"Willi" wrote


It's amazing to me how much angling pressure a trout population in a
fertile environment can handle. The C&Ring does beat up some of the fish
but the populations can be amazing in terms of numbers and size.


I'm several hours of phone calls and web surfing into my efforts to get a
better idea of what fishing pressure might do to the overall ecology, with
little concrete results. It seems that fish counts are about all that have
actually been studied. Studies on how creatures further down, and up, the
food chain are affected by crowds of fishermen don't seem to have been done.
At least not done and published in easy to find places.

But, the encouraging news is that "we" don't seem to have as much negative
impact as might seem likely. That is, if the trout is considered and
indicator, i.e. his numbers seen as a reflection of overall health. And
that is probably reasonable, since if wading crowds were decimating the
invertebrates, the trout population would follow.

MY "guess" and it's strictly a guess, although I'm continuing to look for
facts to make that guess better informed is that C&R is NOT "no kill" and
that the C&R mortality is the single biggest effect of fishing pressure on
C&R waters. Playing them quickly, not touching them more than you must, not
taking them out into the air long periods for photos ( 30 seconds is proven
a "long" period that reduces survival ), reviving them completely, and
stopping fishing before you " C and R" large numbers ( since a small
percentage mortality of a large number is still a large number ) would seem
the most vital part of "treading lightly."

Here is nearly the only mention of fishing pressure being a reason for
science I've found so far, outside of C&R mortality studies. It's from a
Yellowstone annual fisheries report

"In response to concerns related to perceived
excessive angler use and potential riparian
damage, the fisheries staff initiated a multi-year
population assessment of Yellowstone cutthroat
trout in Slough Creek. In the mid-1990s, annual
angler use occasionally exceeded 25,000 hours
but has since returned to levels observed ten
years earlier. Concurrently, hourly catch rates
declined to below one fish per hour. With this
information as background, some of the more
heavily used portions of Slough Creek were
sampled in 2001 and 2002. Preliminary results
indicate that the Yellowstone cutthroat trout
population has changed little since the stream
was last sampled in 1989 Despite high levels of
angler use in this catch and release fishery, we
estimate that there are several hundred adult
cutthroat trout (longer than 330 mm) per
kilometer in Slough Creek. "


Implied, is that the Yellowstone biologists think the fish a good
"indicator" of overall riparian health.

My search will continue, it's and interesting topic. NONE, of my letters to
prominent people in FF industry or conservation organizations, has been
answered, thus far. I have talked to two fisheries biologists on the
phone, and was given good advice on what journals and such might have
information published. Neither knew of any studies beyond fish counts, on
fishing pressure on C&R waters.