Shad die off.

[OhioFisherman]

Since a lot of our friends up north don't have Shad in their area. here is a pic and article about one from my area early this year.

https://www.news5cleveland.com/news/local-news/oh-cuyahoga/this-is-why-thousands-of-dead-fish-were-spotted-in-the-cuyahoga-river

All we have are gizzard shad and they get up to around 15 inches long, and they are even in some of our inland lakes. Not much use for them, they provide a food supply for a lot of other species though. The Lake Erie walleye eat a bunch of them, a bigger meal than 3-4 inch emerald shiners.

 

They use them down south to train bass?

[tomO]

We used to have lots of shad here in the Ohio river, very few the last five years. Not sure why that is.

[OhioFisherman]

They never appeared to be the most obvious fish in the water to me Tom, most of the time we noticed them rippling the surface.

[muskybw]

the St. Clair musky,LOVE EATING THEM, before they go up the Thames River to spawn ! september & october. they go right up to London !

[OhioFisherman]

Thanks for that info musky, I was wondering how far north their range extended.

[tomO]

They were always around, in the spring and fall they were thick.  In 2014 they were so numerous you could cast and bring in 2 or 3 of them hooked on your lure at times. they were maybe 2 to 4 inches long. I stood on the bank of the Ohio river for an hour one day as a continuous stream  4 or 6 feet wide of Shad hugging the bank swimming down river. Hardly any since then. Heavy rains and high water is the thing that may be messing up the spawn in spring. I don't know. It was the 1st of August before the rivers around here finally dropped to normal levels and cleared up this last year.

[Mike Pike]

I see them in massive schools here on Lake Ontario Paul and always thought it was a shame they aren't highly regarded for their edibility.  There's soooooooo many of them!  I think they're members of the herring family so very oily and wouldn't taste good prepared in traditional methods, me thinks.  They're super bony too.  But I've read about a guy who cast a net for them and smoked them and said they tasted pretty good.  Id probably pass, though.  lol

[OhioFisherman]

11 hours ago, Mike Pike said:

I see them in massive schools here on Lake Ontario Paul and always thought it was a shame they aren't highly regarded for their edibility.  There's soooooooo many of them!  I think they're members of the herring family so very oily and wouldn't taste good prepared in traditional methods, me thinks.  They're super bony too.  But I've read about a guy who cast a net for them and smoked them and said they tasted pretty good.  Id probably pass, though.  lol

LOL, I remember dragging a jig on bottom and accidentally snag dead ones, turtle food?

[outllaw]

On ‎12‎/‎18‎/‎2019 at 2:08 PM, muskybw said:

the St. Clair musky,LOVE EATING THEM, before they go up the Thames River to spawn ! september & october. they go right up to London !

shad migre from l.huron into l.st clair every fall ,migration starts early august with small.as waters cool bigger shad arrive. every year. in spring die-off by millions leave a big stink.