Spiel

Nice inland ice January 7, 2009 Will Elliott / www.buffalonews.com Solid ice surfaces formed on many water bodies for area anglers this past week from the north end of Lake Simcoe to the south end of Chautauqua Lake. Lenora Creber at Casey’s Fish Huts (705-437-1560) had huts out at Port Bolster last weekend and clients did well on perch throughout all daylight hours. Along with perch, jiggers have come up with an odd walleye from shallower bay areas. “One was a 10-pounder; it would be nice to see the walleyes come back here,” she said. Randy Carleton at Randy’s Fish Huts (705-437-2989) set up last Friday over 28-to 32-foot depths off Port Bolster for a good mix of perch and herring. Herring remain off the limits for anglers. “Whitefish have moved in and one client got a nice one, but [clients see the whitefish] cruise just under the ice holes,” he said. Steve Barber at Steve’s Fish Huts (705-437-1013) set up on 8- to 12-inch ice off Holmes Point Road in Pefferlaw. Barber’s clients have taken a higher ratio of keepers this year, with many measuring well above 10 inches. Cooks Bay at Simcoe offers good ice (averaging 10-12 inches) on the Keswick and Guilford sides of the bay. Early starters head out to deeper waters when possible. Jiggers work 25-foot depths, doing a lift-and-drop twitch for perch. Schools can be found at shallower depths, but the bigger perch hold deeper. Terry Goy at Terry Goy Fish Hut Rentals ( www.utube.com/terrygoy ) worked plain jigs Tuesday and caught perch without an attached bug/grub. “Just about everything works for perch right now,” Goy said, noting the keeper-to-runt ratio is about 5-1.

Hatchery offers thanks January 7, 2009 Mary LeFeuvre / www.bancroftthisweek.com To the editor: As we enter the New Year the Board of the North Hastings Community Fish Hatchery would like to wish you a very happy and healthy New Year. While many of our thoughts will be about 2009 we would like to briefly reflect on the past year. A mere 12 months ago the hatchery was nothing but a drawing on a piece of paper and a big hole in the ground. Today we have a facility, while not yet completely furnished, where we are raising our locally adapted, unique genetic Lake Trout called the Jewel. Despite the ups and downs that we encountered along the way we believe it was all worth it. The success of our building phase would not have been possible without the support of the many organizations, businesses and people in the Community. That support ranged from direct cash contributions, merchandise for the various fundraisers and the building; to lending a helping hand for hatchery chores, and we thank you for that generous support. We too would like to thank the following Governments and their agencies/programs for their support; The Eastern Ontario Development Program administered on behalf of Industry Canada by our local CFDC, The Rural Economic Development Program, administered by OMAFRA, The County of Hastings and the Municipality of Hastings Highlands. Our initiative as, among other things, an economic development opportunity, was important enough to gain their support and commitment. Your trust in our efforts is appreciated. Today we have about 8,000 newly hatched lake trout sac fry in the hatchery and in the first week of January, we will have brought back from the Haliburton Highlands Outdoor Association fish hatchery about another 6,000 yearling trout that they have been conscientiously raising for us. These fish will be released in local public lakes this Spring. We invite you to come see the new hatchery in the New Year and see what we have been up to for the last year. You can arrange a tour by calling 613-332-4084. We believe that 2009 will be an exciting year and we will be starting it off with our Annual General Meeting on January 23 at the North Hastings High School. All are welcome. Thank you for making 2008 a great year for the hatchery.

Hatchery offers thanks Posted By Mary LeFeuvre Posted 21 hours ago To the editor: As we enter the New Year the Board of the North Hastings Community Fish Hatchery would like to wish you a very happy and healthy New Year. While many of our thoughts will be about 2009 we would like to briefly reflect on the past year. A mere 12 months ago the hatchery was nothing but a drawing on a piece of paper and a big hole in the ground. Today we have a facility, while not yet completely furnished, where we are raising our locally adapted, unique genetic Lake Trout called the Jewel. Despite the ups and downs that we encountered along the way we believe it was all worth it. The success of our building phase would not have been possible without the support of the many organizations, businesses and people in the Community. That support ranged from direct cash contributions, merchandise for the various fundraisers and the building; to lending a helping hand for hatchery chores, and we thank you for that generous support. We too would like to thank the following Governments and their agencies/programs for their support; The Eastern Ontario Development Program administered on behalf of Industry Canada by our local CFDC, The Rural Economic Development Program, administered by OMAFRA, The County of Hastings and the Municipality of Hastings Highlands. Our initiative as, among other things, an economic development opportunity, was important enough to gain their support and commitment. Your trust in our efforts is appreciated. Today we have about 8,000 newly hatched lake trout sac fry in the hatchery and in the first week of January, we will have brought back from the Haliburton Highlands Outdoor Association fish hatchery about another 6,000 yearling trout that they have been conscientiously raising for us. These fish will be released in local public lakes this Spring. We invite you to come see the new hatchery in the New Year and see what we have been up to for the last year. You can arrange a tour by calling 613-332-4084. We believe that 2009 will be an exciting year and we will be starting it off with our Annual General Meeting on January 23 at the North Hastings High School. All are welcome. Thank you for making 2008 a great year for the hatchery.

Wegman to host ice fishing seminar January 07, 2009 / www.yorkregion.com Georgina Advocate columnist Wil Wegman will host an ice fishing seminar Monday from 7 to 9 p.m. at the De La Salle Hall in Jackson’s Point. Mr. Wegman, who writes the Focus on Fishing column, was the 2006 Perch Trap Attack winner and a member of Team Canada during the 1991 World Ice Fishing Championship. He has taught ice fishing courses at Seneca College since 1987 and also presented his seminars from Sudbury to Toronto and Hamilton to Ottawa. “This will be the first time we have had the opportunity to host one of them here, thanks to the town and The Georgina Advocate,” he said. “The Jackson’s Point venue will be perfect with many avid ice anglers living within a half hour drive.” His presentation focuses on ice fishing in Lake Simcoe with emphasis on how to catch more yellow perch, northern pike, whitefish and lake trout. “Lake Simcoe is a huge body of water and receives more fishing pressure than any other inland lake in the province,” he said. Draw Prizes will be offered courtesy of HT Enterprises, Rapala/Normark, Berkley/Pure Fishing and Lowrance. Gerry Heels, a Lowrance Electronics rep will be on hand to answer questions about their sonar units and how to maximize their performance during the winter. Admission is free, but you are asked to bring along a non-perishable food item for the Georgina Food Bank.

.....Funny you know, with 30 years of ice fishing Simcoe I can't honestly remember seeing a slaughter of on ice smallies and yet I hear they're in there.

....I'll cut him slack this time Roy. He's not been round the board much cause he's actually been out harassing the wee fishies under the ice.

....Attaboy. You know all these perch reports are starting to affect me palate.

....Experience is a great teacher Wayne....

....Sweeeet!

....A word of caution, just becasue the switch may be off it does not mean there is no power in the socket. Best to remove the fuse (or trip breaker) before jamming anything conductive into a broken bulb.

....Good news indeed, I've been wondering about her progress all day. I'm sure you're all happy to be back in the comfort of your own home. Be sure to keep us posted with any updates.

...While I'm sure there must be it was trial and error that worked for me.

Dow Chemical in talks for Michigan dioxin cleanup EPA, chemical giant meet about dioxin at Michigan site January 1, 2009 Michael Hawthorne / Tribune reporter More than three decades after Dow Chemical was blamed for some of the worst dioxin contamination in history, federal regulators are meeting with the company yet again about cleaning up polluted waterways in eastern Michigan. Though some hope the closed-door talks could kick-start a long-awaited cleanup, local environmental advocates fear they will lead only to more delays. The Tribune reported in May that a regional administrator with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was ousted after she cut off similar negotiations with Dow, saying they were going nowhere. "In my experience, Dow only enters into negotiations if they can cut a better deal for themselves, not the environment," said Mary Gade, who was the Bush administration's top environmental official in Chicago before tangling with Dow on the dioxin issue. Meanwhile, advocates say, thousands of people remain at risk from highly toxic and persistent chemicals that are linked to cancer and other health problems. For most of the past century, Dow dumped dioxin into rivers near its sprawling chemical plant in Midland, Mich., creating 50 miles of polluted waterways that empty into Saginaw Bay and Lake Huron. The pollutant was a manufacturing byproduct of the Vietnam-era herbicide Agent Orange and other chlorinated chemicals. Dioxin is so toxic that it is measured in trillionths of a gram, and concerns about dioxin contamination were behind two of the most infamous environmental disasters in U.S. history—the evacuations of the Love Canal neighborhood in upstate New York and the entire town of Times Beach, Mo. But cleanup remains stalled in the Saginaw area, mainly because Dow asserts the contamination does not threaten people or wildlife. In 2008, top officials at the EPA and the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality said the best course of action was to have Dow clean up the area under the terms of an existing state agreement, which took effect in 2003 after more than a decade of negotiations. Now the two agencies say the cleanup would be faster and more comprehensive if Dow agreed to a different set of rules similar to the federal Superfund program. "This is a directional change," said Richard Karl, director of the EPA's regional Superfund office. "But we strongly believe we'll get a cleanup going sooner than later this way." Though federal and state officials vowed that any proposed agreement would be subject to public scrutiny, environmental groups said guidelines for the new talks circumvent stronger requirements contained in the federal Superfund law. "Here we go again," said Michelle Hurd Riddick, a Saginaw nurse and member of the Lone Tree Council, a local environmental group. Officials said it is highly unlikely a deal will be brokered before the Bush administration leaves office Jan. 20. Though regulators linked the dioxin contamination to Dow decades ago, cleanup had been minimal until Gade stepped in. In 2007 she ordered the immediate removal of dioxin-contaminated soil and sediment after high levels of the chemical were found in three areas near the Dow plant and in a residential area and public park some 20 miles away. In the residential area, one sample of household dust had dioxin levels of 3,000 parts per trillion, three times higher than the federal cleanup standard. Levels in the yards were as high as 23,000 parts per trillion and averaged 2,000 parts per trillion. Gade abruptly ended negotiations with Dow nearly a year ago, accusing the company of failing to take steps necessary to protect public health. When she later was ousted from her job, she told the Tribune it was because she was too tough on Dow. Dow officials have resisted attempts to extend the cleanup farther from the plant into Saginaw Bay. Citing the work ordered by the EPA, a spokesman said Dow will restore polluted areas but contests how it should be done. "We're moving at an extremely fast pace," said John Musser, the Dow spokesman.

2008 was the year man-made global warming was disproved December 31, 2008 Christopher Booker / www.great-lakes.org Two recent items from The Daily Telegraph neatly encapsulated man-made global warming was disproved. The first, on May 21, headlined "Climate change threat to Alpine ski resorts" , reported that the entire Alpine "winter sports industry" could soon "grind to a halt for lack of snow". The second, on December 19, headed "The Alps have best snow conditions in a generation" , reported that this winter's Alpine snowfalls "look set to beat all records by New Year's Day". Easily one of the most important stories of 2008 has been all the evidence suggesting that this may be looked back on as the year when there was a turning point in the great worldwide panic over man-made global warming. Just when politicians in Europe and America have been adopting the most costly and damaging measures politicians have ever proposed, to combat this supposed menace, the tide has turned in three significant respects. First, all over the world, temperatures have been dropping in a way wholly unpredicted by all those computer models which have been used as the main drivers of the scare. Last winter, as temperatures plummeted, many parts of the world had snowfalls on a scale not seen for decades. This winter, with the whole of Canada and half the US under snow, looks likely to be even worse. After several years flatlining, global temperatures have dropped sharply enough to cancel out much of their net rise in the 20th century. Ever shriller and more frantic has become the insistence of the warmists, cheered on by their army of media groupies such as the BBC, that the last 10 years have been the "hottest in history" and that the North Pole would soon be ice-free – as the poles remain defiantly icebound and those polar bears fail to drown. All those hysterical predictions that we are seeing more droughts and hurricanes than ever before have infuriatingly failed to materialize. Even the more cautious scientific acolytes of the official orthodoxy now admit that, thanks to "natural factors" such as ocean currents, temperatures have failed to rise as predicted (although they plaintively assure us that this cooling effect is merely "masking the underlying warming trend", and that the temperature rise will resume worse than ever by the middle of the next decade). Secondly, 2008 was the year when any pretence that there was a "scientific consensus" in favor of man-made global warming collapsed. At long last, as in the Manhattan Declaration last March, hundreds of proper scientists, including many of the world's most eminent climate experts, have been rallying to pour scorn on that "consensus" which was only a politically engineered artifact, based on ever more blatantly manipulated data and computer models programmed to produce no more than convenient fictions. Thirdly, as banks collapsed and the global economy plunged into its worst recession for decades, harsh reality at last began to break in on those self-deluding dreams which have for so long possessed almost every politician in the western world. As we saw in this month's Poznan conference, when 10,000 politicians, officials and "environmentalists" gathered to plan next year's "son of Kyoto" treaty in Copenhagen, panicking politicians are waking up to the fact that the world can no longer afford all those quixotic schemes for "combating climate change" with which they were so happy to indulge themselves in more comfortable times. Suddenly it has become rather less appealing that we should divert trillions of dollars, pounds and Euros into the fantasy that we could reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 80%. All those grandiose projects for "emissions trading", "carbon capture", building tens of thousands more useless wind turbines, switching vast areas of farmland from producing food to "biofuels", are being exposed as no more than enormously damaging and futile gestures, costing astronomic sums we no longer possess. As 2009 dawns, it is time we in Britain faced up to the genuine crisis now fast approaching from the fact that – unless we get on very soon with building enough proper power stations to fill our looming "energy gap" - within a few years our lights will go out and what remains of our economy will judder to a halt. After years of infantile displacement activity, it is high time our politicians – along with those of the EU and President Obama's U.S. – were brought back with a mighty jolt into contact with the real world.

Corps to turn on Barrier IIA good news "The recent announcement by the Corps of Engineers is welcome news that will greatly assist in our efforts to preserve the fisheries and unique species found in the Great Lakes," says Rep. Miller January 5, 2009 / www.great-lakes.org WASHINGTON, DC –Congresswoman Candice Miller, MI-10, received confirmation that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has completed safety testing and will activate the IIA electric dispersal barrier in the Chicago Ship Canal by the end of January 2009. This electric barrier will prevent dangerous species from entering in to the Great Lakes and disrupting its fragile ecosystem. “Throughout my nearly three decades of public service protecting the Great Lakes has always been a principal advocacy of mine, and I’m pleased with the bipartisan efforts of my Great Lakes colleagues to ensure a quick and proper implementation of this barrier.” Miller continued “The recent announcement by the Corps of Engineers is welcome news that will greatly assist in efforts to preserve the fisheries and unique species found in our Great Lakes.” The northward migration of invasive aquatic species such as Asian Carp, through the Mississippi River has been a long-term concern of advocates for the Great Lakes. These carp can weigh up to 100 pounds and consume up to 40 percent of their body weight in one day. Their consumption habits could cause tremendous harm to native species in the world=E 2s largest freshwater ecosystem. “I appreciate the thorough safety precautions which the U.S. Coast Guard and Army Corps of Engineers have taken to ensure the safety of this electric barrier and applaud their decision to activate the permanent barrier next month, in order to prevent these dangerous species from entering in to our precious Great Lakes,” said Miller. The electric dispersal barriers in the Chicago Ship and Sanitary Canal are all that prevent these carp from entering in to the Great Lakes. The activation of the permanent electric barrier next month will assist the current demonstration barrier in deterring invasive species from entering in to the Great Lakes.

Highest U.S. Court Ponders Power Plants and Fish Protection January 2nd, 2009 J.R. Pegg / Environment News Service More than 10 miles of cooling canals have been constructed at the Turkey Point power plant at Homestead, Florida to cool the circulating water. (Photo by Penny Zobel courtesy USGS) The U.S. Supreme Court is wrestling with the difficulty of valuing fish and aquatic organisms with little or no commercial worth, hearing arguments in a legal dispute over what steps older power plants should take to limit water use and minimize environmental harm. In oral arguements Tuesday, the Bush administration urged the court to allow federal regulators to use cost-benefit analysis when crafting such requirements - a view rejected by a lower court last year. A majority of justices appeared skeptical of the Bush administration’s arguments, but seemed keen to find middle ground that would allow for some considerations of costs and benefits. The legal issue rests on the interpretation of a provision in the Clean Water Act that authorizes the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to require power plants install “the best available technology for minimizing adverse environmental impact” from cooling water intake structures. The environmental concern is a serious one. U.S. power plants pull more than 200 billion gallons of water a day from reservoirs, lakes and rivers to cool machinery or, in the case of nuclear power plants, to cool reactors. The practice kills large numbers of fish and other aquatic organisms that are drawn into intake pipes along with cooling water. But the economic concern also is considerable. Newer power plants are constructed with closed-cycle cooling systems that alleviate much of the concern, but retrofitting older plants can be costly. Industry groups contend broad technology requirements for all older plants could force some to close and others to raise electricity prices, all for environmental benefits unequal to costs. Heeding that concern, a rule finalized in 2004 by the Bush administration allowed some 550 older plants to chose among several alternatives to reduce environmental harm from cooling water intake structures, allowing them to avoid installing the best available technology if the costs outweighed the benefits. Six states and a coalition of environmental groups, led by Riverkeeper, sued, arguing the Clean Water Act does not allow EPA to conduct cost-benefit analysis when crafting the cooling water intake rules. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit agreed with that view and struck down the regulation, prompting the appeal to the Supreme Court by the Bush administration and several utilities. U.S. Deputy Solicitor General Daryl Joseffer told the Supreme Court justices on Tuesday that the statute’s language is ambiguous and gives the EPA deference to balance costs and benefits. “For more than 30 years, EPA has construed the Clean Water Act to permit it to consider the relationship between costs and benefits in setting limits on water intake,” Joseffer said. When lawmakers wrote the statute in 1972, they understood “that consideration of cost and benefits was not incompatible with the application of a best technology standard,” he added. But several justices challenged that view and wondered how EPA could fairly weigh the costs and benefits of the technology versus fish and aquatic organisms. While the costs of the technology are clear, Justice David Souter said, the value of the fish and aquatic organisms being protected is not. “Are 1,000 plankton worth $1 million?” said Justice Souter. “I don’t know.” Given that uncertainty, Souter added, the application of cost-benefit analysis would seem to unfairly favor industry and “basically eliminate the whole technology-driven point of the statute.” The concern, said Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, is how to compare “things that aren’t comparable.” All cost-benefit analyses are difficult - even “ones which people do in ordinary life,” Joseffer replied. “When I decide whether to buy a TV for this amount or a more expensive TV for a different amount, I don’t know exactly how in my head I quantify that, but I do.” Chief Justice John Roberts rejected Joseffer’s hypothetical and also seemed skeptical of the government’s argument. “If you told somebody that you were going to buy the best TV available nobody would think you meant that you were going to buy a very cheap TV because, considering the costs and benefits, that was the best one,” Roberts said. “They would think you are going to get the fanciest TV you could.” Justice Anthony Kennedy said he assumed that best available technology meant “the most rigorous of standards” set by the Clean Water Act and questioned where it suggested cost considerations for the cooling water intake rules. Joseffer responded that the EPA does not think the best available technology language is stricter than other standards, such as the Clean Water Act’s pollution discharge standards. Those standards require cost-benefit analysis and call for elimination of discharges compared to the cooling water intake provision’s goal to minimize environmental impacts, he explained. “There is no reason to think Congress would want greater protection for fish through intake structures than for people through the discharge of pollutants,” Joseffer said. Justice Antonin Scalia agreed, saying it “seems ridiculous” to allow cost-benefit analysis for pollutant discharge standards “where human health is at stake, and yet to forbid it in this intake situation when you were just talking about the snail darter.” Arguing for the environmentalists, Georgetown University law professor Richard Lazarus said the statute clearly does not give EPA authority to weigh costs against benefits for the intake rules. But that interpretation would not lead to “the kind of absurd circumstances” the Bush administration and industry predict, said Lazarus, because the “plain meaning” of the Clean Water Act guards against the possibility that “a regulated facility would have to spend millions or hundreds of millions or billions of dollars to protect just a few fish.” If a technology is too costly, he explained, it is essentially not be the best available technology, as Congress meant availability to mean both “technologically available and economically available.” That reasoning baffled Justice Scalia. “If I look in the real estate page of the “Washington Post” on Sunday and I look for the best house that is available, the best house that is available might cost $50 million,” Scalia said. “Now, that would be available to me. I couldn’t afford it, but it would be available. You wouldn’t say I can’t buy the house because for me it’s not economically available. I might say it’s not economically feasible, it’s not economically possible, but it’s not economically available? That’s weird.” Lazarus responded that “it may be weird … but it is not anything that has ever been disputed in the interpretation” of the Clean Water Act. Justice Samuel Alito also questioned Lazarus’ interpretation and wondered if the EPA could consider the impacts of increased electricity costs to consumers. “If the effect of achieving a small gain in protecting fish is to increase electricity costs 10 times, is that something that cannot be taken into account?” Justice Alito asked. The EPA can consider whether costs can be “reasonably borne by industry,” Lazarus replied, but cannot hold off on requiring installation of the best available technology because it thinks the benefits are not worth the costs. Justice Stephen Breyer, a member of the court’s liberal wing, honed in on the intent of lawmakers who crafted the 1972 law and sought some middle ground that would allow the EPA to consider costs and benefits without a strict comparison. “As I read it, it says: Of course you can’t avoid taking into account costs, but don’t do it too much,” Breyer said. “And, therefore, you would say: ‘Don’t apply one of these big formal things when you reach your final goal. There are other ways of getting there. Of course, see that it isn’t absurd.’” For 30 years - prior to the 2004 rule - the agency “has had a way” to do that, Breyer added, as it has considered whether costs were “grossly disproportionate” and unreasonable to industry. “Why not let sleeping dogs lie?” Breyer asked. “Let the agency take it into account the way it’s done it to prevent absurd results, but not try to do it so that it’s so refined you can’t even take account of what a fish is worth unless they happen to be one of the 1.2 percent that goes to market.” The court is expected to rule on the case next spring.

A tale of two fishes December 30, 2008 Jennifer Yauck / bayviewcompass.com Lake Superior may be the perfect fishing destination for Jack Sprat and his wife, the nursery rhyme duo who ate, respectively, no fat and no lean.* The lake is unique among the Great Lakes in that it is home to both a lean and a fat form of lake trout. Though they are the same fish species, the so-called leans and fats (or siscowets) have different physical characteristics-and Great Lakes WATER Institute (GLWI) fish biologist Rick Goetz wants to find out why. Fish biologist Rick Goetz aboard the research vessel Lake Char with a large siscowet caught in Lake Superior ~courtesy Rick Goetz One difference between the two forms, as their names indicate, is body fat. Only about 15 percent of a lean’s body weight is fat, compared to about 55 percent in siscowets. “When you grill the fillets of siscowets, they are dripping with fat,” said Goetz. The name “siscowet,” in fact, is an Ojibwa word meaning “that which cooks itself.” The fish also differ in outward appearances. Lean lake trout have small eyes and fins, and long, straight snouts. Siscowets, on the other hand, have large eyes and fins, and short, angled snouts. So why these differences? One possible explanation, said Goetz, is genetics. Earlier work by other researchers has shown lean and siscowet lake trout have some genetic dissimilarities. However, no one has yet determined whether genes might be responsible for the physical differences between the fish. Another possibility is environment. Lean lake trout tend to inhabit Lake Superior’s shallower waters, preferring depths of about 300 feet or less. But siscowets favor deeper waters and are most abundant 400 feet or more below the surface. Siscowets have even been found at Lake Superior’s deepest point, at a depth of some 1,300 feet-more than twice the height of Milwaukee’s tallest building. Environmental conditions such as pressure, temperature stability, and light penetration differ markedly between shallower and deeper waters. Lake Superior’s shallowest waters, for instance, receive some light, while its deepest waters receive virtually no light at all. So, the thinking goes, perhaps these external environmental forces are driving the physical differences observed between the leans and siscowets. Genetics or Environment? Housed in the GLWI fish lab are two green, round 1,000-gallon tanks that each hold 200 leans and 200 siscowets-and possibly the answer to the question of what makes these fish different. Goetz raised the fish, now 2 years old, from fertilized eggs. He obtained the lean eggs through the Les Voigt Fish Hatchery in Bayfield, Wis., which collected them from fish at the nearby Gull Island Shoal in Lake Superior. He and his research team collected the siscowet eggs themselves from Lake Superior fish they netted offshore near Marquette, Mich. in about 400 feet of water. For the past two years, Goetz has kept all the fish under identical environmental conditions-temperature, light, diet, and the like-and is watching to see if they still develop differently. He regularly measures the length and weight of a sample of fish, and evaluates their body shape by measuring the distance between specific points, such as two fins. He also analyzes their fat content. Compared to lean lake trout (top), fat lake trout (bottom)—also known as siscowets—have bigger eyes and fins, shorter and more angled snouts, and a higher body fat content. ~courtesy Shawn Sitar So far, with an average weight of 1.7 pounds and length of 16 inches, the siscowets are considerably heavier and slightly longer than the leans, mirroring growth trends seen in the wild. Goetz also has observed a quantifiable difference in their body shapes. “These fish are actually differentiating morphologically and you can see it when you pick them up,” he said. What’s more, the siscowets have a higher body fat content. Goetz said the results so far suggest the physical characteristics of the leans and siscowets are inherited. “There’s a strong genetic component to them, otherwise they would not persist in fish that have been raised in identical environmental conditions,” he said. Goetz plans to continue monitoring the fish for several more years. Eventually, he would like to tag them and release them in Lake Superior in order to see where they reproduce-especially the siscowets. “We know leans spawn on reefs in the fall, but nobody knows where siscowets spawn because they live deep,” he said. Two-year-old leans and siscowets swim in an eight-foot diameter tank at the GLWI fish lab where they are being raised under identical environmental conditions. ~courtesy Rick Goetz Goetz also wants to develop a way to raise siscowets for fish oil, which contains high concentrations of omega-3 fatty acids, for use in dietary supplements. Although siscowets are plentiful in Lake Superior-they account for most of its lake trout biomass-the fat of these wild fish often contains contaminants like PCBs, which means extra processing is necessary to purify their oil. This wouldn’t be the case with farmed fish, said Goetz, making siscowet farming a safer and more economic option. Jennifer Yauck is a science writer at the Great Lakes WATER Institute. GLWI (glwi.uwm.edu) is the largest academic freshwater research facility on the Great Lakes.

Tapeworms invade the Great Lakes Agencies warn anglers of walleyes from Lake Huron January 4, 2009 Will Elliott / buffalonews.com Avoid slicing slabs of walleye for that sushi platter hereafter. Researchers with Environment Canada have discovered the presence of Asian tapeworms in walleye taken from Lake Huron. Asian tapeworms had been brought into the Great Lakes chain as early as the 1960s when Asian carp were released in Arkansas to remove vegetation growth in ponds. Carp eventually moved northward and began appearing in Great Lakes waters. Until recent findings in Lake Huron walleye, this terrible tapeworm had not been a threat to Great Lakes waters. A 1993 U. S. Biological Survey comment noted: “The worm had never been found in bass [anywhere]. It has not been found in walleye in North America.” A 1997 Utah Dept. of Agriculture and Food issued a policy statement on transporting fish that might carry this parasite, but not specific species were mentioned in that statement. Then, anglers reported finding mushroom-headed or phallic-shaped worms in the flesh of fish caught in the Saginaw Baw area during outings for the past two warm-water seasons. Michigan Dept. of Natural Resources (MDNR) offices were closed for the holidays this past week, but officials there confirmed studies have been conducted on their presence in Lake Huron walleyes. Michigan studies confirmed that these tapeworms have been found in fish taken from inland water bodies as well as the Great Lakes in that state. Sources noted that fish with these Asian tapeworms may be safe to eat when properly cooked, smoked, or pickled. MDNR officials added, “It is a very bad idea to eat any freshwater fish raw or poorly cooked as fish parasites use fish-eating mammals and birds as hosts and it is not known if humans can also be hosts.” Lake Erie Unit Leader Don Einhouse echoed the Michigan recommendations on possible tapeworm-bearing walleye or any other freshwater fish species. “It has been a continuing policy as long as I’ve been with the DEC to recommend thorough cooking of all fish species taken from area waters,” Einhouse said in general about this latest exotic invader. Lake Huron flows directly into Lake Erie through the Detroit River, the same path zebra mussels, quagga mussels, and so many other exotic species took after being deposited at sites around the upper Great Lakes. But to this point Lake Erie Unit personnel have seen no signs of this nasty parasite on walleye or any other species researched at the Dunkirk facility. “We directly study about 100 walleye, examine about 1,000 in our spring surveys and make checks on another thousand during creel surveys,” Einhouse added, and none have shown signs of Asian tapeworms (bothriocephalus acheilognathi, for those into aquatic biology formalities). This foreign invader has been numbered 168 among non-native aquatic species identified in the Great Lakes chain. Some have been injurious or detrimental to existing fish species, others have altered food chains and water conditions, but few have created the extent of visual horrors when anglers first begin seeing these tapeworms emerge from dead fish kept in a fish box or cooler. Lake Huron fishermen report these worms begin emerging from all orifices of fish bodies. In larger fish such as carp, tapeworms can grow to lengths of 12 inches. Fish can pass tapeworm eggs through their feces, which settle to the bottom of lakes, get eaten by zooplankton and eventually are consumed by fish at the top of that food chain. For an angler seeing these creatures for the first time, the viewing can be unsightly. These worms are present mainly in the digestive tract. Michigan anglers have resorted to gutting the fish immediately after a catch and storing the viscera in separate plastic bags until they reach shore and can discard the tapeworm-bearing entrails on shore. In Michigan and New York State, fish and fish parts can not be discarded in open waters. Environmental Conservation Officer Scott Marshall checked the state regulations for open waters of the Great Lakes. Along with not discarding whole fish or renderings/parts of fish within 100 feet of a waterway, anglers aboard a vessel on any state waterway must discard all fish (whole or parts). In Michigan, regulations stipulate on land; in New York anglers must be 100 feet from a shoreline or use facilities at a fish cleaning station open at marinas and launch sites. Asian tapeworms will not be a gastronomical glitch in 2009 and they may not start showing in area waters this coming year, but just the thought of their creepy, slimy presence on good-eating percids (walleye and perch) add yet another aquatic scare out there. Which one will be number 169?

....You are very welcome.

....Yesterday I received a PM from Efka asking me how I sharpen my auger blades with a Dremmel (he'd seen a previous post where I mentioned it). So I thought I'd post it here in the event it may help others. I've found that it does a decent job for me and it's fairly straight forward. I have an attachment for the Dremmel for lawn mower blades and such so I thought I'd give it a whirl on my auger blades. The tools.... assembled and ready.... Blade direction.... So it's simply a matter of passing the blades through the guide several times to get it sharp. The blade in the picture was in bad shape before grinding, nicks, burrs and even a large chip. After getting the desired edge I then use a whetstone and/or stropping. The angle of attack differs slightly from the origional but I found shims remedied this problem. In my case I use electrical wire ties trimmed to size. I found these to be better than metal which rusted and on accasion fell out. The plastic ties will slightly compress and stay in tight. Now I've been doing this for several years and I'm very happy with the results. I've also learned that it's wise not to lend your auger to the unexperienced and I also carry a spare (sharpened) set at all times. From time to time I have encountered grit, muck, sand and even small stones in the ice which of course will dull your blades.....Pronto! I hope this helps Efka.

....I made a trip up there two years ago and fished the Vermillion Bay area. Spent the entire 3 days fishing musky. Naturally we (TEP) and I didn't get any but we did raise over 20 fish in the 3 days and most were of the "tank" variety. Suicks and large inline spinners raised most of the fish but it was as I said to TEP "they've seen it all before....LOL" Can't help you with the walleye bite other than to say they seemed to be everywhere. Beautiful lake, I've no doubt you'll enjoy it.

...Oh boy I almost remember that one very well.

....Nice!

....Bingo!