"Jim tenHaaf" said:
[quote="swanezy"]What is up with that lake right now, are these fish just lethargic from the hot water temps and all the fronts that have been going through? Or is part of it their transition to deeper water..
The hot water temps wouldn't make them lethargic, it would make them even more of an eating machine! Being a cold blooded creature, their need to feed is higher than ever. I would chalk it up to unstable weather and high traffic.
Hot water increases their metabolism to a point, then it will actually put them into a near dormant state. When you say "eating machine" thatn invokes images of fish that can't stop eating. While that might be true with species that are eating zooplankton, muskies aren't feeding on fathead minnows.
Well… I'm not sure it should make you feel better, we haven't seen hot water yet this year. From what I've read the avoidance temp is generally 10 degrees above the prefered temperature. If the prefered temp range of muskies is 68-76 then 86 would be the avoidance temp. If they can't avoid that temp it will cause them to slow down to avoid death from stress.
"Will Schultz" said:
When you say "eating machine" thatn invokes images of fish that can't stop eating. While that might be true with species that are eating zooplankton, muskies aren't feeding on fathead minnows.
Trust me, I would never use that term outside of this forum, especially if I'm around walleye, bass, gill guys. [smilie=biggrin.gif]
"Will Schultz" said:
Well… I'm not sure it should make you feel better, we haven't seen hot water yet this year. From what I've read the avoidance temp is generally 10 degrees above the prefered temperature. If the prefered temp range of muskies is 68-76 then 86 would be the avoidance temp. If they can't avoid that temp it will cause them to slow down to avoid death from stress.
The lake that we were originally discussing though, is Murray, where there will always be water under 80 degrees. The cisco pods will move deeper in the water column as well with the muskies feeding deep too, right? Or am I full of hot air. 🙄
Deep is relative and dissolved oxygen (DO) will determine how deep they can go:
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Muskellunge don't tolerate low DO and will not live below the thermocline. Some species can handle being below the thermocline and hypoxia won't cause death/stress. Cisco are among those fish that can tolerate low DO for extended periods.
I have ran over schools of gills and crappies in low light and calm conditions, could hear them off the hull. I think this adds to the floaters along with the treatments. Also have seen other species of rough fish besides carp floating on the Titt chain in the past week and I think these parts of the chain were recently treated. Also like Hemi said, people like to keep some fish and then decide they don't have enough for a meal, and then feed them to the turtles and gulls, tards.
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