Mountian Man
Bring back da saimanz

#MEGA

Three species of sammins I'd like to see on the Tribs: Atlantics, Pinks, and Chums. We don't need those overrated eating machine Chinooks and Silvers, give the roughsalmon a chance they're way cooler! And the smell of rotting Chums plus the gulls it'll attract should decrease the crowds. Bam, just solved our fish-angler ratio dilemma. Now where can we procure some big Oncorhynchus keta, hmm...

Southernpagreatlaker91
Haha ya really think fisherman care about dead Sam's everywhere lol have ya ever fished Altmar now that's some stink. Worst smell lfz most anglers lfz

Haha, maybe not. I don't fish the NY Salmon, to many guys there to make it worth it for moldy boots, I just wait until the Salmon are done and the Troot take over. If it smells anything like washed up Drum baking in the sun and being picked apart by seagulls and flies then I wouldn't want anywhere near it lol.

Southernpagreatlaker91
Well then trust this you don't want a bunch of Sam's plugging up your steely waters lol

Probably not, though I didn't see or smell any dead Pinks last fall and there were a somewhat large amount of them in Sept-Oct. Maybe the Steelbows just ate their flesh :p

nerka

Divemaster

Mountian Man
Bring back da saimanz

#MEGA

Three species of sammins I'd like to see on the Tribs: Atlantics, Pinks, and Chums. We don't need those overrated eating machine Chinooks and Silvers, give the roughsalmon a chance they're way cooler! And the smell of rotting Chums plus the gulls it'll attract should decrease the crowds. Bam, just solved our fish-angler ratio dilemma. Now where can we procure some big Oncorhynchus keta, hmm...

well dr benke aka divemaster... i do agree with you about the kings...  the atlantics prob wouldnt do as well in lake erie  like they do to some extent in lake ontario  different forage base   the atlantics arent too fond of oily baitfish  alewifes shad etc..prefer smelt......and the chums  eat more of krill and other invertrabates while out in the SALT,,,again wrong forage base  like your ideas on them though....plus most great lakes anglers want  big fish  and the kings are that  big big big  its instilled in them and that wont change  yes  chum get large but with the right forage wich erie couldnt supply....

I'm not sure how Atlantics would do but based on their forage habits I think they'd do better in Erie's eastern better than they do in Lake O, since our east basin seems more similar to a large finger lake in some ways. Erie's OW has really no Alewives or other Shad species in it. The shallow and high water column forage is primarily Emerald Shiners while the primary deep water is Rainbow Smelt, with Gobies mixed in both shallow and deep. And Atlantics may not grow as large as Chinooks but they're still a very large fish, equal to or larger than our mutt Steelbows. Take a look at some Euro Atlantics too, some easily over 40-50", though I'd never expect them to get that big in the GLs. Check out the northern Lake Huron/St. Mary's River Atlantic fishery. Those fish are averaging 3-8 pounds with some larger ones in the mix and growing to that size feeding on emeralds, smelt, and Ciscos while in Lake Huron. Not those nasty Thiaminase rich Alewives in Lakes ON and MI, bleh!

"Erie's OW has really no Alewives or other Shad species in it. "

Once again, the amount of misinformation you spew baffles me.

are alewives the little fish that have a distinct black dot about the size of their eye?
if so...I recall seeing a bazzilions of 'em years ago in a Painsville area  creek.
The small feeder creek , gin clear water  conditions and sunny day made 'em look like "glitter" in the water there were so many.
I recall it because it  was the first time I ever saw  the, "pretty little glitter  fish" .... with extra eyes
 
 
N. atherinoides, N. hudsonius, O. mordax, and N. melanostomus.
 
ccan you put that in laymen's terms for me, Capt'n?
 
Me personally, I wouldn't waste a dime of Fed,  State 'n local recour$es stocking salmon the same size as steel in Lake Erie
Spend the dough on steel ...make eerie grate again
 
..L.T.A.

"Me personally, I wouldn't waste a dime of Fed, State 'n local recour$es stocking salmon the same size as steel in Lake Erie
Spend the dough on steel ...make eerie grate again"

Genie,
I agree.
And that's exactly what PA did after 2003. More bang for the buck with steelhead.

The little bait fish you saw could've been alewives or gizzard shad.
Happens every year. Some more than others.

Ironhed
You need to spend more time on the water and less time internet fishing.
Unfortunately, I cannot post pictures from my phone...stomach contents of the fish we catch in open water don't lie, junior.
If you can't ID a pink over a king salmon it makes me wonder if you can ID a shiner over a gizzard shad...

Oh I spend much more time outdoors than on this internet contraption, bud. 142 days logged on the water last year, which is pretty good for a guy who doesn't do it for a living. Not going to argue with you if you find alewives in their stomachs, but that is odd without a doubt, considering Alewife abundance is very low basin wide as of the most recent survey. That one Salmon was an odd one, no one I know has been able to give it a 100% ID yet, including a couple of fishery biologists, so I'm just calling it a Pinook haha. Caught a few pure Pinks and Chinooks over the summer and they're easy to tell apart for the most part, just that one weirdo!

I looked at pics of alewives and gizz
They all look alike to me....
I do recall a blue hue up top
 
LTA

genieman77
I looked at pics of alewives and gizzThey all look alike to me....I do recall a blue hue up top LTA

Short bottom jaw=Gizzard
Long bottom jaw=Alewife

Divemaster
 142 days logged on the water last year, which is pretty good for a guy who doesn't do it for a living. 

5 months on the water ? Wow , Erie must have calmed down last year. What that cost in gas ?

Ironhed

Divemaster

Ironhed
You need to spend more time on the water and less time internet fishing.
Unfortunately, I cannot post pictures from my phone...stomach contents of the fish we catch in open water don't lie, junior.
If you can't ID a pink over a king salmon it makes me wonder if you can ID a shiner over a gizzard shad...

Oh I spend much more time outdoors than on this internet contraption, bud. 142 days logged on the water last year, which is pretty good for a guy who doesn't do it for a living. Not going to argue with you if you find alewives in their stomachs, but that is odd without a doubt, considering Alewife abundance is very low basin wide as of the most recent survey. That one Salmon was an odd one, no one I know has been able to give it a 100% ID yet, including a couple of fishery biologists, so I'm just calling it a Pinook haha. Caught a few pure Pinks and Chinooks over the summer and they're easy to tell apart for the most part, just that one weirdo!

How many days on Lake Erie?
How many fish have you opened up?
Odd, huh?
Those fish biologists should lose their jobs if they couldn't ID that thing. Who were the biologists, btw?

40-50 days, roughly. I CPR everything but a few bycatch eyes here and there so no popping their stomachs open other than that. I didn't say I don't believe you, it's just strange, you know, catching a large quantity of offshore predators full of a species with low abundance basinwide. The Gizzard Shad I get when the Trout are nearshore and in the bay but I'm perplexed by the alewives. According to the GLFC "age-0 Alewife numbers remained low in all jurisdictions (<6/ha)" (LEC Forage Task Group 2016). So you see why I am intrigued.

Don't know what to tell you about the Salmon my man, had off fin ray counts and overall morphology. All the pinks and chinooks I caught last season were distinct, that one fish was not. Biologists I know are a couple of PFBC guys that go to my local Sportsmans club, showed them the pics and they argued about it for half an hour before deciding there either wasn't enough details or it was a hybrid.

Ironhed
"According to the GLFC "age-0 Alewife numbers remained low in all jurisdictions (<6/ha)" (LEC Forage Task Group 2016). So you see why I am intrigued."

Ask any charter captain on ANY great lake, not just Erie and they will tell you the same as I.
Believe the guys that do a few trawls, extrapolate the numbers from the limited data they receive or believe the guys that are out there EVERY DAY.
I really wish our biologists were allotted more funds for the work that they do but their hands are tied.

The rest, I'm just gonna smh...

Guess I'll just have to pop a few stomachs this coming season to see for myself, because now I'm very curious as to the offshore forage base. Are you finding gizzard Shad in stomachs offshore as well or just nearshore? I'm hesitant to believe that there's any significant number of alewives up on lakes Huron and superior though, maybe a remnant stock but the Salmonids on those two (notably superior) aren't suffering from thiamine deficieny nearly as frequently as Ontario-Michigan ones are, so that has to be an indicator of a thiamin rich (ex. Ciscos) and Thiaminase poor (few alewives) diet. I couldn't agree more with wanting our biologists to receive more funds for research and analysis of data, hopefully that's coming in the near future but I have my doubts.

johnthefisherman
Do you guys realize where the name "the stinkhole" originated? 

Are you referring to the area in PIB?

Divemaster

johnthefisherman
Do you guys realize where the name "the stinkhole" originated? 

Are you referring to the area in PIB?

Yes.