The arrival of Brook Trout in Oregon

[Irishrover]

Today in most streems and lakes in Oregon there is no size limit or bag limit for Brook Trout. The reason is it's a non native fish and there is an efferort to reestablish the native rainbow population. (Native in the most loose scense of the word).

"Beginning in the early 1910s, state hatcheries produced millions of rainbow trout fry. They used mules, horses, hikers, trains, and cars to deliver the popular game fish to new and remote locations. Pacific Northwest rainbow trout were also introduced to waterways in many foreign countries. In exchange, non-natives such as the brook trout were introduced in Oregon. " Coppied from an Oregon history site.

"Danger to Local Native Trout
The introduced alien trout in each place are doing better than native species. Most of the thirteen species of cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarki) native to the Pacific coast of North America have been pushed out by brown, brook and rainbow trout. And, in ironic twist of fate, the brown trout in the UK is struggling to maintain a foothold against brook trout introduced from the US."

"As awareness of trouble caused by introduced species increases, efforts are being made to undo damage done by intentional trout release for sport fishing worldwide." Coppied from an article on invasive trout species.

There have been a lot of species introduced into Oregon waters. I do believe that the fish biologist during that time period were trying there best to create a healthy diverse fishing experience for the angler. It just developed some problems and now they are trying to reverse the process. It seems that the brook trout is one aggressive eater and can out compete the rainbow for food. It also didn't help that there was no bag limit on trout until 1901, and that limit was set at 125 fish per-day.

Taking brook trout out of the system is just a method of helping those rainbow re-establish themselves in their original natural area.

Some of the non native fish introduced include the brown trout, brook trout, atlantic salmon, shad and walleye. I just hope no one introduced the piranha.:shock:

 

[ketts05]

Nice post, lots of good info. I've often wondered how the brook trout pushes the rainbow so hard when the brown trout is a more predatory fish that would seem equally or even more detrimental to species like the rainbow or cutthroat. A really interesting article here about northern pike getting into trout rivers in Montana and possibly doing some serious damage. I think pike fishing would be fun I would not want to see it at the downfall of "native" trout populations throughout the state. If you look around on the (or read moldychum) there is a rebuttal to this article on that website, but, no offense to the writer, I thought it lacked the convincing evidence that trout and pike can co-exist without the trout population taking a major hit.

 

[Irishrover]

That's quite a picture in that first link. I like the part about cutting the heads off the pikes. I had read another article about the introduction of pike and walleye to Montana. My preference is to keep the native species healthy and not introduce non native fish. Non native made a mess out of Diamond Lake and it took years to get it back to normal. I hope we never see a pike here in Oregon.

 

[bigsteel]

didn't someone use koi as live bait at diamond lake

 

[Troutier Bassier]

Atlantic Salmon? Where do they swim?

 

[beaverfan]

They have them in East Lake and Lost Lake going over Santiam Pass as well as a few more lakes.

 

[Irishrover]

People dumped a lot of things in Diamond Lake. It would not suprise me in the least if they put some kio in the lake. The big problem started when folks used live minnows for bait. In California it's legal to use live minnows and it works great for bass. But when they got loose in Diamond Lake it got ugly.

Hosmer Lake, one of the fantastic Cascade Lakes is one of the locations where atlantic salmon swim. They are catch and release only now.

 

[Fish-On Fred]

No More!!!

No More!!!

:think:Last june, I went up to Diamond Lake after I fished O'Dell Lake for a week, I learned that after the lake, (Diamond Lake), got rid of the problem that it had, someone brought up from CA., another minnow to catch the big ones. When will this stop? Selfish people screwing up!!!! This was told by a young man that was obsearving my boat for invasive things. Now, we pay for these stupid acts. Please do not encourage this behavior as our future fishing for native fish is held in the balance.......Fredrotest:

 

[troutdude]

It was indeed Koi Minnows that caused the problem. So, checking boats for live bait ought to be a standard ODFW / OSP practice!

I vote to arrest anyone with California license plates, at Diamond Lake...unless, they pay 5 times the going rate for an out of state license! :shock:

OK. Maybe that's a bit harsh...but, you get the idea.

 

[ketts05]

Hahaha, I am with you troutdude can we keep all these out-of-towners away from the peaceful and well maintains streams and lakes?!? Nah, but I don't think its out of order to make sure that out of state licensees are forced to read the regulations cover to cover and asked about any laws that are different from the state they are from (over and over and over again). Frankly there are jerks everywhere that ignore the rules to land a few fish but a lot of it is ignorance and instead of going by the rules that if you don't know error on caution they just assume that its okay to do things the same way everywhere.

 

[Mad dog]

Just think of all the introduced species....Largemouth, Smallmouth, Striped bass, all panfish other than Sacremento perch, carp, Channel catfish, Mackinaw....all species that the majority of anglers here relish the thought of fishing for!

You can blame Californian's or other out of state anglers for Oregons problems but the truth to the matter is that I see lot's of NON ENGLISH speaking people that are residents or Oregon that don't or won't follow the fishing regs or fish without ethics as well!