15+ lb Potomac river snakehead

[Arowana1]

First thing, it is too late to fix the mistakes. Second thing, I cringed when you mentioned "native" sport fishery since the popular gamefish ain't native to most areas. Third thing, there are no negative effects from snakeheads on the ecosystems beside the waters where the snakeheads were found was already altered, full of non-native fishes.

Your logic is off, it is not to late to manage or fix a mistake. They removed all the Northern Pike from Lake Davis/California. As well there is a native sport fishery for all areas of the USA. Here in California it is the Trout, Salmon and Sturgeon fishery (not a bass or sunfish fishery). As well ironically their is a native species (the Bowfin Amia calva) that is found in the Southern USA that is essentially an American version of a Snakehead. Lastly the Snakehead is an apex predator and whenever you add a new apex predator it has effects on the entire ecosystem and to think it is not going to have an effect on the native fishery long term is naive. Even though it may take Fisheries Biologist decades before we have got a complete idea of what kind of effect Snakeheads are going to have on the native fisheries. From what I have read about Snakehead management in Florida is there is a 100% cull for all Snakeheads caught that limits and reduces populations in Florida. To encourage an invasive (not even native to North America) sportfishery to US water ways to me is a bad idea.

Jeremy

 

[MN_Rebel]

Your logic is off, it is not to late to manage or fix a mistake. They removed all the Northern Pike from Lake Davis/California. As well there is a native sport fishery for all areas of the USA. Here in California it is the Trout, Salmon and Sturgeon fishery (not a bass or sunfish fishery). As well ironically their is a native species (the Bowfin Amia calva) that is found in the Southern USA that is essentially an American version of a Snakehead. Lastly the Snakehead is an apex predator and whenever you add a new apex predator it has effects on the entire ecosystem and to think it is not going to have an effect on the native fishery long term is naive. Even though it may take Fisheries Biologist decades before we have got a complete idea of what kind of effect Snakeheads are going to have on the native fisheries. From what I have read about Snakehead management in Florida is there is a 100% cull for all Snakeheads caught that limits and reduces populations in Florida. To encourage an invasive (not even native to North America) sportfishery to US water ways to me is a bad idea.

Jeremy

While it is easier to remove a non native fish from a lake. However it is physically impossible to remove a non native fish from river systms. Once again please explain to me why snakeheads has to go but other nonnative fishes are allowed to stay? However not all fisherman will cull snakehead in florida. California have excellent. bass fishery if i am not mistaken. You know snakeheads has been in the Americas for 20years and no negative effects has surfaced.

 

[FLESHY]

Fish biologist in training chiming in - what's "native" even mean? For most people it means fish that white people brought here or cared about. Ecosystems, species - will change. Extinction, migration (whether natural or not) will happen. A couple years ago they told us (wrongly, and we knew it then) that snakeheads would soon take over. As it turns out they have found a niche like everyone else, and their spread has slowed. And for everyones info Amia calva is native to much more than the south - and other than in some basic visual sense is very different from a snakehead. Different family of fish entirely.

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[FLESHY]

Ps - have we won the war on carp yet? Im not saying to encourage invasives, but let's be realistic. Also we might want to touch on the definition of invasive vs exotic. Many might say snakeheads are not invasive. Loosely used term that shouldn't be.

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[MN_Rebel]

Ps - have we won the war on carp yet? Im not saying to encourage invasives, but let's be realistic. Also we might want to touch on the definition of invasive vs exotic. Many might say snakeheads are not invasive. Loosely used term that shouldn't be.

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I agreed. It is loosely used term. I do not encourage to spreading the invasives, however I encourage a fishery to manage their numbers. Snakehead bowfishing is getting popular and Florida freshwater exotic fishery is getting lots of attention. I do not agree with catch and kill every one method as it is pretty useless. When I was young, I was required to kill every carp I caught by the law in Minnesota. It doesn't work and the kill law got toss out the window.

Most average people do not care about ecosystem, they only cares about their favorite sportfish and they don't want other less-popular fish eating them. Which that is why the snakehead got bad rap because it is a scary-looking predatory fish and it got LOTS of attention than the flying Asian carps which is really our number 1 enemy.

 

[mcsnapper1]

Your logic is off, it is not to late to manage or fix a mistake. They removed all the Northern Pike from Lake Davis/California. As well there is a native sport fishery for all areas of the USA. Here in California it is the Trout, Salmon and Sturgeon fishery (not a bass or sunfish fishery). As well ironically their is a native species (the Bowfin Amia calva) that is found in the Southern USA that is essentially an American version of a Snakehead. Lastly the Snakehead is an apex predator and whenever you add a new apex predator it has effects on the entire ecosystem and to think it is not going to have an effect on the native fishery long term is naive. Even though it may take Fisheries Biologist decades before we have got a complete idea of what kind of effect Snakeheads are going to have on the native fisheries. From what I have read about Snakehead management in Florida is there is a 100% cull for all Snakeheads caught that limits and reduces populations in Florida. To encourage an invasive (not even native to North America) sportfishery to US water ways to me is a bad idea.

Jeremy

I remember this. Didn't they "remove" the pike by poisoning the entire lake, killing EVERYTHING in it. Way to save those natives! The pike would never have been able to do as effective of a job.

 

[spotfin]

Hats off to the op for eating the snakehead!

 

[FLESHY]

Another point to be brought up is look at management strategies...everything that exsists...does so because we encourage it and says it can.

Things we dont like or find useful have volunteer crews killing or pulling it left and right.

Earth at this point is basically our little biology experiment - and even without that, ecological, environmental, and biological change and bottlenecking is inevitable...choose to manage these things now as a resource IMO.

 

[MN_Rebel]

Another point to be brought up is look at management strategies...everything that exsists...does so because we encourage it and says it can.

Things we dont like or find useful have volunteer crews killing or pulling it left and right.

Earth at this point is basically our little biology experiment - and even without that, ecological, environmental, and biological change and bottlenecking is inevitable...choose to manage these things now as a resource IMO.

Right on!

 

[fwprawn]

So what are you catching them on ?