RiverEyes
The Cooling ponds and canal’s at the power plant at pool 14
are old and not used for the nucler power plant.They converted
to fresh water cooling years back this left the ponds & canal’s
available. I dont know if any of the other power plants along the MISS. would have the ponds. I think they also have striper’s in them, and stock them in some lake’s in ILL.
CURRENT BREAK
Thanks for asking the questions rivereyes. Very informative indeed.
Nice report Eyes ! Keep the diologe go’in with him please !
and when you run out of questions, I have a thousand more.
Ask him about the Zebra’s. Have ya noticed all the shells
covering the ramp at Clinton-I also found a huge section down in the old lock section by Leclaire covered with them also !
I also read an article written by him, where he stated the the lower pools where silting in so fast that the Walleye fry having no where to go, reside in the river channels where-by they are suffering a high mortality due to the barges plying the channel also.
Hey guy, somebody up at pool 14 said you wheren’t that smart. “I guess I’ll defend ya next time !!
Keep up the good work ! This stuff is interesting !!
Gofish
Kensyl Reading———EFN ProStaff
Hey Kensyl!.. well the guy on pool 14 is correct!! I have to quote Robert Frost here….
“Half the world is composed of people who have
something to say and can’t, and the other half who
have nothing to say and keep on saying it.”
well.. you can guess which group IM in!!
and John has mentioned the problem with fish spawning in the channels…. shortly after hatching walleye can not yet swim and they drift in the current… apparently a big old barge comin through really “screws” with them….. (pardon the pun)…. and fry mortality can be high….. if ONLY they could stop barge traffic for a short time it would quite likely have a significant impact… OR… if we could somehow revitalize the backwater areas so that the fish could go back to spawning there……
one note of interest to our pool 4 crowd is John speculated that POSSIBLY the fact that Pepin is just a short ways down river that it provides a large buffer for the fry by giving refuge from barge traffic and greatly reducing mortality….
its possible that the really HIGH river levels like last year help because they stop barge traffic during those periods…..
the above information is not direct quotes from John Pitlo but information that I have to pull from memory from conversations…
Interesting you mention Zebra mussels. For some reason – there was a tremendous die-off of Zebs last summer. Sometime during late summer, early fall – we had water tempertures in the mid-80’s (at least in the middle & lower pools, Pool 10 on down) which apparently was lethal to adult Zebs. Nearly every survey of native mussels completed during the fall period showed that all the Zebs were dead – but native mussels were still alive. However, as you know, young Zebs drift with the current for up to 8 days and there was re-colonization of most areas by young Zebs by the fall. And so it goes – we learn more about the animal every year.
Thanks for the report Rivereyes….Interesting reading!
I’ve noticed the clam beds near my house have very few zeb’s compared to early last year. (On pool 14) I guess I won’t complain so much about the hot weather now! River Eyes, I’m on 14 but not the sot who Kensyl talked to. Maybe intelligience, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder!?!?
Hey Rooster!
No worries…. If there really is a guy on pool 14 who thinks I have a bigger mouth than brain… well hes a pretty shrewd guy…. I cant fault anyone for that!! There are most likely guys on EVERY pool that figured that out quite a while ago!!….
but once in a while I shutup and listen to what the really knowledgable people have to say…. and I learn…. and I cant even remember how long Ive been part of this board… I guess literally years!.. (well more than 1 qualifies as years!!)..
but the point is… Ive been a river fisherman ALL my life… and I have learned more in the relatively short time Ive been part of this group of people then Ive learned in all the previous decades!! So when I get a chance to pass on something of interest and value.. its my pleasure to do so……
John Pitlo is a great guy and is the most knowledgable source Ive ever found when it comes to the biology of river walleyes and saugers… its always a great pleasure to talk to him and its always a learning experience….. he has just published a new “paper” and Im looking forward to reading that too!!
I think the really cool thing about this board is we probably have hundreds or maybe even thousands of years of river experience when taken as a group…. and we also have a great group of people who are willing to share that precious information…. there are some people who wish we would shutup and leave people in the dark…. I think thats the wrong attitude to have… because the more people we can involve in this resource the larger voice we have to improve the fishery… the more political clout we have….. what do we have if we all keep it to ourselves? maybe in a few years we have nothing because we have no voice that can be heard and our resource could be destroyed before our very eyes and dissappear maybe forever…………..
*whew*… wonder why Im so philosophical today? Guess Im just glad this board is here, and that Im part of it…..
Have you checked the level of Philosophium Nitrate in this morning’s bowl of Wheaties? IN your defense Rivereyes, I think somone was cornfusing you with “the Pup”………….motormouth with little brains……….yeah, “that guy”! *grins*
Just an update on the spawning in Pool 13. Water temp on Friday was 47 degrees. Male walleyes are on spawning areas in good numbers. I saw the largest male walleye I have ever seen on the Miss. – weighed in at 7 lbs and 25.9 inches long!! I had to squeeze it myself to believe it was a male. Walleye tournament today out of Dubuque – there were at least 8 boats fishing the walleye spawning site that I could count.
what a *MONSTER* male walleye!… Ive never heard of one sooooo big… has anyone else?
fishsqzr,
Do you have any comments on the effect of fishing the spawning beds? Are the eggs disturbed enough to have an effect? Any idea if a fish is caught off the bed whether it will continue to spawn?
Thx,
Pete
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