Had a discussion with a biologist that works Pymy recently and he noted that there are qutie a few small 'eyes on the management side in the nets and a CONSPICUOUS ABSENCE of Alewife on that side.
 
HmMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

We ruined it for ourselves . Stock walleye fry along with Musky ???? Brilliant ... allow alewives to take over the lake & eat the plankton. The only way the eyes are gonna come back strong is to stock fingerlings not fry .... Cannot have all species in one lake they compete & conflict with eachother. Go to Lake Erie plenty of big eyes up there . I won't waste my time at pymy howver ; I hope a miracle does happen for you regulars.

ORIGINAL: Storm Warning 2

Had a discussion with a biologist that works Pymy recently and he noted that there are qutie a few small 'eyes on the management side in the nets and a CONSPICUOUS ABSENCE of Alewife on that side.

HmMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

 
 
 
it will take an act of Congress to get the PFBC to admit alewives are the problem. however, if the possibilty of steroids in the alewives exists, arlen specter may investigate the pymy problem.

alewives bad news for plankton.

When is alewives season open?

always.lol they reproduce like rabbits

I know that they eat a lot of walleye and perch fry too.
 
Read about Saginaw Bay and its miraculous rebirth since the early 2000s...

What is your source for Saginaw? I would love to read up on it.

Strong hatches of Saginaw Bay walleye occur when adult alewives are scarce!
Ann Arbor, MI — Recent strong hatches of walleye in Saginaw Bay were most likely a result of low alewife abundance, and not other environmental factors.
Walleye has been stocked almost annually in Saginaw Bay since the 1978, and their population has little natural reproduction despite abundant adults. This changed suddenly in 2003-2005, when record high levels of natural recruitment were observed.
Researchers from the U.S. Geological Survey and Michigan Department of Natural Resources (MDNR) teamed up to try and learn the reason for this change. Saginaw Bay is well-studied, so they compiled a broad array of environmental data from the bay to see which environmental patterns best explained the recent record hatches. It turned out that the most likely explanation was recent low alewife abundance, and not weather patterns as has been thought previously. David Fielder, an MDNR research biologist says "we believe that poor walleye reproduction prior to 2003 was due to adult alewive preying on or competing with walleye fry just after they hatch. As soon as the alewive declined in Lake Huron, walleye reproductive success greatly increased for three years in a row despite very different spring conditions." Findings from this study may allow MDNR to adjust stocking rates by predicting years when natural walleye reproduction will occur. This study also indicates that the decline in Lake Huron alewife, while bad for Chinook salmon, had positive effects in Saginaw Bay.
Original Publication Information
Results of this study "Environmental and Ecological Conditions Surrounding the Production of Large Year Classes of Walleye (Sander vitreus) in Saginaw Bay, Lake Huron," are reported by David G. Fielder, Jeffery S. Schaeffer and Michael V. Thomas in the latest issue (Volume 33, No. sup1, pp. 118-132) of the Journal of Great Lakes Research, published by the International Association for Great Lakes Research, 2007.
Contacts
For more information about the study, David Fielder, Michigan Department of Natural Resources, Alpena Fisheries Research Station, 160 E. Fletcher Street, Alpena, MI 49707 USA; fielderd@michigan.gov; (989) 356-3232.

Thank you.