New regs coming for ML

This year I at least understand what happened.
last year (62,000/100,000) wasnt so bad either
2022 (15,000/80,300) that’s unbelievably flawed reg setting.
The tribes have a vested interest in this being done right. We get a lot more harassment and blame when state regs get more strict than necessary.

And dude, your reported numbers wern’t just columns flipped around. At least I don’t think so. You were about 22,000 pounds off in 2023.
and yeah I’m a stickler for numbers. Fisheries management is almost all numbers. I barely even touch a fish anymore. Emails, budgets, and spreadsheets.

Good to hear you can confirm the cisco hatch. Fingers crossed they survive the winter. I’m also optimistic for the 2024 walleye year class.
Not all of the biologists share that optimism, we’ll see I guess.

I said 40k of 100k was left on the table yes it’s closer to 38k. Again for the sake of argument of leaving lbs on the table and flipping through pages on my phone I rounded.

62,525 of 100,300 was harvested according to the MNDNR website.

Not sure where you got being off by 22k but whatever. Again I posted what was left at the end of the year to still harvest NOT harvest numbers.

If it is a safe harvest number why be more than 10k away from that number in any given year.

Thanks for saving me time posting the actual harvest numbers.

I will stick by my suggestions for change.

A. Grow a pair and have better negotiating skills from the start.

B. Manage the pounds accordingly. This could have been open much sooner.

C. Stop leaving thousands of pounds at the end of a season. Like they have for the past 5 years.

D. Stop with the lies.

oh yeah, now I see what you did. It’s correct, my bad.

Here is a novel idea why not come up with a 3 year harvest number and allow harvest for 2 full years and be able to adjust in year 3 if it is needed.

Probably to simple of an idea to negotiate.

I think a three year plan would be wonderful.
It wouldn’t be a set quota, but rather a formula based on the Spawning Stock Biomass. If the SSB increases the exploitation rate increases, if the SSB decreases the exploitation rate decreases.
For example if the SSB is 1,219,000 lbs, the exploitation rate is 12.9% (the actual 2024 numbers), quota = 157,500 lbs. If the SSB increases to 1,300,000 then 13.5% exploitation rate, quota = 175,500 lbs.
There would be a stop gate installed in the formula, “if the SSB drops below 1,000,000 lbs, exploitation rate may not be more than 10%”

Keep the numbers in the formula for three years, then adjust if needed.

This is mostly off the top of my head, but this is what I’d like to see.

Now good luck getting it adopted into policy…

Sometimes I wish I was emperor of Natural Resources.

Why not just allow a more aggressive harvest until the full quota is reached (or 10% short) then shut it down to catch and release only?

Forecasting Mother Nature rarely goes well.

Upnorth85 wrote:

I think a three year plan would be wonderful.
It wouldn’t be a set quota, but rather a formula based on the Spawning Stock Biomass. If the SSB increases the exploitation rate increases, if the SSB decreases the exploitation rate decreases.
For example if the SSB is 1,219,000 lbs, the exploitation rate is 12.9% (the actual 2024 numbers), quota = 157,500 lbs. If the SSB increases to 1,300,000 then 13.5% exploitation rate, quota = 175,500 lbs.
There would be a stop gate installed in the formula, “if the SSB drops below 1,000,000 lbs, exploitation rate may not be more than 10%”

Keep the numbers in the formula for three years, then adjust if needed.

This is mostly off the top of my head, but this is what I’d like to see.

Now good luck getting it adopted into policy…

Sometimes I wish I was emperor of Natural Resources.

Thanks for your posts interesting reads.
I was at a family gathering last night where this topic came up. My son and my 4 nephews ( all were on HS fishing teams) basic response was yeah we’ve noticed we caught a few more walleyes when we have been bass fishing. The point being there is a younger generation of people fishing who have little to no interest in the ML walleye harvest drama as long as the smallies are there. Walleyes and the people who fish them (like me) are a dying breed and with that goes political clout. Personally I’ve made peace with it and fish the lake for what it is.

3Rivers wrote:

Why not just allow a more aggressive harvest until the full quota is reached (or 10% short) then shut it down to catch and release only?

Forecasting Mother Nature rarely goes well.

They tend to want to stay on the conservative side. Starting with a looser harvest to start the season is risky because then they may have to completely shut it down like they did more than once in the past. And that’s what nobody wants. Even with catch and release, you affect the quota with hooking mortality (which is a completely different topic and a controversial one).

Looks like I am going fishing Aug 16th LOL

gim wrote:

They tend to want to stay on the conservative side. Starting with a looser harvest to start the season is risky because then they may have to completely shut it down like they did more than once in the past. And that’s what nobody wants. Even with catch and release, you affect the quota with hooking mortality (which is a completely different topic and a controversial one).

So then what the penalty for going over? If it’s only going over a small mortality rate of catch and release, why isn’t that acceptable? It’s not like the lake is going to get wiped out by a couple months of catch and release.

3Rivers wrote:

So then what the penalty for going over?

The penalty gets taken out of the following year’s quota if I remember correctly. So say you go over by 10,000 pounds, that amount is dedcucted from the future quota amount the following season.

Maybe Ripjiggen or BigWerm can confirm this but I seem to remember it occuring at least once, maybe twice, when Mark Dayton was the governor.

Plus they shut walleye fishing down completely with very little notice. Everyone hates that part.

Good question.

dirtywater wrote:

What can I say I’m just a sheep! I’m forward thinking only, and this will be better for the resorts and anglers for the rest of the season than if they had not made the change. Hence I see no reason to complain today.

Sorry DW, I didn’t mean that to come off as a personal attack on you, it was more in reference to some of the celebrations I’ve seen elsewhere online like this is an indication of managerial success by the DNR. And FWIW in a vacuum of this sole decision, I’m glad it’s opening up a little more.

dirtywater wrote:

Also: I don’t know what you had in mind, but Munchausen is something very different than what you compared it to.

No, I was using it correctly. “Munchausen syndrome, is a factitious disorder in which those affected feign or induce disease, illness, injury, abuse, or psychological trauma to draw attention, sympathy, or reassurance to themselves.”

Like the DNR tells everyone how bad Mille Lacs is doing, and how they have to keep fishing closed or close to it and have seasons that are nearly impossible to keep up with (keep 1 fish until this date, then CnR then we are going to open it up two fish at a later date, and then you can night fish again after this date etc.), but then they open it up to 2 fish in a tiny slot and act/are treated like they did something miraculous. Which is also why it’s important to keep historical perspective.

Upnorth85 wrote:

Yo it’s your least favorite tribal fisheries manager here.

I really appreciate your input, even if we don’t always agree! “Peace is not when everyone agrees. It’s when we can respect our disagreements and still treat each other with respect.”

gim wrote:

The penalty gets taken out of the following year’s quota if I remember correctly. So say you go over by 10,000 pounds, that amount is dedcucted from the future quota amount the following season.

Maybe Ripjiggen or BigWerm can confirm this but I seem to remember it occuring at least once, maybe twice, when Mark Dayton was the governor.

Correct, and some would say the state anglers are still paying the penance on that to the tribe.

The penalty gets taken out of the following year’s quota if I remember correctly. So say you go over by 10,000 pounds, that amount is dedcucted from the future quota amount the following season.

Maybe Ripjiggen or BigWerm can confirm this but I seem to remember it occuring at least once, maybe twice, when Mark Dayton was the governor.

Correct, and some would say the state anglers are still paying the penance on that to the tribe.
________________________________________________________
The state has gone over the quota 9 times. See the graph I’ve attached. Though there used to be a “conservation cap” system that allowed last min negotiations to allow for continued catch and release fishing, often the state would pay it back the following year. Something like that anyways, the overages were before my time.

I’ve also attached a spreadsheet I use when I have data questions from the past 10 years. I don’t really worry about what happened before 2014. 2014 is when the current population model was developed, and I consider the period before that the pre-invasive species era.

There is not currently a conservation cap system or an overage policy in place. After the last time, 2019, the policy agreement was dissolved. The tribes are not currently interested in an overage policy agreement.

Attachments:

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I’d be interested to know how you determine that anglers overharvested. Where do those numbers come from? We know the fish mortality number is just a made up number as you go along.

I just wish somebody would admit they have no clue as to what their doing with Mille Lacs.

Daddy always said, figures don’t lie if liars don’t figure.

It’s all an estimate from the DNR creel survey.

Creel surveys are inherently inaccurate.
I’d prefer a creel survey for the avg joe.
Then have mandatory catch reporting from the guides and launches. Assuming the catch reporting would be 100% accurate it would help make up for the inaccuracies of the creel survey.
But for now this is what we’ve got to go on.

Upnorth85 wrote:

It’s all an estimate from the DNR creel survey.

Creel surveys are inherently inaccurate.
I’d prefer a creel survey for the avg joe.
Then have mandatory catch reporting from the guides and launches. Assuming the catch reporting would be 100% accurate it would help make up for the inaccuracies of the creel survey.
But for now this is what we’ve got to go on.

You mean counting bass boats at the landing is not accurate?

I agree creel surveys are a joke in this instance. I like your reporting system except for how that data may correlate to the bite or harvest numbers. Either way it can be skewed one way or the other.

I would think your hourly catch rate on a launch would give some decent data but how that is interpreted would be the challenge. Long term logs would make sense but not sure there will be many launches left in future years.

What is the reasoning for not collecting that data? Seams easy enough and helpful for a lake that is micro managed more than any other lake in the state.

Upnorth85 wrote:

I don’t really worry about what happened before 2014. 2014 is when the current population model was developed, and I consider the period before that the pre-invasive species era.

Can you explain the difference in population modeling pre and post 2014?

What, if any, invasives do you think are having a major impact on ML besides zebra mussels?

We need more researchers to research the current research and researchers. Hopefully we can lower the unemployment rate by creating more governmental jobs to rubber stamp the current rubber stampers. That is how things get done efficiently and effectively, keep people employed and solve problems, with more people to bet on the weather. The dnr and our state leaders are an absolute embarrassment. They could plug up an outhouse, find 100 plumbers to try to figure out why the dumb thing won’t flush. Then cry for more money to find more plumbers. You just can’t fix the stupidity of a system that leans on a resume of failure.

I’ll give it a try, I’m not a modeler, but I think the main difference was the model did not differentiate between sexes. I’m not sure why that wouldn’t have been included, but sometimes a model wont work when you add too many variable. Perhaps sex had to be removed.
Anyways that was part of what lead to the population decline, amongst a million other things. Males were being over targeted. Back then we were all about protecting the large female spawners. Turns out it’s more complex than that. Tribal catch is ~80% male by design, but when angler regs were designed to protect the large females, targeted smaller males were hit double. The sex ratio became skewed, before the population declined. This could have been picked up with a split-sex model.
That was during the 24% exploitation rate era, 24% is a fine exploitation rate if a walleye factory is firing on all cylinders, but one thing goes wrong and that becomes a high exploitation rate quickly.

The other invasive that has a profound impact is spiny water flea. Not only do Spiny water flea eat other zoo plankton, but also are not suitable food for forage fish. They get stuck in shiners gullet and they die. I did hear that Tulibee can digest spiny water flea, perhaps if ML is cooking up a Tulibee year class right now Spiny water flea densities would decline?

Last impactful thing I’ve heard of and someone here can probably confirm. During the 70’s and 80’s many cabin and resorts had failing septic systems, and probably pumped grey water right into the lake. These sources of nitrogen fertilized the historically clear and less productive lake. This in turn led to increased productivity lower in the food web that ultimately led to a shitload of food for walleye of all years classes. The clean water act cleaned this up, the lake became less productive, and now despite having miles and miles of premium spawning habitat there isn’t enough food for all these fish. The juveniles regularly starve over winter.

Oh and now the water gets to a million degrees in the summer and frys the juveniles brains. I heard there has been some adult Tulibee die off this past week. Looking forward to cooler weather.

The septic thing is accurate. I’ve heard that before too. Plus add in zebes and you get significantly clearer water than what there used to be. Which allows sunlight to penetrate deeper, and also allows weeds to proliferate deeper too.

The clear and warmer water has certainly helped smallmouth and pike populations out there. While not helping walleyes.

So we need to pump some poop back in her?

John Rasmussen wrote:

So we need to pump some poop back in her?

Yeah just like Minnetonka

LOL there is actually some truth to that, especially around Big Island on the 4th of July.

Our cabin is on the north end. I’ll whip up some chili for the family and see what I can do.

Alex Fox wrote:

Our cabin is on the north end. I’ll whip up some chili for the family and see what I can do.

Now that’s the spirit!

We all have to sacrifice. Better add a squatty potty to the end of the dock

Can you explain why in 2022 the state quota was set to its lowest number in 5 years even though the biomass at the time was its second highest recorded since 2014?

Bad negotiations?