Tuesday June 22, 2010
It was just before 3:00 am when the truck arrived at Tatman Launch. The fish were loaded Monday evening and then the drivers drove thru the night so that they could avoid hauling the fish during the heat of the day. Upon arriving at the launch, the driver set up a pump to begin the long process of tempering the water in the tanks with lake water. This process took nearly 2 hours, with temperature and dissolved oxygen checked periodically. The fish were in good condition from their journey, and were now getting used to Lake Raystown water. This picture was taken just after sunrise.
While waiting for the fish to be ready, our grower (Skip Bason) chats with board member Mark Sipes. Skip has many years of experience in capturing, spawning and growing Striped Bass. Mark has contributed much of his own money over the years to help the fishery at Raystown Lake. If you catch a nice striper in the lake, there is a good chance that it was put there by the efforts of these two individuals.
After the tank temperature is within a half a degree of the lake temperature, the stocking begins. The fish are transfered onto the waiting tanks on board pontoon boats via a pipe system that Denny Roth and Dave Rhodes put together. The truck has a 12 inch diameter outlet, which gets necked down to a 6 inch pipe as it enters the pontoon boat tanks.
This is a picture Eric McVicker took with his waterproof camera as the fingerlings are being flushed down the tube and into the tanks on the pontoon boats. It looks like a wet & wild ride for the little guys.
This is another view of our transfer setup. Denny Roth is making sure all the fish coming down the tube go where they are supposed to - in the tank. Each tank held about 250 gallons of water and roughly 35,000 fingerlings. Oxygen was used on board the pontoon boats as well.
Denny's 24' tri-toon proved very effective in hauling fish down the lake. With his 150 hp Yamaha he was able to achieve 23 mph fully loaded. Denny made three runs in all, placing fish in locations on the lake where we know alewives have been spawning. This is critical for the striped bass fingerlings so that they will have immediate access to alewife fry as a food source, a proven tactic by Virginia fisheries biologists in studies they conducted.
Now it's Charlie Meyers' turn to load fish onto his boat. Even though Charlie's boat is just a conventional 2 log pontoon, it did very well hauling a tank full of fish. The square tanks kept the weight well inside the boat, and were not prone to sloshing and shifting. Charlie made two runs, distributing fish in yet more places. This strategy was adopted from research done by biologists in which they learned that survival rates are higher if fish are distributed in the lake, rather than dumping them all in one location and overstripping the available food source.
This picture was taken on the Striper Dogs boat, as we cautiously pulled away from the dock. We had one of the older open tanks on board, with much of the weight at the front of the boat. The boat was leaning so heavily in the front that we had to get some weight in the back to balance things out. Mark Sipes is seen lamenting that he is only regarded as "ballast". Eric McVicker is seen to the left of Mark, and Mike Stoeffler (Arnolds Marine Service) is on the right.
This load was deposited halfway between MM18 and MM19. As we idled slowly in reverse, Mike pulled the stand pipe - allowing the fingerlings to flow into the lake. Mike observed that within a few seconds they swam straight down. They were obviously still in great condition. These fish were placed in deep water, but a flat with vegetative cover was only a short distance away. Open water vs weeds is a subject that is sometimes debated, but we think the fish made up their own minds quickly.
It was very satisfying to see so many fish go into the lake on this day. According to the tally sheet, over 212,000 fingerlings were stocked. This could well be the most Striped Bass fingerlings stocked in one day on Raystown Lake, ever. This could not have come to pass were it not for the efforts of the whole membership of the PSBA. Every gun ticket sold, every 50/50 ticket bought, every donation, and all the work by dedicated people has made a difference. Thanks to everyone for making this day possible.
Skip is planning to grow out more fish for a fall 2010 stocking. These will be much bigger, although there will be fewer. We will let everyone know when the next stocking will be.
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