New Red Lake Regs

news.dnr.state.mn.us/2017/04/03/new-upper-red-lake-walleye-regulations-announced

Personally I would prefer they erred on the conservative side and kept it at a 3 fish limit. Per the DNR there were approximately 109,000 pounds of walleye caught this winter. If the average walleye caught was 1.5 pounds, that breaks down to 72,666 fish or 24,222 3 fish limits. Broken down further that works out to 2,018 limits per week, based off a 12 week season starting in mid December through end of season February 26th.

I’m not sure what the DNR can do to more accurately estimate the amount of fish taken, but their numbers are significantly off imo. I went to Red the weekend when Rogers’ sold 9,000 road passes, and there were just as many going on thru JR’s and WestWind. Well over 30,000 people fishing just that weekend imo, so very possibly hit that 24,222 limits number just that weekend.

I 100% agree YET if the lake can stay healthy and still produce that kinda’ #’s than I say go for it…

(I will add that myself and many friends were hole hoppin’ that same weekend when 9000 road passes were sold (New Years weekend I believe?) and we caught 3 keeper’s for the weekend between 12 guys. Now I know others did better than that but the bite was off that weekend lake wide from what I read so no way 24,222 limits were caught…)

I think it was the weekend after that, January 7-8th. We had very good fishing, caught our 2 limits in 3 hours and were on our way back to the cabin. Regardless, based off the amount of people, I just think the #’s are off. And again not sure what the DNR can do to make it more accurate, and if the lake can handle it I have no problem…

BigWerm wrote:

I’m not sure what the DNR can do to more accurately estimate the amount of fish taken, but their numbers are significantly off imo. I went to Red the weekend when Rogers’ sold 9,000 road passes, and there were just as many going on thru JR’s and WestWind. Well over 30,000 people fishing just that weekend imo, so very possibly hit that 24,222 limits number just that weekend.

Talk about number being off.

So rogers sold 187 road passes per hour for 48 straight hours? Call me skeptical if that adds up to anyone.

I agree with you on the #’s being off…

biggill wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>BigWerm wrote:</div>
I’m not sure what the DNR can do to more accurately estimate the amount of fish taken, but their numbers are significantly off imo. I went to Red the weekend when Rogers’ sold 9,000 road passes, and there were just as many going on thru JR’s and WestWind. Well over 30,000 people fishing just that weekend imo, so very possibly hit that 24,222 limits number just that weekend.

Talk about number being off.

So rogers sold 187 road passes per hour for 48 straight hours? Call me skeptical if that adds up to anyone.

Good point, that 9k number is 100% hearsay. But a weekend could include Thursday and Friday, which would make it more feasible though still unlikely. Not that the 9k number really matters though, there were definitely thousands of houses out, and I would assume each house had multiple people in them.

That New Years weekend I had a lot of family and friends up there, they had well over 60 anglers. They limited out New Years eve in a couple hours. They also released a LOT of fish.

I went up there a couple weeks later and I had the same results. My 3 yr old caught his limit jigging. It was the best fishing we’ve ever seen out there. 80+ fish a house. We kept limits for all 16 anglers.

Some friends of mine went up there 4 other times and they had limits every single time. I know others did much poorer, but we couldn’t have been the only ones knocking em dead all year.

I heard it was common to have a 1-2 hr wait to fry fish at JR”s… That’s a lot of people catching fish. I know JR can fry fish fast, so I can’t even imagine the amount of fish coming out of Red. What a fishery!

I’m in favor of what ever is best for the fishery. Smaller or larger limit, all we can do is put our trust in the DNR. I know that doesn’t always work out but we don’t have any other choice.

I was up on New Years also, I heard 4000 out of Rodges that weekend at 20.00 cash a house , WOW! Let the IRS figure that out? I also think the harvest data is way off. Would hate to see Red crash, best winter fishing MN has currently.

I was also up there over New Years (first trip to URL) and we only got 1 fish between 2 of us with hole hopping during the day. Guess we just picked the wrong weekend

I could believe 1-2k.

I guess the point I didn’t make is that I believe you need to consider all the numbers to be relative. While accuracy is nice, basing the limits off of consistent data is most important.

As an armchair biologist myself, I’m not too worried about Red unless they start to make some major changes.

There is 2880 minutes to 48 hours.

Lets say during the busiest times they have people right at the access taking cash. What, say 15 seconds per vehicle getting through on ice? 4 a minute for 8hrs day? That gets to about 2000 vehicles, x2 days, with only a single vehicle coming through every other minute of the day gets that number up there around 7k on weekend.

Only if they could sell roadies for the ice roads, imagine the cash to be made off that!!!

Wasn’t throwing the #’s around to beat anyone down on them, kind of worked it out and thought it was interesting cause I never gave it much thought either.

biggill wrote:

I guess the point I didn’t make is that I believe you need to consider all the numbers to be relative. While accuracy is nice, basing the limits off of consistent data is most important.

I see your point, but I think this is where a lot of the DNR criticism comes from. They release some #’s like this from St. Paul (or whatever DNR office), based off a creel sample, and it does not correlate to what the people actually on the body of water see. In this example forget how many houses/road passes were out whatever weekend. They are basing the increased bag limit on 109k pounds harvested falling under the target harvest range, and the 109k is likely correct based off their measurement standards. But the 109k estimate is obviously incorrect to anyone that actually went to the lake.

But in the end are we happy with a 3 or 4 fish limit?

Do we feel the fishery is in trouble?

I understand what you are saying but I believe the concern comes from the Mille Lacs debacle. we know the numbers aren’t right but even so, the decisions being made don’t even follow their numbers.

With Red, while the numbers may seem off, there doesn’t appear to be a big impending crash. Stable catch rates and stable limits seem to have the lake on track for sustainability. If anything, I think increased harvest there would be beneficial. Knock some of the numbers down to maintain a safe ratio of predator vs prey.

bigstorm wrote:

I was also up there over New Years (first trip to URL) and we only got 1 fish between 2 of us with hole hopping during the day. Guess we just picked the wrong weekend

We had well over 50 on Friday, 10 + sat sitting on hwy, 3 on Thursday night in 20min late start 1 hr of fishing , numbers are off IMO

So the nets and the cannery doesn’t effect Red?

Dutchboy wrote:

So the nets and the cannery doesn’t effect Red?

Ask the DNR to send their blue panel of experts to answer… Then, it’ll be up to us to drink the smurf koolaid, or not.

Joe Scegura wrote:

That New Years weekend I had a lot of family and friends up there, they had well over 60 anglers. They limited out New Years eve in a couple hours. They also released a LOT of fish.

I went up there a couple weeks later and I had the same results. My 3 yr old caught his limit jigging. It was the best fishing we’ve ever seen out there. 80+ fish a house. We kept limits for all 16 anglers.

Some friends of mine went up there 4 other times and they had limits every single time. I know others did much poorer, but we couldn’t have been the only ones knocking em dead all year.

I heard it was common to have a 1-2 hr wait to fry fish at JR”s… That’s a lot of people catching fish. I know JR can fry fish fast, so I can’t even imagine the amount of fish coming out of Red. What a fishery!

I’m in favor of what ever is best for the fishery. Smaller or larger limit, all we can do is put our trust in the DNR. I know that doesn’t always work out but we don’t have any other choice.

That just might be the most honest and most reasonable thing I have seen written about the DNR in a long time.

Dutchboy wrote:

So the nets and the cannery doesn’t effect Red?

Most likely it does, to what overall detriment to the entire upper and lower lakes…we’ll probably never know.
BTW, you probably already know this but just to clarify…there is no cannery. Ever find canned walleye anywhere? Yes, they do have a processing operation in Redby. Here is link to an article from MPR, although from 2009 it does give some interesting tidbits on that process.

http://www.mprnews.org/story/2009/08/03/red-lake-walleye-fishing

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Dutchboy wrote:

So the nets and the cannery doesn’t effect Red?

I think gill nets have proven over time to be very detrimental to any lake with netting and angler harvest. However, I have no idea how much what happens on Lower Red, affects Upper Red. I also do not know if they do any netting on Upper, and if they do how much they do.

Walleyestudent Andy Cox wrote:

Here is link to an article from MPR

Interesting article Andy, thanks for sharing. I find it odd that they continue to operate the commercial fishery vs switching to a recreational fishery. Seems they are selling the resource short. It would be interesting to see what the tribe profits off of the processing plant. And for $1.75/fish up to 100/day for tribal members. I don’t know any guide that charges $175/day. Plus if they operated like URL/LOTW/Mille Lacs they would also have a significant tourism industry, and people staying at their casino on fishing trips.

I think this discussion is very telling about where we as fishermen are at in regards to harvesting fish, and our shift in views and opinions on fishing in general. There are a number of folks (myself included) who are surprised at this change to allow 4 fish, and feel that may be be too liberal and have concerns. This seems like a strong indication that many of us are in favor of reduced bag limits, and fishing isn’t just for bringing fish home for the freezer anymore. Perhaps its time in a statewide change in bag limits, specifically for walleyes at the moment.

Coincidentally, I find it ironic that there is concern about this 4 fish limit as being too liberal based on this past winter’s fishing success (or lack there of) and with mentions of the incredibly high amount of fishing pressure, all the while also having strong concerns about the impact of netting.

Here is my bias take on Red. The natives netted it out. The MN DNR then spends taxpayer money to restock Red WITHOUT requiring concessions regarding the nets. Then the processing plant opens, which to me is a open handed slap in the face of every person in the state. Red can dry up for all I care. There will never be one red cent of my money spent there ever.

BTW, the liberal limit increase is to mollify the tourist industry in the area. Higher limits equals more fisherman which equals more dollars for the area. Don’t for a second think this has anything to do with the fishery being back to normal.

Dutchboy wrote:

Here is my bias take on Red. The natives netted it out. The MN DNR then spends taxpayer money to restock Red WITHOUT requiring concessions regarding the nets. Then the processing plant opens, which to me is a open handed slap in the face of every person in the state. Red can dry up for all I care. There will never be one red cent of my money spent there ever.

BTW, the liberal limit increase is to mollify the tourist industry in the area. Higher limits equals more fisherman which equals more dollars for the area. Don’t for a second think this has anything to do with the fishery being back to normal.

And as you have self admitted…”bias take” on Red. Perhaps the “natives” (let’s be more specific “indigenous people”) netted it out, however they sold all to markets/buyers, restaurants, wholesale, retail, to “non-indigenous people” (being more specific, “white people”). So who’s to blame…really?
Also for what it is worth, Red Lake nation is truly a separate country. They are not a “reservation” like all the other “indigenous peoples” living on designated lands via ceded territories. So all of their “country” might as well be anywhere. All of lower is entirely within their countries borders, so no concessions there regarding nets, not even shared. Upper? They have most of that too!

Dutchboy wrote:

BTW, the liberal limit increase is to mollify the tourist industry in the area. Higher limits equals more fisherman which equals more dollars for the area. Don’t for a second think this has anything to do with the fishery being back to normal.

It’s interesting that you mentioned the tourist industry, because generally speaking it seems that the resorts on URL don’t play the blame game or pull out the sympathy card like we’ve seen from resorts on Mille Lacs. Since the walleye crash on URL, the resorts have been active in the rebound and have expressed their cautious concerns, and from multiple posts that I have seen over the last few years from resort owners up there they truly do care for the fishery and respect the sovereign nation of Red Lake. It appears that they have a strong mutual respect and understanding of one another, which I feel is quite commendable, and something we can learn from and resemble.

Dutchboy wrote:

Here is my bias take on Red. The natives netted it out. The MN DNR then spends taxpayer money to restock Red WITHOUT requiring concessions regarding the nets. Then the processing plant opens, which to me is a open handed slap in the face of every person in the state. Red can dry up for all I care. There will never be one red cent of my money spent there ever.

BTW, the liberal limit increase is to mollify the tourist industry in the area. Higher limits equals more fisherman which equals more dollars for the area. Don’t for a second think this has anything to do with the fishery being back to normal.

Probably trying to capitalize on the business lost from Mille Lacs.
I’ll be there on opener to harvest my limit and c/r lots more.

Dutchboy wrote:

Here is my bias take on Red. The natives netted it out. The MN DNR then spends taxpayer money to restock Red WITHOUT requiring concessions regarding the nets. Then the processing plant opens, which to me is a open handed slap in the face of every person in the state. Red can dry up for all I care. There will never be one red cent of my money spent there ever.

BTW, the liberal limit increase is to mollify the tourist industry in the area. Higher limits equals more fisherman which equals more dollars for the area. Don’t for a second think this has anything to do with the fishery being back to normal.

I 100% agree with your statements yet wonder why then do they pick Red’s economy over the ML’s economy to try and get some $$$ infused into that area?

It’s not a either or, it’s a AND situation. My guess (I really don’t know) is that tourism is split into districts across the state for funding. Mille Lacs would be a different district just like Rochester would be. Like I said, it’s only a guess.

Dutchboy wrote:

It’s not a either or, it’s a AND situation. My guess (I really don’t know) is that tourism is split into districts across the state for funding. Mille Lacs would be a different district just like Rochester would be. Like I said, it’s only a guess.

Only a guess?? Ordinarily Dutchboy I would say most of your posts make some sense whether I agree with them or not, but this I cannot stretch my imagination far enough.
How does the tourism budget (dollars) being split into different districts have anything, even remotely to do with the 1 fish increase in the walleye bag limit on Red Lake?