Depends on who you ask. Blue cats had no barriers and could go as far as Minneapolis until the dams were built. Early 1900’s records are bad for catfish. Many different common and scientific names that varied by region throughout the Mississippi basin. Descriptions of catfish over 100 pounds that were not being called flatheads exist in reports. However, no one has preserved specimens of blue catfish to definitively say they were native to Minnesota. There are some blues in the Iowa stretch of the Mississippi. Lock & Dam 19 is likely the major culprit impacting blue catfish migrations upstream, not to mention many other species.

Rod Bent wrote:

Hi Joel,
Thanks for the info. As you know I am very interested in the sturgeon project. I’m sure that more details about the telemetry study are welcome. (Did you ever find the missing receiver?) Having a growing paddlefish population would be a great thing. I’m curious how the sturgeon that Sharptailer and I gave to the Fish and Wildlife folks are doing up by Mpls.
Keep us in the loop.
Gregg Gunter

LOL, I don’t remember which missing receiver we had been talking about, but chances are no, we didn’t find it. Still hoping to recover some of those missing ones. Have 3 I couldn’t find last fall, two in the MN River and one by Lilydale. Will focus on those ones first before I try to find the other 5 that have been lost since 2013.
As for the fish you provided, guessing you are referring to the fish that were given to the U of MN to be studied inside the auxiliary lock chamber at LD1. They had a block net up to keep those fish in there for their study and something was chewing holes in their block net and the fish escaped. They weren’t using the same transmitters we are using, so we don’t know where they went once they got out.

Brian Klawitter wrote:

Tangler, I have a message into one of the planners at the Corp about your second message. I had the same question when they were going to draw down the lower portion of P3 and not lower the St Croix…how the ell does a person do that!
It’s all about control of the dams and the “tipping point”.

To be clear, I don’t know what I’m talking about so hold on.

Yeah that tipping point makes me scratch my head too. When there was talk about a Pool 2 drawdown, someone told me that if you dropped the level of Pool 2 in Hastings by a foot or two, that the effects of the drawdown would only be noticed downstream of downtown St Paul. And a foot or two at the dam doesn’t mean a foot or two everywhere. Not 100% positive on that based on the individual who told me, but it was said with conviction so it must be true right?

I’m no hydrologist, but Pool 2 is impounded by Lock & Dam #2. If you alter the upper end of Pool 2 by removing LD1, that won’t drop water levels in Pool 2. Pool 1 will change dramatically. It would no longer be an impounded pool I’m assuming it would drop several feet (unless you construct a staircase of rapids that would hold water back and maintain water levels in Pool 1). Not being a hydrologist, I don’t know if upper Pool 2 would maintain its existing water level or increase. I don’t think it would decrease, because you wouldn’t be altering anything that is holding water back (i.e. LD2) on the lower end. Let’s just say that LD1 is 18 feet tall. Now you remove it. What was once the lower end of Pool 1 drops 18 feet to meet the level of upper Pool 2. But maybe it doesn’t drop 18 feet, maybe it only drops 15 feet because there is enough boulders covered in sediment right now that the boulders are holding water back much like a dam is intended to do. Pool 2 hasn’t really changed, but a new habitat was introduced and connectivity to another 6 miles of river has been opened up. By the time all the sediment flushed out of what is now Pool 1, it might be 6 miles of rapids.

As for the barge and truck traffic…the barge traffic through LD1 has already ceased…completely. So we are already a couple years into trucks replacing barges in this area. If a barge went upstream through LD1, it went through both Lower and Upper St Anthony Falls locks to get to their destination. Now that the Upper St Anthony Falls Lock is permanently closed, there is little justification to maintain the expense of maintaining and operating navigational locks and dams without significant commercial traffic. These locks were put in to move commercial product, not to move kayaks and fishing boats up and down the river. Again, I’m no hydrologist, but I don’t think removing one or all three of those dams (LD1, LSAF, USAF) would have any negative impact on commercial barge traffic that still travels up and down the Minnesota River.

People have been talking about restoring the gorge and rapids for 20+ years. Removing those dams is more about uncovering what the water and sediment is hiding because it is impounded. I’m not advocating keeping or removing the dams. I’m just trying to address the question of sturgeon and paddlefish habitat and what would likely occur if one or more dams were removed. My job is to work with the conditions I am presented with, and I have to cooperatively work with the USACE. I’m not going to look those people in the face and tell them they should lose their job or go work somewhere else.

Joel

Removing Ford Dam (LD1) would be a big help to restoring spawning habitat for lake sturgeon and paddlefish. It would restore large rock and fast water that lake sturgeon prefer for spawning. Gravel bars would also likely be restored, which is what paddlefish need. The rest of Pool 2 would be relatively unchanged. The big change would be to Pool 1. Water levels in Pool 1 would drop, current would be faster, habitat would be more coarse, and would benefit a large number of river species. Pool 1 as it is right now is beneficial to common carp. Yes there are other fish there, but given the lack of fishing pressure in Pool 1, you might think it was a hidden gem because accessibility is terrible. I am continually unimpressed with the fish population as a whole in Pool 1.

While the habitat would be restored, that doesn’t necessarily mean the fish would return to spawn there. Pool 2 is relatively devoid of lake sturgeon. I have worked on Pool 2 since 2008. I have seen one lake sturgeon. One. In 2015. I put a transmitter in that fish, and in less than 3 weeks, it was in the St Croix and has not been back since. That fish likely originated from the St Croix, it went for a little swim and got past Lock & Dam #2 (no small feat), and we happened to get our hands on it while it was on its way back home. We have implanted 47 lake sturgeon with transmitters between the St Croix, Pool 4, and the one in Pool 2. Some haven’t been at large for very long and most were immature, so things could change, but I have only seen one lake sturgeon swim as far as the Ford Dam. It went there in July and was probably a juvenile, so it wasn’t there on a spawning run. After it bonked its head on the Ford Dam, it went downstream a few miles and took off at least 25 miles up the Minnesota River for about 2 weeks then went back to the St Croix. So if the lake sturgeon spawning habitat is restored in Pool 1/Pool 2, the lake sturgeon would need to get past LD2 in Hastings first. That dam is one of the hardest for fish to pass (only LD5 may be harder to pass). Yes fish can lock through, but they are not drawn to a lock. They are drawn to flow and the dam gates. If the water is high enough, the gates are out of the water and velocity through the gates is reduced, making it easier for fish to pass.

Paddlefish are a different story. There appears to be a resident population of paddlefish in the Minnesota River, and they will utilize the Mississippi as well. We have seen transmitter paddlefish swimming laps, going as far as 200 miles up the Minnesota River, and exploring a good portion, if not all of Pool 2. Again, not very many years of data, but we have seen 5 transmitter paddlefish show up below Ford Dam and I have seen other paddlefish below the dam in the summer. None of those observations appear to be for spawning purposes (maybe one in mid-May). That movement is more summer travels. Those transmitter fish were implanted in different areas, one in the Minnesota River, two in Pool 2, one in Pool 3, and one in Pool 4. So at least two of them passed LD2 to get up to the Ford Dam. Given a good number of paddlefish end up below LD2 in the spring (15 paddlefish transmitters there in spring of 2018) and the low number that pass into Pool 2 (2 transmitters in 2018, one in spring one in summer), just reinforces the fact that LD2 is hard to pass (and we don’t really know if they have a desire to pass, we assume they would pass if it was easier, but it is possible that is their final destination, but I think they are making due with the situation). Since there appears to be a paddlefish population above LD2, removal of the Ford Dam could be beneficial to paddlefish providing more spawning habitat. I don’t think the paddlefish that are currently in the Minnesota River/Pool 2 are just coming from downstream. I think they are maintaining their population, probably spawning in the Minnesota River.

Shovelnose sturgeon are similar to paddlefish in that there is a resident population in the Minnesota River. They don’t appear to travel as much as paddlefish though. I have seen one shovelnose sturgeon in Pool 2 in 10 years. It was close to the Minnesota River confluence and would have been a state record by about a pound. I haven’t seen a shovelnose in Pool 2 since the telemetry project started, but my counterpart in Hutchinson implanted a bunch and I have yet to see them in the metro. Shovelnose start showing up again in Pool 3, below LD2 in Hastings. I’m no shovelnose expert, but they seem to prefer faster water with sand and gravel bottoms. Removing the Ford Dam would create that and shovelnose would likely move in if they ever moved far enough to find it.

I know that is a really long winded answer. The short take home message is yes, removing the Ford Dam would improve the habitat for sturgeon and paddlefish. I think paddlefish would take advantage of it for spawning before sturgeon would because there is an established population that would find it. Sturgeon would find it eventually, but LD2 would be the barrier slowing down Pool 2/Minnesota River recovery, at least for lake sturgeon. Other dams are not near the barrier that LD2 is. LD3 in Red Wing, it’s a sieve. We’ve had all kinds of transmitter fish pass that dam. Walleye, flathead catfish, muskellunge, white bass, and almost 40% of our lake sturgeon and paddlefish have been documented passing that dam.

Joel

I will try to answer these questions as best as I can.

We didn’t sterilize the fish for two reasons.
1. It is an incredibly involved effort to sterilize an adult bighead carp. The U of MN brought in a vet to work on invasive carp and after removing the gonads in an extensive surgical process, the darn thing grew the gonads back.
2. If it was even possible to sterilize the fish, there is the question of whether or not a sterile fish behaves the same as a fertile fish. Know thy enemy. Don’t know thy modified enemy.

We also discussed partnering with USGS and stocking triploid (sterile) invasive carp and tracking them (has been done on grass carp for years, recently developed for bighead and silver carp). However, some people (and this extends beyond the MNDNR) did not like the idea of stocking them, even if they were sterile. Also, see #2 above.

We stand to learn a great deal from this fish. Our permit is limited to implanting two fish at a time simply because it is a starting point. I wanted to do this four years ago but we had to convince some people it was necessary. When we finally did that, turned out it was illegal for even us to release them. We will track this fish, learn about it’s preferred habitat, and target it for recapture, which could very likely lead us to more (which will be REMOVED). We have a handful of spots where we have captured these things, so we know we can go back to those spots (and we do) time and time again to try and catch more. We have no idea if the areas where we have caught them in the past are actually important and preferred habitats, or if we just happen to catch them because that is where our efforts are focused.

Last thing. Releasing one or two fish will not doom us all to them suddenly spawning. There are more fish out there, and those are the ones we want to find. This fish will lead us to them. We have been seeing bighead carp in the St Croix since 2003 and they have yet to have sufficient numbers of fish up here to successfully spawn and recruit a year class. It took a long time for them to have enough fish above Lock and Dam #19 to successfully spawn. We’ve got some time before that critical mass is reached, and we are going to do our best to prevent the invasive carp from ever hitting that critical mass.

That is all I can type out at the moment. We are headed out right now to go locate it again.

Joel

FYI, the pic from the story on KSTP.com are not fish from this haul. That is an AP photo of a bighead carp and grass carp. The haul last week did catch one bighead carp and one silver carp, a photo of the latter was posted on the news release.

Joel

Yes, MNDNR is still actively tagging lake sturgeon. In fact there are three different area offices that are doing it (Hinckley, Lake City, and East Metro).

These numbers may not be exact, plus or minus a few fish for varying reasons, but since 2003, we have tagged 634 lake sturgeon in the lower St Croix River (below Taylors Falls). Between MNDNR and angler reports, there have been 243 recaptures. Quick and dirty math says that is a 38% recapture rate. However, some fish have been recaptured multiple times, sometimes as many as 5 or 6 times.

That is all I’ve got for now. Got to run.

Joel

Glad they made an effort to tell some anglers. Wish they would make an effort to tell me what is going on so my work isn’t affected.

Wish I could have been there to tag fish this year. If it is any consolation, we have put a few transmitters into flatheads this year and are going to be implanting a few more this Thursday up by LD1.

Joel

We’ll collect the white bass by any means necessary. Electrofishing, trap nets, short term gill nets, etc. The ones we tagged the other day were by-catch in a commercial fisherman’s seine haul.

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Oh I already know the spot, do not worry, I would NEVER EVER reveal the exact location of 43.675875,-92.974671

BUT JUST IN CASE THAT DOESNT SPAM OUT…

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Now that is funny right there.

We saw a few eels while sampling on Pool 2 this year and remember a few from the St Croix in a trap net in 2006. They are rare and definitely not worthy of being tossed on the bank.

Joel

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You guys really only found 1 flathead?

I would think going at night when the fish are up in the shallows would be a decent way to get bigger numbers.

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No, sorry, I thought you were just asking about that fish. We shocked up 27 flatheads and 6 channel cats yesterday. 20 of those fish were big enough to tag (minimum 9.8 inches to tag it). Biggest yesterday was a 30.7 inch flathead.

We can’t shock at night for flatheads. The settings we use on the shocker boat target flatheads exclusively and fish often come up behind the boat or as far as 100 yards away. And we probably miss half of the fish. We would never see those fish at night plus it would be a suicide mission with all the obstacles on the river.

Eventually I will take some video and post it about the chaos that ensues while shocking for flatheads. It’s an adventure.

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When I was writing that Joel, I thought about this and I wonder if you know or can give us an idea. I know there are a lot of variables like water temps and size of meal, but how long does it take a flathead to digest a meal? How about other species?

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I can’t answer that off the top of my head. It may only take a day or two in warm water. The information is out there about what percentage of body weight they eat per day (for various species), but I don’t have it at the moment.

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Are you able to release any of the data about the fish you tagged?

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Yes, but it’s not much data. That flathead was not weighed, was 24.4 inches long, and I did remove a spine from it for aging, but it won’t be aged until this winter. I’m guessing that walleye was at least 15 inches long. Was a pretty good sized meal. Based on the historic data from Pool 2, that flathead should have weighed 6.14 pounds based in its length.

Joel

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He will release him. In a few days in the form of fertilizer.

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That’s funny right there. You guys crack me up.

That is a question better answered by the West Metro crew in Shakopee. I don’t think they have plans at the moment, but maybe once they are fully staffed. They have been running with a small crew in that office so they haven’t had the resources to do much outside of core activities.

Unless they have been illegally introduced, there should be no flatheads about the Taylors Falls Dam. The falls/dam was and is a barrier to their upstream range.

Joel

That’s one of the drawbacks, but a minor one. You have to find the best position through a little bit of trial and error. I don’t think I have adjusted mine since I set it.

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Question – should we consider lake sturgeon to be ‘closed’ year round on the Minnesota? Would the DNR have to do studies of the population to determine if they were included in the fall season or C & R only? Just thought of this.

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Yes, lake sturgeon is closed on the Minnesota River. I’m not aware of any talk about opening it either. There are a fair number of shovelnose in the MN River, but lake sturgeon are pretty rare. The West Metro office would have the best information, but I don’t think they have much data on them.
I’ve been working on Pool 2 quite a bit since 2008 and have yet to see a single lake sturgeon, or shovelnose for that matter. Before any seasons would be opened in new waters, we would have to know something about the population, if they are resident or transient.
I have seen a few shovelnose in the St Croix, and that was noteworthy. They are pretty rare in the Croix for some reason.

Joel

I replaced my pole bow light with permanently mounted navigation lights, and mounted a tractor flood light to the top of the pole light. Had to drill a couple holes in the metal housing of the pole light and wired it so I just plug it in like a removable navigation light. I’ve rigged up two more to mount on the bow that will give me a little more distance with the lights I bought. Haven’t wired the base units yet though.
This is a very jimmy rigged way to do it. It is not without it’s flaws but has served me well when I actually can get out catfishing once or twice a year The advantage of using the navigation pole is the light gets above my stowed trolling motor.

Joel

I finally had time to look up the new language for the bait statute. It does not say catfish anywhere. Here is what was added to the statute and effective July 1, 2012.

(3) harvest of bullheads, goldeyes, mooneyes, sheepshead (freshwater drum), and
suckers for bait from streams or rivers designated as infested waters, by hook and line for
noncommercial personal use. Other provisions that apply to this clause are:
(i) fish taken under this clause must be used on the same body of water where caught
and while still on that water body;
(ii) fish taken under this clause may not be transported live from or off the water
body;
(iii) fish harvested under this clause may only be used in accordance with this section;
(iv) any other use of wild animals used for bait from infested waters is prohibited;
(v) fish taken under this clause must meet all other size restrictions and requirements
as established in rules; and
(vi) all species listed under this clause shall be included in the person’s daily limit as
established in rules, if applicable.

I had a link to what the language was, but I can’t find it at the moment. The proposed language I have saved from February did not say specifically for catfishing. Can probably find it on the MN Statute web site.

Joel

Here’s my best guess on the subject. I’m guessing it is forage related (gizzard shad). Seems unlikely that it would be fuel spill related since it had the smell, but no off taste. It’s not uncommon for fish to get off flavors or smells, and is quite common for people to complain about fish from rivers. I attribute most of that to gizzard shad. Gizzard shad can survive in cold water, but aren’t terribly excited about it. So they (especially smaller ones) may be having a hard time right now and the predators may be gorging themselves on weak and dying shad. Shad are VERY oily and if they are already dead, are starting to decay before a fish even picks it up for a meal. Those rotten decay gases could be contributing to a nasty smell. Mississippi River fish upstream of Coon Rapids Dam should not experience the same thing as shad are not established upstream of the dam.

If it smells funny but tastes fine, probably no big deal. Biggest thing for taste of freshwater fish is to cut off the fat and cut out the red meat. Those areas will concentrate off flavors. Soaking fish in milk is supposed to help with off flavors too. I can’t find a scientific answer to that, but it is something I do with most of my fish. Maybe someone should email Alton Brown to get the answer to that one. I use milk to wash my hands after handling hot peppers too.

Here is an interesting link about off flavors in fish. Looks like it doesn’t take much diesel fuel to produce off flavors in a lake or pond situation (1-2 gallons/10 acres).
https://srac.tamu.edu/index.cfm/event/getFactSheet/whichfactsheet/33/

Joel

Do you know how many people think Pool 2 is catch and release for ALL species because the water is contaminated? A lot. I had someone catch a tagged catfish and said they threw it back because you can’t keep them. After I told him what the regulation actually was, he said he wouldn’t have kept it anyways. But I don’t remember if it was a Pool 2 stigma or if he just didn’t actually eat catfish.

I like seeing the look on people’s faces when I tell them the catch and release reg on walleye etc has nothing to do with contaminants.

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Heres a question, Is it because the colder the waters have less plankton, beings thier plankton eaters? So that water doesen’t support a large population, just wondering.

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It’s possible they haven’t gotten here sooner because of the growing seasons here. But paddlefish can do it. Paddlefish have been on the decline in this state for years, but it is not because of the lack of food, it is because of the lock and dam system and changing habitat. Metabolism slows down quite a bit in winter and they eat enough to survive. That’s the nice thing about rivers, food is always coming downstream. Zooplankton doesn’t cease to exist in winter months, so if paddlefish can do it, so can Asian carp.

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Does this barrier effect both channels and flats?

I have one other question.

Why aren’t they here already in numbers? A person would think they would be constantly moving up stream for spawning reasons if nothing else.

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I sat in on a presentation by a company rep who makes these things and they made no differentiation between species of catfish. I don’t have the specifics, but I did write down in my notes that they reported “catfish.”

Could be a few reasons they may not be here in huge numbers yet. Keep in mind, this is me guessing as I haven’t researched these ideas. They are some educated guesses.

If things are good where they are, why would they leave? I don’t know if they have any homing tendencies, but if you’re a planktivore and life is good, don’t make any changes.

They grow fast, and I’m wondering if they are stonger swimmers and more adventurous when they are a little smaller. Once they get big, they have to expend a lot of energy pushing their bigger bodies through the current. They might be attracted to the current at the dam for spawning, avoid the lock more or less, spawn, then the eggs drift downstream and hatch and that hatch has to come back upstream again.

Maybe they have a homing preference to spawn where they were spawned. Only the ones that don’t migrate back to where they hatched would be the ones that would be expanding the population upstream. Totally a guess, but it sounds good doesn’t it?

Joel

Thought I would break down some contaminant stuff from fish I collected on the St Croix in 2009 just to show how goofy it can be sometimes. Note, these are not flatheads, but channel cats. Another note, don’t assume all sizes of fish are tested. The fish that are tested are what we catch when sampling and the recommendations are based on AVERAGES.

These four fish were all north of Stillwater.
15.5″ channel cat, 0.087 PPM Mercury, 5-years-old.
16.2″ channel cat, 0.184 PPM Mercury, 6-years-old.
19.6″ channel cat, 0.119 PPM Mercury, 7-years-old.
26.1″ channel cat, 0.149 PPM Mercury, 10-years-old.

As for PCB’s, they collect in the fattiest part of the fish so it’s best to trim away the fat…and the belly meat, to reduce PCB exposure. There is no way to trim away mercury as it distributes throughout the meat.

From 4 fish between Prescott and Stillwater.
16.1″ channel cat, 0.027 PPM PCB.
16.5″ channel cat, 0.082 PPM PCB.
21.1″ channel cat, 0.134 PPM PCB.
21.7″ channel cat, 0.086 PPM PCB.

From 2 fish from Stillwater to Taylors Falls.
21.2″ channel cat, 0.025 PPM PCB.
26.1″ channel cat, 0.281 PPM PCB.

Last year I had a 42.4″ flathead that died during sampling on Pool 2. I had it tested for contaminants so it wouldn’t go to waste. It had the highest mercury content ever recorded for Pool 2, but was below mercury levels that are commonly seen up in northern lakes. That fish had 0.946 PPM Mercury and 0.155 PPM PCB, and it was 18-years-old. That level of mercury contamination would put that fish in the 1 meal per month category from the MN Dept of Health (and 1 meal per week for PCB levels).

Fun stuff huh.

Joel

Maybe I’ll mention a few things about this subject. I’ll try to keep it to facts as much as possible and leave my opinion out of it. So take it for what it is worth and read nothing more into it.

1. Asian carp are already being targeted by commercial fisherman farther south. As I was told, they can’t even satisfy the current global market they are shipping to. Plus, since they are shipping fish around the world, they run into the occasional political issues, like tariffs, that hurt the market.

2. Those fish that aren’t used for food are used as fertilizer, fish/pet food, etc.

3. The part of the sonic bubbler that affects catfish the most is the sonic part. Basically, they choose a frequency that deters the target species the most. Just so happens that catfish overlap in that frequency range. When it comes to trying to prevent Asian carp from passing a point in a river, catfish will likely lose that battle. We don’t know if passage for catfish in the Prescott area is critical, but our educated guess is no, it is not, and catfish will be just fine not being able to pass through the Prescott narrows.

4. This type of barrier has never been used in this large of a scale.

5. The certainties of life are death, taxes, and no barrier is 100% effective.

6. Asian carp have been swimming upstream for 30-40 years. Everyone should have known this was coming. I saw a 30 pound bighead carp for the first time in Indiana in 1998 and had never heard of them.

I’ll leave it at that.

Joel

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It’s all hot air until someone actually gets a ticket, fined, and convicted. for the infractions we are talking about.

You never know what kind of CO/Sheriff you are going to run into on any given day. Heck who’d a thunk that you could get a written warning for sitting on a 12″ wide 30″ high gunnel at idle speed going through a no wake zone.

Yep you can.

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Darren, that really sucks.