Too much pressure!?!

[fishin4sum]

Dude, in those hours incidental mortality rates are also formulated. And by total hours fished their formulas helps to determine number of fish caught per hour. It is not perfect for Upper Red but not everyone on every lake always catches their limit. It is more of an indicator of how many fish are getting pulled out of the water. A rough number of fish kept, and incidental kill rates can then be developed. How else can they justify their logic for raising or lowering daily limits?

[bturck]

This thread was originally began as an influx of ideas reagarding the current situatiin. I feel that some positives have definitley been derived from the converstions here,

here is something that I started to think about last night: a Red Lake walleye stamp predicated to Red Lake only and mandated to fish the lake. Lets just say for sake of argument and numbers that in order to fish the lake your acces fee wold include this stamp at $10. You could also if you intend to spend more that one trip in the lake have a season stamp for lets say $100 to include multiple trips as many of us make. This stamp would need to be part of your license if checked by a CO. i can see this more in a favorable scenario than singling out house users, outfitters ets. the cost would br assumed by those of us who utilize the resource. The money taken in could be used for stocking, reclamation projects etc

4

I believe the DNR and advisory groups would still have to a very proactive group in determing catch results and limits. Its basically a use tax i know but personally iw ould be in favor of something like this. with the money I have inequipment 4 1/2 hr drive gas, food minnow cost a rental this would in no way be a deal breaker. I'm sure there will be some negative reponses here and that great, the thread was started with idea of hearing "WHAT IF". so i take no offense at someone who thinks i'm carzy.

looking at the numbers last night that Kelly posted, it didn' t take long to see what is happening. WE CAANOT allow this great resource to crash once agai. Have a great day everybody...Turck OUT

[magnum mike]

Your stamp idea has merit but I can't believe the funds generated from something like this would be used for the intended purpose. Just sayin'...

[Getanet]

I don't think you're crazy, but I would have some concerns about a use-fee such as you propose. Namely:

* What about guys who aren't targeting walleyes? Do they still have to pay the fee? If not, how do they go about proving what they were fishing for?

* More importantly, on an isolated lake I could see this being financially and logistically feasible. But how long before that idea caught on and many other public lakes required a fee to fish it? The costs would add up pretty quickly for people who fish a lot.

Generally speaking I don't like the idea of restricting access to public resources. However, if resorts on Red had a separate "tip bucket" that went toward stocking efforts it would be surprising how much could be collected.

[Jmlsmp]

i like red lake better when it was a crappie lake. Th re has been to many restrictions and issues since the walleyes have been back

[crestliner61]

First off....the original question. "What are some solutions to relieve the pressure?" Very tuff question.

Maybe shorten the season on the lake, both for open water and ice fishing?

This is probably not a good solution for the folks trying to make a living on the lake, but maybe just charge a higher rate for the periods that you are aloud to go out and fish?

I don't know...there are over 4 million people in this state, plus all the people that come from other states. All the talk and hype of how great the fishing is on sites like this....there just going come and try and have the experience.

I personally have only fished the lake 4 times in my life. Three of them were the last 3 winters (once each) and I can say if it were not for the information of what I get of this site and another, I may have never gone there. Oh, was up the end of November and it was "one" of the best walleye trips I have ever had.

I have been going up to the Rainy River for over 20 years and of all those times driving by when the crappie boom was happening, never did stop to try it out. When I finally did (towards the tail end of it), got skunked.

Don't have a sure fire solution....but maybe it is for everyone to keep their mouth shut on how good the bite is?

[fishing tech]

I would be for a stamp to fish URL. If the money went for stocking and a fulltime CO assigned to URL only. $10/stamp and make it good for a year or 1 for boat fishing 1 for winter fishing. The stamp would be good to fish the lake, any species.

[crestliner61]

Here's a post from another site.....to me this is what fuels the pressure.

"Went out this past weekend. Fished 15 FOW. Bite was GREAT at dawn and dusk. Day bite was slow. Caught and ate limits everyday. Came home with our limits too. Nothing we did outperformed anything else. We got them on rattle reels, jigging, and dead sticking. One particular jig did out perform the rest though.

We had 16 guys in a group and all fished relatively close to each other. We ended up with around 205 walleyes over 3 days. Everyone went home with their 3 fish. We also saw a lot of younger class fish. Which means that the lake it pretty healthy."

So, who would not want to experience this that is a avid fishing person? C&R or not?

[InTheSchool]

So far we have:

Reduce the limit of walleyes year round.

Ban eating of fish on the lake.

Limit the number of fishermen through limited access.

Ask the Red Lake Band for some of their quota.

C & R only, in December.

Continue the way we are with DNR adjusting limit and slot as needed.

Annual stocking of the lake.

State/stamp user fee.

Shorten seasons.

Everyone needs to stop being so greedy!

[dj2quick35]

I am originally from WA state and when i look at there non-resident fee compared to ours, i think that we could raise ours up to that $90-100 range and generate income from there. I also grew up having to buy salmon stamps, steelhead stamps, sturgeon stamps (endorsements) if we wanted to fish for any of those fish on the Columbia River Basin and then you had to turn in catch cards after you caught one. Now i know that walleye and those fish are not the same, but the state has raised about $2.3 million in revenue since 2011 and that money was used for fisheries and other programs to increase the fish population.

Being from out of state and having to pay extra fees to fish certain waters.....i would have no issues paying for a stamp to fish upper red and i live 7 hours away and make maybe 2 or 3trips there a year. Anything to keep it a walleye producing lake so one day i can take my 3 month old son there to fish the lake and enjoy what it has to offer.

[cookie129]

As the crappie boom slowed down fishermen got exposed to the greatest walleye fishing in there life's. The crappie boom really put upper red lake back on the map. Some even got to experience the greatest crappie fishing in there life. Man the stories that can be told and Fun! Fun! Fun!

A lot of them fishermen now have wheel houses and choose upper red lake to fish on. I have 4 houses and are not even close to being rented everyday. They come in droves on weekends to have a good time and maybe have the best fishing of there life's. If the dnr figures two fish will help reduce the take to a safe level all the power to them.

[Red Lake Remote]

I see a lot of posts directed towards generating funds, charging outfitters or anglers to create funds and even stamps as a money maker. The general census is to use these funds towards stocking, essentially turning the Red Lakes into a "put and take lake" similar to smaller waters.

As a member of several of the the committees/boards that work with this and one of the directors of the Upper Red Lake Area Association I can assure you stocking to fill the harvest void is not the answer. You simply can not stock enough fish to keep up with harvest levels. Early attempts to stock fish to compete with natural mortality (birds/bigger fish/ bad water etc) was a long shot. The oiginal stocking efforts where an attempt to simply get them started during what we thought could be a 15-20 year walleye fishing closure, similar to the little pony motors that would start the giant diesel engine back in the day. We were looking for a spark, mostly a spark of hope during the first walleye crash. Luckily the lake healed itself in about ten years mostly from natural reproduction and ten years of CLOSED fishing, with no walleye angling pressure. A lake of this size with such an incredible biomass must be self-sufficient in its own spawning stock, we as humans simply cannot create that much nature, but we sure can kill it off quick.

My take on this is simply too much pressure. Perfect weather conditions for the rapidly growing wheelhouse and day trip boats numbers are killing the lake off. I am sure I am going to be roasted, hate mailed and receive all kinds negativity for saying it, but I am still going to say it. Wheelhouse numbers and day trip boats that do not lodge are the big harvest generators, with the wheelhouse visit from 24-40 hours in the lead by a long ways. Yes, some harvest does come from rentals and guides such as myself but that number has actually stayed very stable as many outfitters downsized or now run smaller operations offering 4-6 houses. I also know of 7 decent sized outfitters that have either folded up, retired or moved onto other ventures the last five years. Outfitters, portables and the open ice day trippers take their share but when you look at the numbers and the cold hard facts wheelhouse popularity, day trip boaters and weather conditions are the big players in this game.

Now take those factors and remove the number one hindrance to ice anglers, the snow, you now have a walleye harvesting monster on the loose. I have never seen the acres of lake chewed up so fast before. My operation basically sticks within a mile of shore. But the pressure steamrolling across the lake has me trapped. I have already hit what I feel is my outer limit of where I can go as three south shore outfitters have plowed 9-10 miles across the lake keeping me from going south or west. Another south shore operation just south and slightly east of them that is actually butted up against the a east shore operation has that window blocked while also pushing the eastern shore guys north. This is causing a domino effect that has the operation to the east of me now moving houses and roads west to the east and south-east of me with their wheelhouse traffic spilling into my track trails and getting stuck on a daily basis seven miles from their access. I find myself sitting on the extreme north shore trapped in a little 3/4 mile circle from about half of the outfits on the lake. Watching the crowds rolling across towards me for the first time ever I get a sick feeling in my stomach wondering about the future of the lake...again. I have never seen pressure like this and never thought I would see the majority of the south shore push across to the north shore in search of acres. When I talk to the road operators about the move they all say the same thing "Sorry, but the crowds burned up everything behind us we had to keep going." That statement I find the scariest of all as it is mid-January and we have run out of ice already.

My thoughts on what to do? We can not stop people, boats and wheelhouses from coming to the lake, we can not make the weather do what we want and most of all we can not quickly fix the lake if we break it. BUT we can reduce the harvest numbers, pressure and the popularity of the lake by reducing legal take to maintain a balance. So we have reduced to two fish for now I would not be surprised if it goes even lower or ends up as a catch and release scenario until popularity/pressure levels out. I have never seen such unprecedented pressure on the lake and as much as it will hurt my business I agree we need to do what we have to and slow things down before we derail the entire train...again.

[fishin4sum]

Well said! Reduce the limit to one or none. Only way the fishing pressure is going to be reduced. A lot cheaper to go to grocery store and purchase some canadien walleye fillets at market price than to spend thousands of dollars on fishing gear and bring home a few fish. Also the incidental mortality rate seems to get lost on this thread. You may be tossing them back down the hole but i guarentee you 100% of those fish are not surviving. That incidental mortality rate is higher than the 3 fish limit people are allowed to take home. Gonna be a lot of dead fish on the shores of the lake this spring.

[jriegel]

Seems like alot of sour grapes the north shore guys have against the south shore guys. I find it funny how you contradict yourself in the same paragraph.

Yes, some harvest does come from rentals and guides such as myself but that number has actually stayed very stable as many outfitters downsized or now run smaller operations offering 4-6 houses.

And then at the same time:

have never seen pressure like this and never thought I would see the majority of the south shore push across to the north shore in search of acres. When I talk to the road operators about the move they all say the same thing "Sorry, but the crowds burned up everything behind us we had to keep going."

Is there a study that says stocking can't help it did the first time in 3 attempts. Red Lake is nothing more then a giant rearing pond. how could it hurt to have supplemental stocking along with natural reproduction? It is a put and take fishery because it is not hard to fish. If we got ahead of it with supplemental stocking on years of high harvest and keep it at two fish harvest always we would not have a problem. I don't understand why people need to take home more then 2 fish. A 20 inch fish fed me, my wife, and daughter, the other night, not caught on Red. Greediness is the biggest downfall of the lake and some of the resort owners are the biggest culprits, and with one huge snow storm they will get there payback.

Lots of random thoughts there

[BLACKJACK]

As the crappie boom slowed down fishermen got exposed to the greatest walleye fishing in there life's. The crappie boom really put upper red lake back on the map. Some even got to experience the greatest crappie fishing in there life. Man the stories that can be told and Fun! Fun! Fun!

The crappie boom is what first drew me to Red and I've been coming back 2-3 a year ever since, both on the ice and open water. Oh lord was the crappie fishing fun!! I sat off of Hudaks and caught big crappies on 14 straight casts!! When the crappies started getting scarce and we started catching these 6-8 inch walleyes we called them 'rough fish'. Now its one of the best walleye fisheries around. What really makes it special is that even a very average fisherman like me can catch walleyes. And thats part of the problem.

Some random thoughts after reading thru all the posts:

I'm a little PO'ed at the DNR, they saw the good early ice, the good bite, the crowds, they had the 'over catch' pounds from last year hanging over their heads, why wasn't the limit shut down sooner?? Water over the dam at this point but now its going to be painful.

I'd agree on a 'Red Lake stamp' of $10-20 -- if it would help in some way. Thats small change compared to all the other costs of a trip to Red, gear, etc.

I don't think cutting the limit from 3 to 2 is going to make that much of a difference. One adult can't eat 6 fillets anyway, after the first meal on the ice, you'll have to cut back on keeping, then throw in a couple of kid limits, you're still going to catch, eat, and keep about the same number of walleyes.

My solution is lets solve the problem right now, total C&R starting Feb 1, the outfitters would lose some bookings but would survive until next year, total C&R on open water, no outfitters would be hurt and the guides would have to goto other lakes or promote the big pike fishing, then see where the poundage is in Nov 2015. Set the limit where it needs to be, 1 or no more than 2, outfitters would get there bookings, and the reduced limit would discourage some fisherman.

Painful but necessary.

[jriegel]

My solution is lets solve the problem right now, total C&R starting Feb 1, the outfitters would lose some bookings but would survive until next year, total C&R on open water, no outfitters would be hurt and the guides would have to goto other lakes or promote the big pike fishing, then see where the poundage is in Nov 2015. Set the limit where it needs to be, 1 or no more than 2, outfitters would get there bookings, and the reduced limit would discourage some fisherman.

Painful but necessary.

I agree solve it before it goes too far

[laker1]

Cutting the limit to 2 instead of 3 will do more maybe from people driving a long ways to fish here. Now they won't come.

[Ringbill]

The easiest and cheapest thing that can be done is limit the take. Even if more money is raised for stocking via stamp(tax) there are not that many walleyes available. There are only x amount walleyes produced a year and those fish are distributed throughout the area. Can more be produced? Maybe, It just isn't available today. We went through this on Leech a few years back and literally the check book was open.

The fact of the matter is I don't really spend anytime on Red. Its too busy and there are a lot of lakes with beautiful limits of walleyes in them.

[walleye34]

Red Lake remote, your last post, in the 3rd paragraph about wheelhouse and daytrippers are killing the lake. you are probably 100% correct. But you guys hold the keys to that. Boats maybe not so much with a public landing but I don't know a single spot a guy could safely get out with a wheelhouse without going through a resort and paying $10-$15/day. The assocation you have up there could very easily make a huge impact, limit road passes given out but when money is to be had everybody is going to go full throttle. I believe 1 resort is trying it this year,limiting passes. Resorts are pushing all over the lake, why, to sell more road passes, to be the resort who gets customers on the hot bite. It does not take long for word to get out anymore about poor fishing out of resort "x" and the traffic slows down. I am not trying to blame you guys, we are all to blame for the pressure but the resorts hold the keys to the future with a real quick fix that nobody can do anything about. no laws need to be passed, no DNR meeting, nothing. Simply limit road passes given out, if we had snow this year they would have had to, you could not plow roads, and spots fast enough with the traffic on that lake this year MN DOT could not have kept up if we had snow. But that's the problem, that involves giving up some money. I think I have seen some posts about estimating 2000+ wheelhouses on the lake. Thats is $20k daily in road pass fees alone at $10/day.

[rainbow dave]

How about this

1.NO ELECTRONIC FISH LOCATING DEVICES ALLOWED ON THE LAKE!! CELL PHONE, GPS ONLY.IF CAUGHT 1000.00 FINE AND CONFISCATED

2.BARBLESS SINGLE HOOKS ONLY,NO TREBLES. IF CAUGHT HAVING ANYTHING ELSE ON THE LAKE $500.00 FINE.

3.NO FISH CONSUMED ON THE LAKE. 500.00 FINE

4. IF CAUGHT WITH OVER LIMIT,CONFISCATE ENTIRE RIG,PLUS FINE 250.00/FISH

[laker1]

The lake has all the small fish it can handle,we fishermen just got to let them grow up. Stocking would be a waste of time and effort.

To reach a pound fish are about 4 years old.

The walleye brain size hasn't changed but are equipment,mobility,and electronics keeps getting better. The only thing that can be done is regulations,like it or not.

[bturck]

Question for Kelly or Jonny. What is the reservations people take on the situation? Granted they are not over their harvest, but the over all picture still has to have implications for the entire system

[traveler]

All that's needed to stop the slaughter is more pressure ridges.

take my word for it...

Jonny, sorry there's no "remote" out there this year, tough year to start your new venture, hang in there.

Might well need to go C&R, or at least keep the limit at 2, or even drop it to 1, at least till we even out the scales a bit. It's probably the only practical solution.

[zero]

Mother nature my have a say in this, next year could bring more snow and wind. the neighbors that own the rest of the lake may have tough netting season, just because you put a net down doesn't mean you will catch them.but if the lake has two or three bad year classes in a row things could get really tight.

[Red Lake Remote]

Seems like alot of sour grapes the north shore guys have against the south shore guys. I find it funny how you contradict yourself in the same paragraph.

Yes, some harvest does come from rentals and guides such as myself but that number has actually stayed very stable as many outfitters downsized or now run smaller operations offering 4-6 houses.

And then at the same time:

have never seen pressure like this and never thought I would see the majority of the south shore push across to the north shore in search of acres. When I talk to the road operators about the move they all say the same thing "Sorry, but the crowds burned up everything behind us we had to keep going."

The pressure forcing road operators to keep pushing further across the lake is the high wheelhouses numbers. Rental houses have not grown in numbers very much in the last few years, wheelhouses have.

I can see how that may have been misunderstood. I did not explain the point very well.

Also to clarify in response to a couple posts that I am benefiting from wheelhouses, I do not allow wheelhouses out of my access nor do I plow roads. I am maxed out at 16 anglers a day. Anglers are hauled in track transports to and from the 4 rental houses. The system/plan was actually developed to try and escape some of the pressure on the lake while keeping things small, simple and efficient.

Another posts asked about the opinion of Red Lake Nation, well I can not answer for that but I do know they have followed their part of the agreement to the T. We the state anglers are the ones that keep going over harvest numbers and breaching points of the MOU agreement.

[Red Lake Remote]

I'm a little PO'ed at the DNR, they saw the good early ice, the good bite, the crowds, they had the 'over catch' pounds from last year hanging over their heads, why wasn't the limit shut down sooner?? Water over the dam at this point but now its going to be painful.

It normally takes six weeks to make an emergency regulation change, in this last case the commissioner and other high ranking political officials were able to push it through as fast as they could as they knew it was a bad situation.

Plus they can not make a reduction or shutdown things on a hunch or prediction fishing will be good, it has to be on paper to make it work. Everybody involved is trying to find the best balance possible. If the reduced limit was implemented and we had a low harvest year the complaints would come from the other direction.

[kelly-p]

Quote:

The walleye brain size hasn't changed but are equipment,mobility,and electronics keeps getting better. The only thing that can be done is regulations,like it or not.

Well said. Plus the lake has been pounded from shoreline to shoreline and out to the "Line".

Quote:

Question for Kelly or Jonny. What is the reservations people take on the situation? Granted they are not over their harvest, but the over all picture still has to have implications for the entire system

I do not know. The Band has stayed under the top of their Safe Harvest while we have greatly exceeded ours in 2014 and could be on pace to exceed it again in 2015. Can you imagine the outcry and finger pointing from sportfishermen if the situation was reversed?

Quote:

Mother nature my have a say in this, next year could bring more snow and wind.

I was thinking about that also but then I remembered that last winter was one of the worst I can remember as far as bad ice, deep snow and slush and we still went over our Safe Harvest by 63,000 pounds.

Quote:

the neighbors that own the rest of the lake may have tough netting season,

They are not the ones going over their Safe Harvest. We (Sportfishermen) are the ones harvesting too many walleyes and are in real danger of violating the Agreement.

Quote:

Might well need to go C&R, or at least keep the limit at 2, or even drop it to 1, at least till we even out the scales a bit. It's probably the only practical solution.

Good to see you posting traveler. We've missed your humor.

Tough year on our vehicles. My jeep blew the engine and one plow truck blew the tranny. So much for smaller repair bills when I'm not working on the lake as much. Your Jeep,,,,,,,

[birchbranch]

I am quite sure wheelhouses and public access fisherman are much less ethical than resort denizens. Please allow me to throw the talk flag. This reeks of local people assuming they have more rights to public water than others.

[Bureaucrat]

I tried reading through this whole thread. I kept running into the same ideas. What's at play here is what is at play across the whole state with every resource. The fact of the matter is, times have changed, and the horror stories we were warned about in gun training ten and twenty years ago are here.

It's time to simply reduce limits statewide. How many lakes have to get discovered and subsequently crushed into oblivion for ten years before we realize that yesterday's regs don't work today? If there were better managed harvests statewide, fishermen wouldn't have to congregate in one spot because everything else has gone to dump.

If Red is fished into collapse again, I say leave it in collapse. Let it evolve into what it'll be. This nonsense of leaving the gate wide open and keeping an eye on how close we get to collapse is plain silliness.

Sportsmen and the DNR need to view the resources for recreation, and not a substitute for the grocery store.

[Fishalittle]

I like this statewide reduction in limits concept. My father-in-law has been saying it for years now already. Take all the limits and cut them in half. (well pike might be a problem (1.5) but lets reduce everything.) Lots of people drive 5-8 hours to the "hot lake" because they want their kids to catch something when they fish.....not just stare at a bobber all day. Those that say it will hurt tourism and I can't feed my family on half a limit.....well then you will have to bring the family along and teach them how to fish....tourists-market to them that the fishing is great, not the harvest and they will come....if not then pressure is reduced! Resorts might have to make a few concessions in the overall plan as do the local sportsmen.

If we develop a problem of too many fish in a given lake we can regulate an increased harvest a lot easier than decreases in the public eye anyway.