Lake Mille Lacs safe harvest levels set

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Lake Mille Lacs safe harvest levels set (February 3, 2009)

Safe fish harvest levels have been set at Lake Mille Lacs for the 2009 fishing season.

The safe harvest of walleye has been set at 541,000 pounds, up from 430,000 pounds last fishing season. The state’s allocation is 414,500 pounds, up from 307,500 pounds last year.

Indian bands that signed the 1837 Treaty will be allocated 126,500 pounds of walleye this fishing season, up from 122,500 pounds last year.

The state’s 2009 walleye harvest may include an overage allowance of up to 5 percent.

The yellow perch and northern pike safe harvest levels are the same as last year. The yellow perch level is 270,000 pounds; the northern pike level is 25,000 pounds. The state’s allocation is 135,000 pounds of yellow perch and 12,500 pounds of northern pike.

Due to low abundance and low incidental harvest in both the tribal and angling fisheries, quotas will not be set for tullibee and burbot. Instead, these species will be monitored, and safe harvest levels will be discussed in the future if abundance, harvest, and fishing interest increase.

Every year fisheries experts from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) and the eight Chippewa bands meet in January to share information and determine safe harvest levels.

“Now that we know what the State’s walleye quota is for 2009, we can evaluate where the winter fishery stands and can evaluate if our current regulation will keep us within our allocation,” said Ron Payer, Minnesota DNR fisheries chief. “And once we have done that, we will meet with the Mille Lacs Fisheries Input Group.”

The current Mille Lacs regulation allows anglers to keep four walleye up to 18 inches, which may include one trophy over 28 inches. Anglers are required to release all walleye from 18 to 28 inches.

Total walleye angling harvest was 76,000 pounds in 2008. The safe harvest level was increased from last year due to low total harvest in 2008.

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Looks like we will have a 20 – 28″ protected slot again. How does one get on this input committee….

are you sure they are not going to stick with the 18-28 protected slot? Kooty, buy a resort!

I’m really curious if all “our” complaining last year had any affect on what quota the natives asked for. To be brutally honest, I’m surprised the arrogance at the GLFWIC didn’t mandate more quota. I often wonder if they are just pushing us to the point where the DNR says, “It’s your lake, do what you want with it.” Although they fooled us into restocking Red and look where that is getting us.

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Looks like we will have a 20 – 28″ protected slot again. How does one get on this input committee….

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Sorry to tell you this Kooty, but a 20-28″slot is highly unlikely. Last year we had a vote and it was pretty much unanimous that the Input group wanted to have a consistant regulation that would not change for many years unless absolutely needed. The 18-28″ slot is what we all agreed on.

Now befosre you get your undies in a bundle over this, you need to understand that for years the regs on ML have been changing, sometime as many as 4 times in a year. People coming to the lake just never knew what to expect, nor did the resort owners. This slot provides us with the best consistant regulation that will allow us to safely remain in compliance with the court mandated harvest limits, and at the same time still offer better slots than Winnie, Leech, or Red. (FYI….the state wanted us to follow along with those other lake’s slots and make it easier on everyone, but we knew we could offer more than that on Mille Lacs.)

As for the Input group, would you like to be my guest? Our next annual meeting should be in the next 2 weeks.

I agree 100%, I have no problem keeping fish under 18 and letting the bigger fish go to catch another day. two years ago i had more pic’s of 26 to 29 inch fish then i new what to do with.it make’s my trip’s even better when you catch the big one’s.

What is the point of upping the safe harvest quota if they are not going to allow a bigger harvest slot of fish to be killed?? Obviously we don’t want a summer like a few years back and have to lose 125,000 lbs to hooking mortality. But isn’t the goal to maintain a certain amount of walleyes, perch, smallies, pike and muskie. There is XX amount of biomass to support those fish.

I suppose their netting could show that there is an excessive amount of 14-18″ fish that are great little feeders. In that case, I can see not changing the slot.

Honestly I don’t care what the slot is, I just assumed the with more lbs needing removed from the lake they would open up the slot some. I could care less if it’s the same every year, I figure I better read the regs each time I go to the lake cuz you never when it will change. Especially on Mille Lacs.

I’ll PM you about the meeting. I’d love to attend one if I’m not traveling for work. Thanks for the offer!!

Dont worry you will never come close to the quota anyway.There is still a lot of forage in the lake and the natives are netting the same size fish.The DNR told the resorts last year if they went way over the quota they could shut down the lake so they decided on 18.At least this is what George at Hunters told me.I told George I would have stuck with 20 for the reasons I mentioned above and try to draw a few more customers.

Because of the quota and netting on ML it will tough if not impossible to manage it.Everyone is targeting one class of fish and when the big ones start biting expect a lot of floaters.ML has roughly a 4 year cycle and if it is on track 2010 will be the killer bite.Thats when you will see all the floaters.

Kooty,

There are a large number of smaller walleyes in the lake right now, and they will make the majority of the harvest this season and next. Remember all the 12-14″ fish we were catching last year, as well as the 8-10″er’s. Well, they are all going to be bigger this year.

As for all the larger fish, the DNR is concerned of what could happen if we were to have another forage base crash. Walleyes will canabilize their own if there is nothing else to eat. I’m not up to date on what they are looking at doing, but whatever it is will have to be worked out with the Indians and fit within the wording of the court decision. I’m pretty sure, but not certain,that it is possible for the 2 sides to agree to a mutual change in the Treaty Harvest guidelines and have it be allowed by the court. Like I said, what that could be….I have no idea.

I havnt been to one of these meetings but know people that have.I think they are good for getting suggestions but for the most part the DNR already has their mind made up.

If I was a resort owner up there I would be pushing to raise the slot to 20.Why? Because I think it would draw a few more people and still be manageable.With the slot at 18 you are creating an over abundance of large fish that will end up floating at some point before they hit 28.It isnt hard to catch fish in ML between 20-28 but you arent going to draw a crowd on those fish.

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I havnt been to one of these meetings but know people that have.I think they are good for getting suggestions but for the most part the DNR already has their mind made up.

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Thats not exactly the way it is Rob. The DNR does know what they can and can not do, because the court decision pretty much outlines that to them. What they then do is meet with us and ask for our input as to how we would like to see it accomplished.

OK so what imput have you guys gave them that they have actually used?

Most recently….the 18-28 protected slot instead of the 17-28 slot they proposed. We didn’t want to be just like Winnie, leech, or Red as the DNR wanted to do.

The set regulations instead of changing regs every year was an Input group product also.

The 48″ minimum for muskies on ML was started by the Input Group. Namely ….ME! I was the first person to bring it up, and the next year they started the questionaire, and the next it was implemented on ML as well as about 40 other top muskie lakes. Seems many anglers want to see that state wide.

21″ minimum and only 1/day limit on smallies was an Input Group idea.

Resort owners before the input group are the people responsible for the very first protected slots ever, on ML.

Don’t make light of the work of the resort owners and other members of the Input Group for what we try to do in YOUR and everyone elses best interest. There are a lot of members who don’t “waste” their time anymore trying to explain it to everyone like I’m trying to do either. Its a pretty thankless thing we do try to do.

Things could/would be a lot worse if we weren’t there.

You are right though, its gotten so bad there that you probably could do much better fishing somewhere else. Maybe somewhere where you can use 2 lines if you want.

Just 1 less boat moving in on me when I’m fishing! Especially a tournament.

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Most recently….the 18-28 protected slot instead of the 17-28 slot they proposed. We didn’t want to be just like Winnie, leech, or Red as the DNR wanted to do.

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I’ll go on record as agreeing with the current regs as a long term goal to stay within the court mandated safe harvest limits. As long as both sides understand there will be years with overages as well as underages.

I hope to never see a year again with a 14-16 inch keeper slot. May as well make it total C&R. Keep in mind that the DNR or Tribes can swing the hammer and close it down too!

-J.

Actually I dont move in on people in tournaments.I fished that spot the first day of the tournament and there wasnt one boat there in the AM.You and 6 other boats were there on the second day.

You are right though,I plan on spending more time on other waters and even pool 4 so I can use 2 lines if I want.Ill still hit ML a few times in the spring and fall and fish a few tourneys there but for the most part yes there will be one less boat there…mine I plan on spreading my money around a bit more and the funny thing is some of these other places really appreciate it.

And I was just starting to like ya a little Jack Now Tuck is your only friend Hey Im headed to LOW on Monday Ill honk on my way by

How did I get dragged into this?????

Troublemaker.

Troublemaker.

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I wasn’t saying you moved in on me. I was infering to day 2 when all the boats moved in on both us. Remember when I pulled up my anchor I asked you…”how many people did you tell about this spot!” That was because we were buried in boats. Day 1, you and 1 other boat were the only boats there beside me all day, and I camped there from 10am till weigh in.

Didn’t know you had such a problem with me. Guess I know now though. Good fishing to you.

Just 1 less boat moving in on me when I’m fishing! Especially a tournament.

Maybe its the way you worded this I dont want people to think I move in on people in tournaments although plenty of other people do it.I dont have a problem with ya and Im glad you explained things a little more.Im always curious and like to know what is going on up there.Like the old saying you cant always believe everything you here.By the way next time dont let out so much anchor rope,it scares the fish away from my boat Next time I see ya Ill buy you a beer and give ya a big hug By the way there have been several times I was going to fish an area and you were already there with clients so I went somewhere else.No big deal its a big lake and I hate crowds.

Don’t mean to hijack the thread, but Jack (or anyone else), why did the DNR change the limits on tournament boats last summer to 2 per person? Only 76,000 pounds taken, I don’t understand the thinking
I wonder if you could bring the topic up at the input meeting?

The thinking there was based on the tight restrictions we had on us as a result of being in “catagory 3” situation.

This is a measuring system used to access the condition of the spawning bio-mass. 3 being the worse case. Without going into lengthy detail, these conditions are decided by several numbers from the fall net surveys, including #’s of fish per net, size, sex, ect…. When the state is in a catagory 3, there is absolutely no allowance allowed in the court ruling for any over harvest at all. The lake could and would have been shut down to all fishing if it was determained we had reached our allocation.

So…..the DNR decided as a means to lower harvest/mortality it would be a good idea to restrict tourneys once water temps got to 70 degrees to only 1 limit per person per boat per tournament. That is why so many resorts switched to 2 – 1day tournaments instead of staying with the 1 – 2day format. It allowed the contestants a chance to bring more fish to the scale. Not exactly in tune with the spirit of the DNR’s reasoning, but it did keep people signing up to fish. Mind you that usually the better fishermen are fishing these tourneys, so there was a bigger chance that large numbers of fish would be caught and weighed.

Hope that gives you some idea why it was the way it was. As for this season, we’ll find out when we have our meeting what condition the lake is in. If we are in a 1 or 2 we can have some over harvest and the need to restrict tourneys will not be as great. Of course, that doesn’t mean the DNR has to relax the restrictions on tourneys either.

I’m interested to hear about how the DNR and the Input Group felt about last year’s walleye angling quota (307,500 pounds) compared to the actual walleye angling harvest (79,000 pounds). Was that considered a success??? Seems to me that was not a good thing, since they kind of missed their target by 226,000 pounds.

I also find it interesting that the tribal member actual harvest numbers were not disclosed in the article above or anywhere else that I can find. So how many pounds did the tribal members gill net last year? We should know since we paid the DNR to count them. The way I see it is that the tribal members were a lot closer to their allotted quota (122,500 lbs.) than state anglers were to theirs and most likely the tribal members harvest exceeded the state angler’s harvest. Kind of sad considering there are 5 million people in the state of MN alone.

I guess I find the whole estimating quotas process somewhat comical. Here’s another example. Two years ago, there was a major adjustment to the slot (when you could only keep 14-16 inch walleyes) due to the fact the state anglers exceeding their annual quota much quicker than expected. For the most part, I guess that made sense to me at the time. However, last year state anglers only achieved 25% of their 2008 quota (79,000 lbs versus 305,000 lbs) but no changes were made last year or this year to in regard to the slot limit. Isn’t there an unexpected 226,000 pounds of walleyes out there swimming around (minus hooking mortality)? I’m just using their numbers…

The low harvest total is too bad, but not a bad thing when all things are considered. There was plenty of room for more harvest, and not a single person from the DNR or the Input Group would have been upset if more fish had been harvested.

As you, I, and many others here pointed out over the course of the season, there was an abundance of bait fish/food in the system last year. That lends to a slower bite, which is exactly what happened. Another factor for the lower number was the fact the lake was colder all of last season, which brought the hooking mortality numbers down. And lastly, with all the negative word of mouth everyone wants to spread about the lake, many fewer people were fishing Mille Lacs last year. They fished other lakes, because they actually believed they couldn’t catch fish on Mille Lacs.

If you’d like to hear or learn more about it, feel free to come to the annual Input meeting Wed. 2/18, 6:30, Hazelton Town hall. You won’t be given the chance to speak until after all the scheduled meeting is over, but you will have a chance to ask questions if you want.

You’ll be surprised how much of a learning experience you’ll have.

Jack, I fully understand what you are saying.

However, Brad’s logic is logical.
Why can’t we harvest more fish this year?
There are 200,000+ pounds of “extra” fish swimming in the system that are “rightfully” ours for the taking, yet the DNR is saying we can’t?

That decision isn’t quiet set in stone yet. We still have the Input meeting next Wed. but quiet frankly, I don’t see much chance of it changing.

Last year there was such an abundance of minnows so we couldn’t find fish that were hungry, but this year most likely will be a bit different. Last year we had large number of smaller perch, and minnows in the lake for all these walleyes to feed on. This year those forage fish are all bigger, so not exactly suitable for smaller walleyes to eat. There is a large number of smaller (14-16″) walleyes moving into the “harvest” zone, as well as a large number of smaller walleyes. Indications before ice up were that the small minnows, last years hatch, while many in numbers, were small in size and some question was raised as to how well they would survive the winter. If there was any sizable die off of those smaller minnows, those smaller walleyes will not have nearly as much forage as they did last year, and the bite should be a lot stronger with more fish being caught and kept.

As was stated in my post about the status of the Mille Lacs walleye fishery, we went into last year with very low numbers of fish in the “spawning stock bio-mass”. Those unharvested fish from last year are helping to refill that segment of the lakes population and hopefully bring it up to much safer levels for the future. In some regaurd, we are now paying for the bites we had in 2001-2002. If you remember, there was no food in the lake, the fish were skinny, and they cannabilized their own young to survive. Those year classes were lost, and now those lost year classes are not filling their intended role in the stocking bio-mass.

So, the prediction is that we’ll have a stellar bite this year?
Good info!

Hopefully, yes.

More importantly though, hopefully the fish that were not harvested or lost to mortality last year will raise the spawning stock bio-mass out of the “condition 3” and into either a “condition 2 or 1”.

Jack: Thank you very much for the info and for representing the best interest of the lake at these meetings. I know it is a difficult task to balance people’s desire to keep fish along with the long-term goal of maintaining a healthy fishery, but I think the DNR is doing a great job. ML is a buetiful, awesome fishery for almost every species in the lake, and I prefer the 18-28 inch walleye slot, and in general, a philosophy of underharvest for all species by hook and line anglers. Thanks for your hard work.

Kelly

Thank you Kelly!

I’m fortunate to have a chance to see the system at work from a different prospectus than most people here. They sometimes find the system frustrating, and sometimes I find it frustrating trying to pass that understanding accross to everyone. I care, and I want to help everyone get a chance to better understand the proccesses that are in play on this lake. It is not a simple thing, as much as we all wish it was.

Thanks for the recognition, I do truly appreciate it.

Good fishing this year!