Sanford Muskies

Scrappy · Post by **Scrappy** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 8:54 am

Below is the text of a letter to the editor that I submitted that was printed in the Midland Daily News yesterday. I want to thank Pete Lebaron for his suggestions to my draft.

I am a lakefront property owner and avid musky fisherman. It has come to my attention that a number of trophy muskies (48 inches and over) have been harvested from Sanford Lake so far this season by spear fisherman. A fish of that size is a trophy in any sportsman's eyes and harvesting a musky over 42 inches is legal to licensed fisherman in the State of Michigan. I do not mean to suggest that legally harvesting these fish is in any way improper or necessarily unethical. Rather, I hope to set forth a few things that I'm hopeful open water/ice/spear fisherman will keep in mind before deciding whether to kill one of these noble creatures.
Muskies are an apex predator whose presence in any water body is quite limited on a fish per acre basis which is why they have become known as the fish of ten thousand casts. Adding to the natural scarcity of muskies present in Sanford Lake (or any of the other Tittabawassee chain of lakes) is the fact that the lake is not conducive to any real natural reproduction by muskies. Instead, Sanford Lake's musky population is reliant almost solely on stocking efforts by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (MDNR). Since the musky stocking program began on Sanford Lake decades ago, the lake has not received consistent stocking at the numbers recommended by the MDNR largely because of budget constraints and the inherent problems associated with raising musky stock at the MDNR's Wolf Lake Hatchery. For every fish taken out of Sanford Lake, that is one less fish we all have to enjoy on future fishing trips as there is no guaranty that the fish stocks will be replenished. In addition, even when adequate stocking occurs, it can take between 15 and 20 years for a musky to grow to trophy length. Most avid musky anglers practice catch and very careful release to help ensure that the mortality risk is kept to a minimum. I for one am grateful that musky fishing is available here in Midland Co. and I hope that will continue to be the case for the foreseeable future and for future generations. Until such time as the MDNR can more consistently stock muskies in Sanford, I urge sportsman to think twice before purposefully killing any muskies. For those that read this and believe that muskies need to be eradicated because they are damaging the other fish populations of the lake with their voracious appetites, I can tell you that nothing could be further from the truth. And, if you don’t believe me, I urge you to contact your local MDNR biologist or the Michigan Musky Alliance (www.michiganmuskiealliance.org) for information which dispels this widely believed myth.
Scott Scarpelli
Sanford

hemichemi · Post by **hemichemi** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 9:08 am

Kudos. I hope it does some good.

Duke · Post by **Duke** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 9:59 am

Scott- nice job on this and the Sanford Dam efforts!!! thank you

Steve S · Post by **Steve S** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 10:03 am

Scott, very nice letter. It will be interesting to see the replies.

hemichemi · Post by **hemichemi** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 10:49 am

http://www.ourmidland.com/opinion/lette ... e9e97.html

Zero comments so far.

Smada962 · Post by **Smada962** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 2:11 pm

Nice job. If even only 1 person reads this and takes it to heart it has done good. Thank you.

Kingfisher · Post by **Kingfisher** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 2:16 pm

Good letter. Mike and Michelle

Scrappy · Post by **Scrappy** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 3:01 pm

That was my hope that if my letter was read by one person and it gets him/her to think about this and become more educated, then I did my job. At the end of the day, we can not stop anyone from legally taking a musky no matter how painful that might be. However, we can all try to do our part to educate the masses one person at a time. My letter may ultimately do no good whatsoever but at least I tried to get the word out and get people thinking. We should all be proud of our role in MMA where we strive to educate every single day.

Esoxonthefly · Post by **Esoxonthefly** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 3:40 pm

Question, why isn't Sanford on the list of lakes where spearing is illegal? I was under the impression that stocked lakes weren't open to spearing.

Post by **Will Schultz** » Thu Feb 03, 2011 4:01 pm

Esoxonthefly wrote:Question, why isn't Sanford on the list of lakes where spearing is illegal? I was under the impression that stocked lakes weren't open to spearing.

Much of the stocked water is open to spearing.

Burglar34 · Post by **Burglar34** » Sun Feb 06, 2011 8:57 am

This is really unfortuate and hit close to home! With the water level down and hardly any fishing pressure since September it's probably like shooting fish in a barrel. To bad some kind of spearing ban couldn't be made due to the current conditions.

Hamilton Reef · Post by **Hamilton Reef** » Sun Feb 06, 2011 5:18 pm

Scott, Have you talked with or emailed your local outdoor writer Steve Griffin, griff22450@aol.com, to see what his views are or if he would write a article supporting your efforts to protect the Sanford muskie?

Scrappy · Post by **Scrappy** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 12:59 pm

I sent Griffin a copy and a friend of mine raised this with him. He did an article a number of years ago that the Dark House Association took offense to and he got a lot of heat about it as a result. Bottom line is Steve is gun shy to get in the middle of this.