Montana news ticker

Had pot-luck lunch a few days ago with some old friends, including a
suprise (to me) guest: Montana's now semi-retired Dick Vincent.
Dick was the guy who's research led to the end of
fish stocking in Montana rivers thirty years ago.
Dick made a career out of studying Montana's Madison River.
It was Dick who first broke the whirling disease
story back in the early 1980s.

=========Whirling disease (not the Saturday night variety)
Dick talked a lot about a paper he will try to
publish later this year, summarizing 28 years
of whirling disease research.

This is an interesting story. There is strong and growing evidence
the fish are adapting in different ways at different
rates in different systems.

Willow Creek above Harrison Resevoir, for instance, was so heavily
infected a few years back, the rainbow populations
quickly dropped to near nothing. But now they're back. The worms
and the parasites are still there, but Willow Creek's DeSmet
strain Rainbows (oritginally stocked from Lake DeSmet in Wyoming many
years ago) have rebounded strongly and quickly. The resevoir and the
feeder creeks have good numbers of big, fat rainbows again, all the
way up to 6-8 pounds. Total numbers are still measurably below their
historic highs, but there are good numbers of fish now, including some
real honkers.

The Madison has come back too.
But unlike Willow Creek, the Madison's rebound has
come at the expense of larger fish. Madison river rainbows
are now showing unmistakable signs of biological resistance
to the disease. Fish that would have died 10-15 years
ago are now living 3-4 years. But unlike Willow Creek,
not many live longer than that.

The Missouri near Wolf Creek, below the damns, is still a mystery.
Recruitment from the Prickley Pear and the Deerborn
has dropped precipitously. But the biologists (apparently)
underestimated the importance of main-stem rainbow spawning as well
as recruitment from tiny, heretofore unnoticed feeder streams.
Missouri river rainbow numbers are indeed down from their historically
high numbers, but not nearly so much as previously expected.

Mainstem Missouri silt pads still hold large numbers of
tubifex worms. But those worm pods have not become infected,
not to the degree they have in the Prickley Pear and
the Deerborn anyway. So a more extensive infestation still
lurks as a disturbing Missouri River possibility.
But it hasn't happened yet.

Each ecosystem seems to have its own environment, quirks
and responses. Each case is a little bit different.
That was the gist of his lunch-time whirling disease story.

=========Pike in the Gallatin
Dick's most disturbing news concerned the lower mainstem
Gallatin. Illegally stocked pike, from a rich man's farm pond,
escaped into the river a few years back. And it looks like
they've taken hold. A few huge, close to 40" pike have been
taken from the lower Gallatin. Worse yet, so have some small ones too.

Pike have existed in the Big Horn for years. So how bad this
new Gallatin River Pike story turns out to be remains to be seen.
But it isn't good news, no matter how you spin it.
How far down the system will they migrate? A Canyon Ferry
Perch party now seems inevitable. How far upstream?

==========Whitefish
Whitefish populations, Dick said, are in decline throughout
the northern rockies, and they don't know why. I think I've noticed
this.
The numbers of whitefish you catch on the Yellowstone now do seem
to be way down the last few years. Dick said there is some
temperature
speculation, but no studies and no real evidence.

Adult whitefish can withstand high temperatures, perhaps better than
most trout. But whitefish fingerlings (which hatch out in Feb-March)
need cold temperatures. And we've had over a decade of warm/dry
winters
now. Dick also mentioned that Whitefish fingerlings are an important
eary season trout food.

while-one wrote:
Had pot-luck lunch a few days ago with some old friends, including a
suprise (to me) guest: Montana's now semi-retired Dick Vincent.
Dick was the guy who's research led to the end of
fish stocking in Montana rivers thirty years ago.

Thanks for the thoughtful and informative post.

Tim Lysyk

"while-one" wrote in message
...
Had pot-luck lunch a few days ago with some old friends, including a
suprise (to me) guest: Montana's now semi-retired Dick Vincent.
Dick was the guy who's research led to the end of
fish stocking in Montana rivers thirty years ago.
Dick made a career out of studying Montana's Madison River.
It was Dick who first broke the whirling disease
story back in the early 1980s.



Interesting stuff .... thanks