Larry Muskies in trouble

[captpierre]

https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/st-lawrence-musky-population-threatened-by-invasive-gobies

[dave524]

Why is this population having a difficult time co-existing with Gobies ? while other populations seem to be doing OK with gobies or am I missing something.

[AKRISONER]

49 minutes ago, dave524 said:

Why is this population having a difficult time co-existing with Gobies ? while other populations seem to be doing OK with gobies or am I missing something.

Most other species protect their nesting grounds, muskies breed and leave. They don’t seem to benefit as much from predation of the gobies either like the smallmouth and pickerel do. 
 

we all see how the smallmouth are doing in fisheries with gobies.
 

funny how the smallest fish has the biggest impact on the apex predator in the waterbody

Edited April 13, 2021 by AKRISONER

[Fisherman]

I would have thought that Muskies would have made quick work of them, but, maybe gobies don't taste good.

[OhioFisherman]

1 hour ago, AKRISONER said:

Most other species protect their nesting grounds, muskies breed and leave. They don’t seem to benefit as much from predation of the gobies either like the smallmouth and pickerel do. 
 

we all see how the smallmouth are doing in fisheries with gobies.
 

funny how the smallest fish has the biggest impact on the apex predator in the waterbody

An interesting article, Perch also don't guard a nest, and gobies may be a reason for the declining population in the central basin of Lake Erie here?

https://thefishsite.com/articles/species-profile-yellow-perch-perca-flavescens

A gobie or school of them might just eat up a whole strain of eggs?

[kickingfrog]

Nest predation is one possibility the other could be the gobbies impacting another species in the muskies food chain or even older year classes of gobbies eating young of the year muskies. I believe one of the main reasons established muskie lakes don't do well with introduced pike is the pike hatching long enough before the muskie that the young of the year pike prey on the slightly younger/smaller muskie.

[dave524]

21 hours ago, AKRISONER said:

Most other species protect their nesting grounds, muskies breed and leave. They don’t seem to benefit as much from predation of the gobies either like the smallmouth and pickerel do. 
 

But wouldn't Goby predation be a factor everywhere Musky and Goby co-exist ?

[AKRISONER]

5 minutes ago, dave524 said:

But wouldn't Goby predation be a factor everywhere Musky and Goby co-exist ?

im not sure im clear what your question is, but my assumption that due to the nature of a musky to be large and eat larger meals less often, my assumption is that muskys do not benefit from eating gobies in the same manner as a bass or walleye. 

Not that either of those species dont eat the occasional large meal, but I dont think its the musky's nature to spend its day cruising foraging small bits of food like a goby, They are more so an ambush predator waiting for for a larger fish thats made a wrong turn. While smallmouth bass on the other hand, this is basically all they do, swim and forage for food.

[akaShag]

43 minutes ago, AKRISONER said:

im not sure im clear what your question is, but my assumption that due to the nature of a musky to be large and eat larger meals less often, my assumption is that muskys do not benefit from eating gobies in the same manner as a bass or walleye. 

Not that either of those species dont eat the occasional large meal, but I dont think its the musky's nature to spend its day cruising foraging small bits of food like a goby, They are more so an ambush predator waiting for for a larger fish thats made a wrong turn. While smallmouth bass on the other hand, this is basically all they do, swim and forage for food.

I think you hit the nail on the head here.  Muskies aren't likely to eat gobies in any significant number, and there are millions of them in the SLR, including large populations (according to the article) on traditional muskie spawning areas.  Perch and smallmouth are getting BIG slurping up unlimited goby buffets, but they do not appear to be putting a dent in goby numbers yet.  Nevertheless, I am heartened to see that John Casselman figures there will be a way forward.

Doug

[dave524]

1 hour ago, AKRISONER said:

im not sure im clear what your question is, but my assumption that due to the nature of a musky to be large and eat larger meals less often, my assumption is that muskys do not benefit from eating gobies in the same manner as a bass or walleye. 

Not that either of those species dont eat the occasional large meal, but I dont think its the musky's nature to spend its day cruising foraging small bits of food like a goby, They are more so an ambush predator waiting for for a larger fish thats made a wrong turn. While smallmouth bass on the other hand, this is basically all they do, swim and forage for food.

I was referring to the Gobies eating the unprotected Musky eggs, should be an issue everywhere not just on the Larry.

[akaShag]

6 minutes ago, dave524 said:

I was referring to the Gobies eating the unprotected Musky eggs, should be an issue everywhere not just on the Larry.

I am sure this is true, but the report noted that there are large infestations of gobies on the SLR muskie spawning grounds - perhaps this is not true of other bodies of water?  Wondering, for example, of Lake St Clair...........

[AKRISONER]

45 minutes ago, dave524 said:

I was referring to the Gobies eating the unprotected Musky eggs, should be an issue everywhere not just on the Larry.

Yes I believe that the infestation of gobys is specifically notable in the st Lawrence. Although Georgian bay has gobies the infestations seems to be far less prevalent. 
 

I have no idea what factors would impact this.

[12 Volt Man]

Great so now I have an even less of a chance of catching my first

In all seriousness this sucks overall. big time. 

[OhioFisherman]

What about the northern pike population there? they spawn the same way?

[AKRISONER]

1 hour ago, OhioFisherman said:

What about the northern pike population there? they spawn the same way?

Far More prolific though.  Big breeders are far more common. 

[OhioFisherman]

Agreed, but the gobies could still impact that, just may take longer? Spawning and survival rates of the spawn, them eggs get eaten and the numbers drop? That VHS might also be a bigger factor than realized? I have seen the pictures here where it suspected in fish kills, but it always seems to involved fish that are a lot common than skis or pike? If you see a dead ski or pike do you do a study to determine the cause of death?

[kickingfrog]

Lots of factors to consider. Maybe the pike year classes are not doing well either. Who knows? There isn't the same targeting of big pike like muskie in that area with big name guides and whatnot. Pike and muskie don't have the same spawning cycle/timing. Most large pike prefer a much colder water temp than big muskie so they are usually much deeper come summer.

[Rizzo]

pike also spawn really early....gobies might not be too active at that water temp yet.

[Dave Bailey]

One thing that I have often wondered about may be on the horizon; genetically based chemicals that target a specific gene sequence, unique to a species, and kill it. How close it is I cannot say, but on a recent chat with a skeptics group I chair, we had a biochemist PhD talking about various things, mostly related to COVID 19, and I asked him if the idea was possible. His reply was that there was work being done in that direction. So we may see a solution to that damned goby problem in the future, but I imagine there will be a lot of testing to be done before any of it can be put to use. 

[OhioFisherman]

1 hour ago, Dave Bailey said:

One thing that I have often wondered about may be on the horizon; genetically based chemicals that target a specific gene sequence, unique to a species, and kill it. How close it is I cannot say, but on a recent chat with a skeptics group I chair, we had a biochemist PhD talking about various things, mostly related to COVID 19, and I asked him if the idea was possible. His reply was that there was work being done in that direction. So we may see a solution to that damned goby problem in the future, but I imagine there will be a lot of testing to be done before any of it can be put to use. 

That sounds like something they should look into to prevent the carp they are trying to prevent from entering the Great Lakes?

[Canuck]

The last thing we need is God wanna-be scientists genetically engineering things.  With the trillions of variables in genetics there is far more risk of something going very wrong and solving one issue and creating a much worse other issue.  Gobies are here to stay.  Hopefully normal evolution will shift things around and the muskies that spawn in areas that are not overrun with gobies will become dominant.  Same for perch.  

[AKRISONER]

the idea of removing the gobies from some of these fisheries where our predator species walley and smallmouth bass are relying so much on them for prey scares the hell out of me. Especially because its been shown that the gobies have had a negative effect on those predator species old sources of prey. 

 

did they not also discover that gobies eat zebra muscles? Hence when you go to the kawarthas where there are no gobies the entire bottom is literally 100% coated in zebra muscles while other lakes with gobies the bottom is not.

[akaShag]

Video (not very good quality) showing gobies eating zebra mussels:
 

 

[Snidley]

Isn't lampricide a good example of species specific poison?

[Garfisher]

Kinda. Lampricide would target all lampreys, which would include our native Silver, Chestnut, Northern Brook, and American Brook Lampreys. I've also heard while chatting with someone who's worked with the Sea Lamprey program, that when they treat the Nipigon River that they know the concentration is about right when a certain species or two start flipping up (they aren't gamefish but smaller fish, I forget the species). Young of year Lake Sturgeon can also be lethally affected by TFM (a type of lampricide) in more acidic waters (https://scholars.wlu.ca/etd/2045/). But generally lampricide treatments have greater benefits than problems for Great Lakes game fish at least