Jordan Shad

[monkscrappie]

One of my customers fished Jordan Tuesday. He stated the water temp was 38 on the surface around the 64 bridge. He also noticed lots of Sea Gulls feeding on Shad on the surface. Anyone else noticed a possible Shad Kill?

Jordan Limit, maybe you could get the Wildlife Resources to commet on this.

Monk

[chief]

Actually Monk, two of your customers fished Jordan Tuesday. I noticed the same thing, but the gulls were diving away from the channel up on the flats in 12-20 ft. I still see tons of baitfish on the locator and the water temp at the bridge was 42- the same at Ebenezer.

[JordanLimit]

I emailed Jessica, the Wildlife biologist a couple of days ago and have not heard back yet. The water at the dam hit a low last week of 45. I just checked and today's report has the water at 48. Chief's observations are probably proof that the shad in the channels are surviving, but the ones up on the flats in shallower water are not doing as well. I'll pass along any information that I am able to get from Jessica.

[Crewmax42]

I saw the same thing two weeks ago and the week before. I saw lots of bait in the channels and a lot of seagulls in the " flats" and working the shad. 41 degrees in general on those trips.

[JordanLimit]

The paragraph below is from Wikipedia. With shad starting to die at 42, that would confirm your seeing gulls eating dead shad on the flats.

The fins of threadfin shad often have a yellowish color, especially the caudal fin. The back is grey to blue with a dark spot on the shoulder. D. petenense is more often found in moving water, and is rarely found deep in the water column. It occur in large schools, sometimes with gizzard shad, and can be seen on the surface at dawn and dusk. The threadfin shad may reach lengths of 8 inches, but only rarely. This fish is very sensitive to changes in temperature and dissolved oxygen, and die-offs are frequent in late summer and fall, especially when water temperature reaches 42°F. The threadfin shad is a favorite food for many game fishes including striped bass, largemouth bass, smallmouth bass, and catfishes. This fish is widely introduced throughout the United States as a forage for game fish.

[Special K]

I've always noticed a certain amount of what I reckoned to be shad die-offs in the later winter months with the yearly presence of seagulls diving and following these schools with a vengeance, but I have since changed my thinking some on this topic, because the gulls are there every year and are diving on shad even during many milder winter years that I can recall. I have also ran my boat smack dab through these schools of shad from time to time on the shallower flats and I believe the gulls are more likely just as likely diving on any shad that approach the surface within the relatively short range of the gull's diving ability. I believe that sunshine and/or dissolved oxygen levels and/or microorganisms and/or ph levels and/or thermal currents and/or wind currents pushing any of those can have just as much to do with the circumstances that draw shad schools to these shallower areas as anything else.

During the times that I was curious enough to check into this pretty cool natural phenomena... I never recall witnessing the presence of dying shad floundering on or around the water surface... but occasionally would see shad just beneath the surface and even waking the surface of the water like any other time of the year... and the schools would often show on my sonar grouped very close to the surface to mid depth in the water column. Accordingly, while I do believe there are shad die offs during extremely cold periods... I believe these currents carrying warmer temperature, dissolved oxygen, microorganisms and optimum ph might be just the draw to shallow water and/or shallowness in the water column for the shad that the gulls anticipate and are drawn to every year at about the same time of the year. Cold weather die offs are just bonus conditions that make the pickin's much better and easier for the gulls and other predatory birds.

Aside from cold weather die offs... I also believe that only a small percentage of gull dives successfully catch a fish. Just my two cents.

[SEA DANCER]

I fished at Harris Tuesday and saw the same thing. Water temp there was 41*.

[Crewmax42]

Thanks for the ponderings, Special K. I have heard that 99% of the fish are in 1% of the water. not sure if that is true or not, but diving birds are certainly a way to visually spot where the bait is, and, in turn, some predator fish., maybe.

[Special K]

Thanks for the ponderings, Special K. I have heard that 99% of the fish are in 1% of the water. not sure if that is true or not, but diving birds are certainly a way to visually spot where the bait is, and, in turn, some predator fish., maybe.

I appreciate the comment Crewmax. I have always said something very similar, but say 80% of the fish are located in only 20% of the water virtually year around. The tricky part of crappie fishing is: The migratory patterns cause this 20% to vary consistently and somewhat predictably throughout the year... which is what makes it so much fun chasing them.
Good luck all.

[JordanLimit]

Three years ago in the extremely cold winter that we had I actually say shad fluttering up to the surface. They would give a kick and go about six inches, then float a little, then give another kick. If a gull did not get them, they would just slowly sink back down. I saw this on Jordan and Harris back then. So far on Jordan this year, I have not seen any floating up like I did back then.

My Father and brother fished Jordan on Thursday. They were fishing in 30' water, right on the bottom. They caught crappie, white bass and catfish. When pop cleaned the cat's, he said they were full of shad. Evidently the fish were under the schools of shad and just waiting for a dead one to drop down for a meal.