Thread: Kentucky Lake size suggestion?

Very prolific. The question I would ask you, because I have been crappie fishing for a much shorter amount of time than you, I can almost guarantee, when were those size and creel limits established? Before sidescan? 10, 20, 30 years ago? I can tell you my crappie catching drastically increased with the introduction of sidescan. How much has the introduction of livescope changed the amount of fish caught? Yep, people slayed them long before either of those. But non-fishing folks like myself slay them now just because of electronics.

I'm gonna get my hands on the data. So maybe it won't be just baseless ideas. The move for Grenada was influenced by a survey of almost 600 folks, which most supported tighter restrictions.

https://www.crappie.com/crappie/kent...barkley-lakes/

Data found. This guy may be making it all up but he seems like he knows what he is talking about to me. Crappie.com is such a crappie encyclopedia. So amazing. Grow season is the major factor. A 12 inch KY fish is 5 years old where a 12 inch MS fish is 2 years old.

Originally Posted by Nick51

https://www.crappie.com/crappie/kent...barkley-lakes/

Data found. This guy may be making it all up but he seems like he knows what he is talking about to me. Crappie.com is such a crappie encyclopedia. So amazing. Grow season is the major factor. A 12 inch KY fish is 5 years old where a 12 inch MS fish is 2 years old.

Being a biology major and fishing on Barkley for near 40 years I do not think this is accurate. The change in weather patterns over the last 30 years would change this data . In my opinion.

The fish size and numbers have changed a lot in just the last few years. The Asian carp and 3 consecutive years of bad spawns due to drastic water fluctuations has really hurt the crappie population. Kentucky Lake is at the end of the Tennessee river chain and it’s levels and current are affected by what happens a lot of other places in the river system.
The Last year or two things are improving and as stated it takes longer to grow big crappie here than it does in Mississippi. A couple years ago a lot of the crappie were very thin and and a lot of it was due to bad spawns of baitfish. We’ve been seeing a lot of baitfish again so hopefully things will continue to improve.
By the way the TWRA already reduced the creel limit from 30 to 20 so the biologist are monitoring and making adjustments as they see fit.
I haven’t been able to do much fishing this year due to some family health issues but most of the fishermen I know were doing pretty good earlier this year.

More people fishing and fishing more. 30 years ago there was few if any people pulling crankbaits in late spring and summer. Also, on ky and barkley I think more folks are figuring out the black crappie. Used to you fished the stake beds and brush in the back of the coves for white crappie the second or third week of april. Now you can catch those black crappie (not necessarily on the stake beds and brush) up shallow much earlier. Electronics play a role I am sure as well.

Originally Posted by Nick51

https://www.crappie.com/crappie/kent...barkley-lakes/

Data found. This guy may be making it all up but he seems like he knows what he is talking about to me. Crappie.com is such a crappie encyclopedia. So amazing. Grow season is the major factor. A 12 inch KY fish is 5 years old where a 12 inch MS fish is 2 years old.

Paul Rister was a fisheries biologist for KDFWR for 28 years, serving western Kentucky as District Coordinator. He retired at the end of 2017.

This data proves what I said, let the fisheries biologists do their jobs and set the size and creel limits, they know what they are doing.

Data received from current Western KY Fisheries Biologist. Truly appreciate the phone call and email from Mr. Martin. I will do my best to summarize and post. If someone is interested in full reports, send me a message with your email and I will forward.

artcarney_agr, this discussion was started merely to see if there is anything us anglers can do, to increase the crappie experience (and because I am away from my family and the boat I spent my life savings on for the next five months). That crappie experience may differ among fishermen. Some may prefer to catch and keep fewer but have larger fish while some the opposite. Maybe there is a majority that prefers one side or the other of that. I have went down a similar path with Non-resident whitetail hunting in KS. Unfortunately the answer in that situation is about money. Policy makers override the biologist in order to maintain a certain amount of revenue instead of increasing the quality of the herd and hunting experience. That is not the case here and that is awesome.

Originally Posted by Nick51

Policy makers override the biologist in order to maintain a certain amount of revenue instead of increasing the quality...

That sometimes happens, and many times it's anglers or hunters with baseless perceptions trying to force policy makers to do something instead of relying on the biologists and their data.

You at least you had the notion to seek out the facts regarding the matter and now understand why I said what I said. Not everyone is like you.