15″ and 16″ Perch

A friend of mine from work invited me to go fish Bitte lake last weekend in Eastern SD. I chose to stay warm and spend some “quality” time at home being I’ll be at the expo next weekend. Well my friend stopped over on the way home and showed me what I had missed. He had caught several 15 inch perch that weighed 2.1 on the electronic scale and a whopping 16″ perch which was bouncing between 2.4 and 2.5 pounds. That one is going on the wall. Another one of those darn “should of been theres!” I will take a picture of the pictures he developes with my digital camera and post it later.

Arnie,

I moved from those waters to the cities a couple years ago. I hate to say this, but the NE part of SD has some of the best fishing in the country. I don’t mean any offense to the MN waters, I love it here for fishing. The hunting leaves a little to be desired, ie my handle….

I’ve fished out there on lakes where you could fill a 5 gallon pale with 25 of those sumo perch. I never take that many, but I’ve seen it where 3 or 4 guys get together and fill a couple pales in a few hours. Luckily the state GF&P is lowering limits on some of the lakes. If you get the chance again, go. Reetz is another lake they are doing some experiment management on, 5 fish only, but they are sumos in there….

waterfowler,

I heard that Reetz was going to a one perch limit with a minimum size of 15″. That should cut the harvest rate. How many people will truly put the time in to chase to keep only one-besides me. TGIF

TGIF, fitting today, huh!!

I would too!!! I’ve caught 14 inchers out there, ie Watertown area, and I tell you what a blast. Three years ago, a lake north of Henry, Long Lake, was on fire. Unfortunately everyone in the country new about it. It got fished out in about 4 weeks. It was nothing to go out for 4 hours and get your limit of 25 fish for 4 guys. Unfortunately too many people think because the limit was 25 they needed to keep that many fish every time out. One day my cousin and I kept 25 fish, nothing under 10, biggest in the 13″ range. After cleaning that many big perch, we never kept more than 5 a piece again. We had way more meat than the two of us needed.

As for Reetz, I hope they do something. A 16″ perch is something special anywhere in the world…. Actually I hope they do something across the board in the state. First thing, start fining the idiots that throw the 3″ perch on the ice. I’m gonna go because this really gets me worked up. Have a great weekend!!!