Dead Lakes

[DEADhead]

recent O2 testing done on Tuesday revealed that these area lakes have little to no available oxygen for fish. Testing was done on several spots on the lake and surface and bottom readings were taken. That means there will be a very good chance of winterkill on these lakes if weather trends remain the same. Subsequently, poor fishing on these lakes right now, which can be confirmed by Peter and I.

Shell

Height of Land

Waboose

Tilde

I'll post the rest of the lakes on the list tomorrow when I return to work.

[Just2fish]

F-dog...Height of the Land?? I thought that one was going pretty good.

[mark n]

Is the DNR going to open up for liberal fishing?

Maybe they wont bite without H2o eh?

Tilde has typicaly been stocked frequently in the past, according to their reports, would you agree?

[Code-Man]

I want to post something just a quick note on this though...It might have Little/No oxygen but it might only be in a little area. I don't know if this is the case for sure but sometimes it's only in one bay or a shallow part of the lake which I hope is the case with some of the lakes.

[DEADhead]

While some of the lakes are localized with low oxygen, some are just plain dead. those lake have been starved since january. some from last summer due to algal blooms. the fish techs do a good job on trying to get a good assesment of a lake when O2 testing; they've been out testing every few weeks and have been testing different spots.

There has been some anticipation by Fisheries on several of these lakes to winterkill. Due to the relatively warm winters the past few years, many of the small lakes have not experienced a winterkill. While this may seem opposite of what many of you would think the DNR would want, it is actually quite the opposite. many of the small lakes and ponds are used for walleye rearing. Without a winterkill carry over fish from a previous year class prey on the newly stocked fry resulting in poor production. When large populations of carryover fish exist in a lake without a good winterkill, chemical piscicides like Rotenone need to be applied. They are expensive, and the DNR would prefer not to dump chemical in a lake. They use rotenone treatments as a last resort.

So the next obvious question is where are these rearing ponds? since I'm not involved in walleye stocking, I don't know which lakes they are using. I do know that the majority of these lakes are land locked with private land, resulting in no public access. This is done on purpose to keep pressure of the rearing pond. Even if you could get access to some of these rearing ponds, IMO I don't believe the fishing would be that good. Plus the majority of the carryover fish wouldn't be considered eaters...

[mark n]

Then I guess the answer is no

[fisherdog19]

These lakes Dead has mentioned are all shallow <20', and are killing throughout, especially those with no water running into them, its not just an isolated bay. HOL hase the ottertail river outlet that fish can migrate to, but most fish will not find it, so only a small percentage may survive. Shell and Waboose will most likely sustain the most damage as they don't have any type of outlet. There are other lakes such as Tamarack(Becker Cnty), and Rock, that may experience kills as well. I hope it's not to bad as HOL and Tamarack are two of my favorites. We'll just have to wait and see.

[kingr]

It seems like Waboose and HOL (waboose esp.) have these minor kills every 5 yrs or so...Just hope it's not as bad as Tamarac was back about 92 or 93....I think every state record was floating on shore

[DEADhead]

Here's the rest of the list:

Beseau

Ellison

Rock

Tamarack

Wolf

Fifteen

Sargent

Little Vanoose

Badger

Cross

Maple

Whitefish

[Skitterpop]

Is lake fifteen the one in Clay county just to the southeast of Lake Eleven?

[kingr]

Thanks for the info! I'm coming back to visit the folks and was heading to Waboose actually. Now I think I'm going to just stick with cotton. I'll let you know how it goes

[kingr]

When will they decide when they're going to get opened to promiscuous fishing?

[DEADhead]

Quote:

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Is lake fifteen the one in Clay county just to the southeast of Lake Eleven?

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Yep.

Quote:

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When will they decide when they're going to get opened to promiscuous fishing?

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I doubt that will happen. That's not a common management tool around here. Probably has something to do with enforcement, but I don't know.

[kingr]

Dead, for future reference can one find this information on the DNR website?

[DEADhead]

do you mean the O2 testing on lakes? If so, it is not posted on the DNR internet site. If there is a lake in question you can call the Area DNR Fisheries Office and ask if the particular lake has been tested that winter. They should be able to help you out from there.

If you're looking for the list of lakes open to liberalized fishing, it can be found here

[chart1444]

Is there any word on how Height Of Land lake made out?

I drove by it today and over half of it was open, didn't see any dead fish, but only looked from the road.

[DEADhead]

the technicians are going to test net HoL to see what the status of the fish kill is. They were waiting for ice out, but it may be a bit longer if the walleyes start coming in to spawn.

[fisherdog19]

I don't think it was too bad. I've fishied it a few times over the last week and haven't see any dead fish, but I have caught plenty of live ones.

[Dahitman44]

F-dog --

You $uck. I wish I could catch a live one.

[fisherdog19]

Hit, we got 16 1lb plus crappies today while fishing with Dead and a buddy of mine. Taking the boat out tomorrow if your off to chase some more slabs.

[DEADhead]

SLABOSAURUS!

F-dog tells no lie. there were many slabs caught today, and a few bobby bass and jumbos. The slabs only hit on the Exude curly tails. Yellow was key; size was 1" or 2".

Caught a couple bass on a white 1" tube, but no crappies. Check out the sponsor page for more info on the Exude plastics.

Good luck finding those slabs everyone!

[Dahitman44]

F-Dog --

R U kidding?

Now, you really $uck.

Is that on secret lake? Did you catch them from the shore?

How about you e-mail a Brother? No more pics of the gal next door either, that is kinda sick.

[Dahitman44]

So, DEAD -- Um ... yeah ... so ... Can I join your cult?

I'll even put on funny hats and milk the big females. Just take me to your slabs.

Wait a minute, that doesn't sound right.

[DEADhead]

F-dog and I got out again today, and pounded the slabs even harder than yesterday. We must have caught at least 40 1 lb plus crappies. YELLOW EXUDE 2" CURLY TAILS!!! Today, we had to tip with a fathead to get them to bite. 4-5 FOW. water temp 55 degrees. No, it was not on "secret" lake either.

slab-a-lab-a-ding-dong. Ice out crappie fishing at it's finest today!

[WigglinMyWorm]

Dead... were they suspended in 4-5 ft of water or were they in water that shallow??

[fisherdog19]

We were fishing in a shallow secluded bay that ranged from 1-6 ft. We found the fish on the wind blown side of the bay where the water was 9 degrees warmer in about 4 ft of water with the bobbers set 2 ft down. I can honestly say that today was one of the best days of crappie fishing I have had. I would say we caught closer to 50, of the 10 I cleaned, 2 were 11 inches and all the rest were over 12 with 3 reaching 13. Can you say slabzilla's?

[Dahitman44]

F-Dog --

Wow. That is awesome.

Can I be your friend?

I am going to try and get out this week, but it looks pretty busy.

[DEADhead]

I think many of the lakes listed in the first post here, survived winter kill. It was very close, but a strong wind at ice out really helped oxygenate the waters. Talked to a couple of Fish and Wildlife Wardens last week, and they did not see any dead fish on the lakes, nor did I on HoL.

[Havin' Fun]

That's good news as Shell and Rock lakes have really come around the last decade and offer outstanding fishing opportunities.

[Scenic]

How did Tamarack do?