State of the Nation...Fishing Related

[Big Sky]

This has been on my mind for a while. Fishing as an activity has exploded since the Covid Quarantine first started. My fear is that many fish and game departments are not paying close enough attention to what it is doing to the resource. They seem to be in a "wait and see" state of mind rather than adjusting quickly to the amount of pressure that is being put on fisheries everywhere in the US. I have personally watched one local river near my home be completely fished out of anything other than the tiny fish stocked last fall. In the past it had some very nice mature fish in it. They are now history and won't recover anytime soon if things don't change, or adjust for how society has evolved and acted during the pandemic. Last Saturday as I was fishing on a small local lake, near a small town, far from any major cities I couldn't help but be a little depressed by the tremendous number of people on the lake. What used to be just a few people, to then 20-30 people is now several hundred people. Yet the fish stocking numbers have stayed the same, the rules have stayed the same, the unlimited access has stayed the same. It's just a matter of time before the resource will be severely damaged if not completely depleted as has happened to the local river. I'm not against anyone fishing or enjoying it. I am against mismanagement of resources and ignoring what is right in front of everyone as they venture out to fish and have to basically find a place to squeeze in between the hordes of people on nearly every decent fishery in the state. When I talk to DNR about it I get really tired of the reply of:" Well if lots of people are fishing there then we must be doing something right." That is only half true. Maybe they did do some things so well everyone wants to fish there. The other half that is not being addressed, and basically ignored, is what are they going to do to maintain the quality with the extreme pressure on those fisheries. All is not well in Zion folks and people need to wake up!

For what it's worth here are a few of my thoughts and feel free to add your own thoughts.
One, increase the number of fish stocked in the most popular bodies of water. Two, reinstate a fishing season on some fisheries that are getting relentlessly hammered 24/7/365. Three, possibly consider some resident only days, like on Tuesdays and Thursdays. There should be some benefit to living in and paying taxes in this state. If you don't think out of state pressure isn't a factor then you haven't spent 5 minutes on the lakes, rivers, and streams from Nephi to the Arizona border. I'm not saying non-residents can't fish in Utah, just give two days a week to the residents. Lastly, consider completely shutting down all fishing on some lakes in the summer when it gets too hot and the oxygen is lower. This is mainly aimed towards trout that just can't recovered and die when caught during the hottest part of the summer. This not a close everything down for a month or two suggestion, but rather let the weather and water conditions dictate whether it's reasonable or not to stress the fish by allowing fishing during those peak high risk days.

Anyway I would be interested in hearing from others what they are seeing as far as pressure goes and what your thoughts are on the current state of fishing conditions throughout the state? Please keep it civil.

[DailyAngler]

You are not alone in your concern. It is certainly an important issue. My hope is we get people back to work and they wont have time to fish constantly. I would also assure you after working a couple seasons for DWR everyone that works for wildlife is very dedicated to keeping fishing and hunting great for everyone. The kind of people in the DWR have great care for our resources and I am confident they are addressing the issue.  I was creel surveyed by DWR at deer creek twice this year and the survey question related to if you are taking more fish due to covid. It can definantly be depressing to see fisheries decline and im sorry to hear about your river big sky.

[obifishkenobi]

Personally, I do not believe the increased pressure from anglers is a long term problem and in some cases is a good thing. Many of the species of fish that people are targeting like trout, wipers and Kokanee are designed to be a put and take fishery, so if a particular body of water gets fished out, which this years creel surveys will indicate, stocking numbers can be increased and those fishery's should rebound quickly because of increased forage, due to reduced bio mass. When we return to a new normal I suspect pressure will also go back closer to the level before the pandemic. I also think that increased pressure will lead to better quality fish of some species particularly Crappie and Perch who tend to over populate and stunt. Hyrum is a good example, last year it was no secret that there where lots of 8" easy to catch perch which is when they become attractive to harvest and lots of people did. This year there are fewer that are harder to catch but they are larger 10" perch, I would rather catch a dozen 10" perch than 40 8" perch. I love that people are hammering the crap out of the 6-8" Crappie at Pineview this year because that will result in 10-12" Crappie next year. As far as non residents, they are good for the bottom line of DWR budget and the local economy's where they spend there money so, on balance I don't take issue with them. Just my two cents.

[catchinon]

You make good points, Obi. But the "put and take" fish are a limited resource. Hatcheries can only produce so many fish. Maybe a 2 fish limit could help: if twice as many anglers take home half as many fish, well, you do the math.

[Big Sky]

I completely agree with Obi in regards to prolific fish that tend to stunt and overpopulate like crappie, sunfish, and perch. Trout on the other hand need different management and can easily be over fished, and completely eliminated in a hurry, because most lakes in Utah do not have the type of water needed for natural reproduction.

[SkunkedAgain]

I have been a little shocked by the high numbers of anglers on the ice this winter, especially last weekend at the gorge... I had no idea how popular the burbot bash had become... There were people lining shores for as far as the eyes could see... I've never seen so many folks at the gorge... but then I usually avoid going there on the bash weekend, so maybe it was the same as usual... just me there on a different weekend... But it has seemed like a busy ice season.. I used to fish lakes and would be the only one there, not this year...

I haven't kept many fish this year, so i don't expect I've hurt the population much, but I expect a lot of new ice fishermen are there for the meat, so it probably is hurting the numbers overall... Be interesting to see how this year affects things, but with the low water prospects it might be hard to tell whether drought or pressure made the difference.. both effects don't sound good for next years fishing though... Keeping my finger crossed... Later Jeff

[obifishkenobi]

You make good points, Obi. But the "put and take" fish are a limited resource. Hatcheries can only produce so many fish. Maybe a 2 fish limit could help: if twice as many anglers take home half as many fish, well, you do the math.

Personally, I do not mind fewer numbers of fish, one of the question they ask on angler surveys is would you like to catch more fish or larger fish, I lean on the side of catching larger fish. Fewer mouths to feed lead to larger fish. Also once a given body of water becomes more difficult for average anglers to find success, pressure will drop on that body of water, leaving it to more advanced anglers who are better at targeting the remaining larger fish. That being said I'm not apposed to changing rules and regulations to meet long term trends in our fisheries but, I think it is to soon to declare that our lakes and streams are fished out because of a once in a century pandemic. There was a post several weeks ago on the Idaho board complaining that all of the lakes in South East Idaho where fished out because of this past years increased pressure, based on this persons inability to catch fish through the ice this year. I responded to that post by saying that I  have had one of my best years ever in those same bodies of water, in both numbers and quality of fish caught. Fisheries are cyclical and always changing and to consistently catch fish you have to be willing to adapt to those changes, by changing tactics, species targeted or locations. An example of that for me is Willard, 5 years ago Wiper fishing was easy, I could count on catching 2-3 dozen wipers most trips and incidentally catching a few Walleye each year. Then the water came up, the shad population exploded and the DWR reduced the number of Wipers planted and increased the number of Walleye based on anglers desire to catch more walleye; all of these factors led to it being harder to catch big numbers of Wipers and made it easier to catch Walleye. I adapted, the last couple years I have been targeting Walleye and have good success while incidentally catching a few large Wipers.

[Big Sky]

Catching fish and catching what most consider big fish is not a big problem for me, but I put a lot of time into it. However, I've lived long enough to see a lot of places drop in what I consider quality due to over fishing, or mismanagement of the resource. It's not like Utah's DNR is impervious to mismanagement of fish and wildlife. Heck, I've read professional periodicals that use Utah as the example of what not to do with mule deer management. I've lived long enough to see Utah go from decent mule deer hunting to what it is now (read terrible!!!) The decline in deer hunting quality is a combination of too much hunting pressure, habitat loss, predators, and weather. Much of the same can be said for the fishing in Utah, and whether it will sustain quality or not. The pressure is through the roof and while it may lessen when people have less restrictions and have to work more, I don't think it will ever be as light of pressure as it was. For the simple fact a lot of new people have been introduced to fishing, and a lot of people who hadn't been in a long time rediscovered the joy it can bring. I expect a year or two from now the lakes will still be shoulder to shoulder during ice fishing and that spring ice out will be as crowded as ever, if not worse. I also expect that the fish stocking numbers won't change much if at all, and there will be very little if anything done by the DNR to adjust to the increase in pressure. I would love to be wrong about that last statement, but with nearly 6 decades of watching how Utah's DNR adapts to change my hopes aren't very high. For the record I was born in Utah, I graduated from both high school and college in Utah. However I spent a good part of my adult life out of state, hence my Big Sky name. I've fished all over the west and I can tell you there is better managed and really, really, really good fishing in other western states. The one thing those other states all have in common is that they adapt quickly and manage for what is best for the fishery rather than what is best for revenue, or even what is publicly popular. Now that I live in Utah again, I will continue to fish out of state, but I sure would love it if Utah would maintain/protect or improve much of what it has.

[Saltslam]

I could get on board with lower limits, but if we don't get some moisture it will be a moot point. I would suggest getting rid of these silly fishing contests other than for fish such as burbot and stripers. Perhaps crappie, perch as pup macks that are overpopulated as well. I'd bet half of the fish taken from the panguitch ice fishing tourney ended up in garbage cans after the tourney. What a waste of resources.

[FishfulThinkin]

This has been on my mind for a while. Fishing as an activity has exploded since the Covid Quarantine first started. My fear is that many fish and game departments are not paying close enough attention to what it is doing to the resource. They seem to be in a "wait and see" state of mind rather than adjusting quickly to the amount of pressure that is being put on fisheries everywhere in the US. I have personally watched one local river near my home be completely fished out of anything other than the tiny fish stocked last fall. In the past it had some very nice mature fish in it. They are now history and won't recover anytime soon if things don't change, or adjust for how society has evolved and acted during the pandemic. Last Saturday as I was fishing on a small local lake, near a small town, far from any major cities I couldn't help but be a little depressed by the tremendous number of people on the lake. What used to be just a few people, to then 20-30 people is now several hundred people. Yet the fish stocking numbers have stayed the same, the rules have stayed the same, the unlimited access has stayed the same. It's just a matter of time before the resource will be severely damaged if not completely depleted as has happened to the local river. I'm not against anyone fishing or enjoying it. I am against mismanagement of resources and ignoring what is right in front of everyone as they venture out to fish and have to basically find a place to squeeze in between the hordes of people on nearly every decent fishery in the state. When I talk to DNR about it I get really tired of the reply of:" Well if lots of people are fishing there then we must be doing something right." That is only half true. Maybe they did do some things so well everyone wants to fish there. The other half that is not being addressed, and basically ignored, is what are they going to do to maintain the quality with the extreme pressure on those fisheries. All is not well in Zion folks and people need to wake up!

For what it's worth here are a few of my thoughts and feel free to add your own thoughts.
One, increase the number of fish stocked in the most popular bodies of water. Two, reinstate a fishing season on some fisheries that are getting relentlessly hammered 24/7/365. Three, possibly consider some resident only days, like on Tuesdays and Thursdays. There should be some benefit to living in and paying taxes in this state. If you don't think out of state pressure isn't a factor then you haven't spent 5 minutes on the lakes, rivers, and streams from Nephi to the Arizona border. I'm not saying non-residents can't fish in Utah, just give two days a week to the residents. Lastly, consider completely shutting down all fishing on some lakes in the summer when it gets too hot and the oxygen is lower. This is mainly aimed towards trout that just can't recovered and die when caught during the hottest part of the summer. This not a close everything down for a month or two suggestion, but rather let the weather and water conditions dictate whether it's reasonable or not to stress the fish by allowing fishing during those peak high risk days.

Anyway I would be interested in hearing from others what they are seeing as far as pressure goes and what your thoughts are on the current state of fishing conditions throughout the state? Please keep it civil.

I think we all feel concerned for our precious resources here in the great state of Utah. Yes, the pandemic has accelerated the pressure this year but the overall trend of increased pressure on our resources has been going on for some time due to increasing population. I too am a native Utahn and have almost 6 decades of history here. I remember "opening day" as a boy and it seemed to me that it was elbow to elbow at Strawberry. I was amazed at the number of people lining the banks and the number of boats on the lake. I also remember the general deer hunt and school was actually dismissed on Friday and Monday of opening weekend because if they held school, very significant numbers would not be there due to the hunt. Those days we had a population of less than 1 million people in the state but a much higher percentage of the population participated in hunting and fishing. Over the last 40 years many people have left the sport but at the same time our population has tripled bringing many new people to the sport. I think we reached a tipping point this past year and I too noticed the congestion even on lakes as large as Strawberry and Flaming Gorge. Even mid-week. I know that it was partly due to the pandemic with more flexible work schedules etc. but the world is different now. Many people have the luxury to fish any day of the week they choose and are not bound by the M-F schedule. I wish there were an easy answer but the trend is not good. I foresee the population continuing to grow an that trend is happening in all our western states. I'm sure we could improve some areas of management but overall I applaud our wildlife resources department for doing the best they can on a very tough issue with limited resources. They do listen us so be sure to share your thoughts with them and attend the RAC meetings etc. The fact is that the population is growing and will continue to do so but the resources are somewhat limited. Bottom line for me is I was just born 100 years too late! At least that's what my kids tell me.

[Big Sky]

FishfulT, I remember the opening day crowds as well for fishing season. However the numbers decreased pretty fast after opening day and by fall hardly anyone fished as they were too busy hunting. Just a little over a year ago if I fished around here after work on a weekday I rarely saw anyone else except during the summer. Now, as you mentioned, it doesn't seem to matter what day you go there is always a crowd. As for the local river here, it went mostly un-fished during the week prior to the pandemic and only was lightly fished on the weekends. It was a nice place to go after work and not have to deal with people. About the second week of the quarantine is when people started showing up. Large groups from California and Nevada. On any given day every parking spot had multiple vehicles parked there. About 13 months ago is was predominantly a brown trout river with a few rainbows for good measure. Catching a 18"-20"+ fish was expected to happen on nearly every trip. Now there are virtually no brown trout and if you do catch one it will be very tiny. What few fish a person will catch will be finless 10" or smaller rainbows from the most recent stocking. I've fished that river on and off for 30 years and it is as bad as it gets right now. Not even worth fishing at all. It's total demise is purely due to pressure and taking too many fish out of it. It won't be long before this trend will be noticed all across the state if not already.

[Envenomation09]

FishfulT, I remember the opening day crowds as well for fishing season. However the numbers decreased pretty fast after opening day and by fall hardly anyone fished as they were too busy hunting. Just a little over a year ago if I fished around here after work on a weekday I rarely saw anyone else except during the summer. Now, as you mentioned, it doesn't seem to matter what day you go there is always a crowd. As for the local river here, it went mostly un-fished during the week prior to the pandemic and only was lightly fished on the weekends. It was a nice place to go after work and not have to deal with people. About the second week of the quarantine is when people started showing up. Large groups from California and Nevada. On any given day every parking spot had multiple vehicles parked there. About 13 months ago is was predominantly a brown trout river with a few rainbows for good measure. Catching a 18"-20"+ fish was expected to happen on nearly every trip. Now there are virtually no brown trout and if you do catch one it will be very tiny. What few fish a person will catch will be finless 10" or smaller rainbows from the most recent stocking. I've fished that river on and off for 30 years and it is as bad as it gets right now. Not even worth fishing at all. It's total demise is purely due to pressure and taking too many fish out of it. It won't be long before this trend will be noticed all across the state if not already.

Sooooo many out of state folks fishing our Utah waters this year. I live in Cedar City so I'm often out on Panguitch Lake, Duck Creek, the forks of the Sevier, etc. and I had never seen these places get so hammered day in and day out like this year. Largely from Nevadans and Californians. I know there's not much to be done about it, but these aren't huge lakes or rivers and there aren't very many of them. This isn't Pyramid Lake or the Henry's Fork. We have small to midsized desert streams and lakes and they can't always take the pressure. It's really been unfortunate to see some places decline. A friend of mine counted 30 float tubes on a small high mountain lake at the same time (!) at one point this summer. :/ idk what can be done. There's too many people these days and too much info on our fisheries.

[Big Sky]

Envenomation09, I feel your pain brother. I don't live all that far from you and unless one lives in Southern Utah and see's it for themselves it is hard to fathom the out of state pressure here. Even if you do see it for yourself it's hard to fathom or comprehend. One's brain does not want to accept what the eyes are seeing.

[richyd4u]

2020 was a nightmare for us Southern UT fishermen. The only good time was with the initial outbreak in early spring and local waters shutting down to county residents only. As soon as that lifted, the CAs and NVs started POURING into our local waters. As an avid bass fisherman and trout fly fisherman, there were mornings that we arrived to SH and it was already closed for the day due to overcrowding. All the plates we saw were NV and CA, with very few UT. It was the same scene at our higher elevation trout waters...Panguitch, Kolob, Minersville, etc were LOADED with out of state people. We talked several times with the owner of that little burger shack at Panguitch and he KILLED it this year! Busiest year he's every had up there. So, it may be good for commerce...but it will take a toll on fisheries and over-all enjoyment of our tax-funded waters. I agree something should be done to reduce out-of-state access. Not sure how that would look, but something should be considered. I always like opening day as a kid, it was more exciting than Christmas to us! I like the idea of letting fisheries "rest". Although our fishery's as kids closed during the winter months, and opened in the spring...I like the idea of closing trout waters during the heat of the summer months, especially those that allow bait fishing. Any fish caught on bait and released is probably going to die, but there is zero chance of them surviving during warm water months. These summer months are also when the NV and CA hoards show up at our lakes. Anyways...hoping things will open more up with the COVID restrictions this year and give those NV and CA people more options.

[Bovineowner]

I spend a lot of time on the West Desert and in SE Utah. I have never seen pressure like 2020 in my 52 years on this planet. I counted 71 side by sides in one group while checking my cattle. The road was turned into flour. This is a road i have traveled my entire life and have went summers where i didn't pass 10 vehicles all summer! I was fortunate to draw a multiseason bear tag in San Juan county and made 11 trips down during the year to hunt bears. Colorado and Arizona and California license plates were everywhere. My good friends who live down there said the same thing. Our state continues to spout the benefits of tourism and throws open its arms to subdivision after subdivision. Meanwhile, we are still the 2nd driest state in the US and are in the midst of terrible drought. The growth that is wonderful for construction jobs, ect. is simply destroying what makes Utah special. Overcrowding, noise, air and light pollution, lack of water, where does it end? All the natural resources will pay the price.

For what its worth-
I realize some may say I'm a hypocrite, as i am a rancher. But i truly care for the land under my stewardship. Without plentiful grass and water, my cattle cannot be productive. I work very hard to not over-stock the land. I try and "bank" grass each year and leave at least half the grass in a pasture that was there when i turned cattle in. I scatter salt on high ridges to draw them away from riparian areas. And ranchers are becoming more and more rare. Each year, American family farms and ranches lose 2600 operations. They become subdivisions and shopping centers or are absorbed into corporate holdings. Someday when a loaf of bread is $20 and comes from Mexico, we will all suffer the consequences. Unlimited and unchecked growth has lots of unintended consequences. That is a much scarier proposition than a temporary covid quarantine to me.

[catchinon]

Maybe they should do like they have with certain big-game hunts. Residents would have unlimited fishing licenses but non-residents would have a quota. That would probably never work because it would hurt the bottom line. How about charging an exorbitant fee for the non-residents? Of course many residents would scream that it was too expensive for their Idaho cousins or whatever. How about we limit the number of licenses per state based on how many of our residents bought non-resident licenses in their state.

To previous posters: be careful what you wish for. Moving lands, etc. from federal to state ownership/control often backfires. Sometimes the states then sell "our" lands to private entities who proceed to charge huge fees to use them or lock everyone out. One example: I used to pore over land-ownership maps to find pockets that I thought might be good places to hunt. I always considered the blue school sections to be open to public use. Not so. Many have been leased to individuals and companies for various uses but they are almost always posted like private land. The silver lining was that the monies obtained went to the public schools. I'm not sure but I'm afraid some of them were sold and "we" lost the benefits.

[Bovineowner]

Maybe they should do like they have with certain big-game hunts. Residents would have unlimited fishing licenses but non-residents would have a quota. That would probably never work because it would hurt the bottom line. How about charging an exorbitant fee for the non-residents? Of course many residents would scream that it was too expensive for their Idaho cousins or whatever. How about we limit the number of licenses per state based on how many of our residents bought non-resident licenses in their state.

To previous posters: be careful what you wish for. Moving lands, etc. from federal to state ownership/control often backfires. Sometimes the states then sell "our" lands to private entities who proceed to charge huge fees to use them or lock everyone out. One example: I used to pore over land-ownership maps to find pockets that I thought might be good places to hunt. I always considered the blue school sections to be open to public use. Not so. Many have been leased to individuals and companies for various uses but they are almost always posted like private land. The silver lining was that the monies obtained went to the public schools. I'm not sure but I'm afraid some of them were sold and "we" lost the benefits.

So the USFS fiasco at Pineview where the public is locked out of using the reservoir is a better idea? And as a person who leases State school sections i can verify that it CANNOT be locked by ANY lessee!!! If you find locked state land, Call the school trust administration and report it. Its highly illegal.

[TheOtherSide]

I don't have any answers, but I certainly can chime in on how insanely busy and packed it was this year. Open bull elk tags sold out in hours which is utterly unheard of, so I ended up with a spike only, and only sorta hunted. First time in my hunting lifetime I wasn't able to secure an open bull elk tag.
I spent around 15-20 days in the Boulder area like I do every year, fly fishing and hiking. Places where I normally wouldn't see a person for days, I was running into many people daily. They all seemed to be from California, Washington, Oregon, and various other places. The small mountain lakes were busier than I've ever experienced, and this was after schools were back in session. Well, at least in this state and everywhere except SLC.
The garbage left everywhere was shocking. I personally removed 9 55 gallon garbage bags from one camp area's bear boxes, and bags of garbage from other backpacking campsites where people just left all their trash in the bear boxes. It was disgusting. I've never seen anything like it.

[MWScott72]

Stupid Dem run states that completely or mostly shut down their own states so that their citizens can overrun arguably better run states that adjoin them. That’s my take anyway and it’s .

I am wholeheartedly against turning over Fed land to States. The short term benefits (think current Pineview situation) are enticing, but in EVERY case in the west, those states then begin to sell off what once was public land to private interests. Every. Single. Time.

As frustrating as the Feds can be, they have a multi-use mandate that States do not. That and any Tom, Dick, and Harry can file lawsuit after lawsuit tying their hands to do anything productive in the present. I don’t envy their position.

[gofish435]

To previous posters: be careful what you wish for. Moving lands, etc. from federal to state ownership/control often backfires. Sometimes the states then sell "our" lands to private entities who proceed to charge huge fees to use them or lock everyone out. One example: I used to pore over land-ownership maps to find pockets that I thought might be good places to hunt. I always considered the blue school sections to be open to public use. Not so. Many have been leased to individuals and companies for various uses but they are almost always posted like private land. The silver lining was that the monies obtained went to the public schools. I'm not sure but I'm afraid some of them were sold and "we" lost the benefits.

Did you know that from 2007 - 2017 that the DWR was paying SITLA $500,000/year to allow for sportsman's access to our state lands?  

They were supposed to negotiate a new contract in 2018 and I'm not sure what the status is now.