to fish . Just sayin . Oh and one other thing is there any word about building the winter cribs this year.

[DonH]

The TFF is the body of water that is most targeted by the Indians to spear. The numbers reflect that. It isn't just that number of female walleyes speared, it's those speared before they have released their eggs. A 17" walleye produces between 41,200 and 49,000 eggs. Imagine the number of walleyes that are not hatched every year due to spearing. Spearing changed the entire food chain of the TFF.

I have been fishing the TFF since 1960. For years we never caught smallmouth bass, in fact about 1980 my brother-in-law had a 14.5" smallie mounted. About 1989 or 1990 we started catching 10" smallies. I made the immediate connection to walleye spearing having started a couple of years earlier. A vacuum was created by a lower number of walleyes and smallies filled it very quickly.

In 1971 I found a rock bar in one of the base lakes that was flooded to create the TFF. I have never seen another boat on it and it is one of the best spots on the TFF. We have between 8 and 12 guys that go up there twice a year to fish and we hand out a trophy for biggest walleye of every trip (everything over 20" goes back after photos), and the rock bar usually produces the winner. We actually discuss who will be fishing the bar on any given day, and if we don't and one of our boats is already on it, the others stay away.

For 25 years we only caught walleyes on this bar. Never caught a smallie, not 1. Now there are evenings when all we catch are smallies on this bar, although usually we also nail a walleye or two. This was a spot that was walleyes only for over 2 decades and it is now an entirely different spot. Same depth, same rocks, different fish.

slot limits and size limits work. If not the walleyes will be the size of smelt. What happened to the jumbo perch. As far as the guides go they should be supporting it to insure the future of there livelihood .And a 50 grand boat well the flowage is not the only water to fish . Just sayin . Oh and one other thing is there any word about building the winter cribs this year.