St Louis Seining report 10-29-11

Well myself and some fellow osu students went to St Louis Pond to help ODFW do some research on the dog training ponds on the south end of the park. (i do believe it was the south end) Basically they wanted to know if and what kinds of fish were present in those ponds as well as size. We tackled 3 of the ponds while we were there and found some of the following in all 3.
Mosquito fish, Bluegill, Green Sunfish, Largemouth Bass.

most of the fish were sub 8 inch some down to sub 1 inch.

We were also told we could go fishing afterwards... however i was the only one to bring a pole and i guess being the odd man out..... no fishing.....how dare they. tease then take it away

Interesting that there are fish present in the dog ponds. Someone must have done a little midnight stocking lol.

wouldnt be a bit suprising. i dont know how much these area's flood during the winter and spring either. by the way I must add there are beavers and lots of woody debris in those dog ponds... (i found plenty in my wading expedition)

Aren't all the ponds connected underground?

i dont think the dog ponds are connected to the other 7 fishing ponds.

the_intimidator03 said:

i dont think the dog ponds are connected to the other 7 fishing ponds.

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That's entirely possible. Was there a lot of fish in them?

a lot of yearlings. we were pulling nets of probably 100-200 fish each pass the bigger bass and green sunfish were in the 4-8 inch range

The dog ponds aren't connected. Just the main fish ponds are. And the majority of the dog ponds are much higher and very far away.

But yeah there are a TON of beaver in those ponds. Some HUGE beaver "ramps" and trails going out of pond 7 to the dog pond that is directly south of it. And in the winter the ponds don't really raise all that much. I'd say about a foot, maybe a little bit more.

Still it's interesting that there are all those fish. Do you now if fishing is even allowed in the dog ponds? I always just heard that they are for dog training only and that there are no fish present.

Cool project or exploring you were able to do. Thanks for the report and insight.

I was planning on going to that but ended up I had to work lunch. I was hoping someone would seine a beaver...

no nasty beaver encounters... left all those on campus... Technically you CAN fish them altho the "dog people" wouldnt be happy about it. I believe odfw is looking into improving those other ponds for fishing and relocation the dog training area's to another section near the road.

Dog pond = The chocolate milk pond?

If so, that is about the only pond I fish unless Trout fishing, I'll just leave it at that, I learned on my own.

the_intimidator03 said:

no nasty beaver encounters... left all those on campus... Technically you CAN fish them altho the "dog people" wouldnt be happy about it. I believe odfw is looking into improving those other ponds for fishing and relocation the dog training area's to another section near the road.

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hehe...go Beavs!!! Nice report. I was wondering how it went and if you would post it....thanks. I, personally, stay away from those ponds.

Drew9870 said:

Dog pond = The chocolate milk pond?

If so, that is about the only pond I fish unless Trout fishing, I'll just leave it at that, I learned on my own.

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I'm assuming by "chocolate milk pond" you mean pond 7. It's the one that has no standing trees around it except on the far south east side. It's also the main one I fish, but it isn't one of the dog ponds. Those are all smaller and more to the south. There are a bunch of them.

pond 7 is part of the chain of managed ponds by ODFW. They dont know why it stays turbid. The dog ponds are further down and generally surrounded by brush with a few access points. these ponds are quite low genereally waist deep at the moment. and in checking them... we did find evidence of dogs... in the mud lol


Also, From what I saw it looked as if most of pond 3 was open around it from a lot of tree's and such which makes it suitable to flyfish. seems most of the other ponds had a bit of brush around them.

Yeah the best flyfishing ponds are 3 and 7. And there is an EXCELLENT point on pond 6 where 3 channels converge that is free of trees. The only bad thing about pond 3 is that it seems pretty dang shallow. I've never had much luck in it personally. I'll probably try to get out there the week after next to do some fishing.