Another lake falls victim to the WDFW policy of: "Never Leave Well Enough Alone"

This sounds like squeaky wheel management to me; that is WDFW adjusting their lake management to the loudest squeaky wheel.

This probably underlines the need for anglers who wish to maintain or change management of lakes of interest to stay engaged with WDFW staff (preferably the local bios) to assure they have influence on the management of those lakes of interest. This only way I know of staying informed of potential changes and being able to react proactively rather than reactive or even worse just "bitching".

Fair probably not, time consuming for sure but also necessary if potential lake management is to reflect your interests. How many hours a year is it worth it to you to potentially protect your opportunities like the Lost Lake brookie fishery?

Curt
 
iveofione said:
For many years a group of us have been fishing Lost Lake in the Okonogan Highlands, a pretty and productive brook trout lake with an excellent campground. At times we have over nighted but more often fished the morning and early afternoon then retreated to the Chesaw Tavern for a pitcher and discussed the day's fishing. The beauty of the fish, their abundance and the camaraderie always made for a special day, a day we enjoyed both in the spring and again in the fall.

On Wednesday I spent my final day on the lake after almost 2 decades of enjoying wonderful fishing there. I did not catch a single brook trout. Instead the lake has been stocked with hatchery rainbows and apparently put in during the pandemic when few people were fishing. I don't have all the details, Roper probably has better info, but it seems as though they were stocked as plus sized plants then grew to about 16'' while nobody was looking. Once discovered the hoards descended and the race to catch the last 16'' rainbow was on. I had heard tales about how fast the fishing was but that is past tense now as the fish were being harvested as fast as possible. Freestone and I camped there overnight and were there only about 20 hours and 30 fish left the lake in just that time. Multiply that by several months of fishing and you get the picture that it has become a put and take bonanza. Now the number of fish is way down and the brook trout seem to have disappeared completely. Next year people will return and wonder where the hell all of the fish are-"It was so good last year....." Duh

In the 22 years I have lived on the frozen tundra this is the 4th lake I have seen compromised by a stocking blunder. Lost was one of the finest brook trout lakes around. Others have been cutthroat lakes filled with hatchery zombie rainbows that either diminished or destroyed the previous fishery. The most blatant example would be Brown's Lake in Pend Oreille County. Once arguably the best cutthroat lake in the state, it was contaminated with hatchery rainbows a decade or more ago and never recovered. Krusty and I spent a day there recently and I think maybe only caught 1 or 2 cutthroat between us, the rest all modestly sized 'bows. I first started fishing it around 1999 and back then it was not unusual to catch 16-18'' cutts, a 16'' fish now would be a trophy.

The good news is that I'll never have to make that long dusty miserable drive up there again. The bad news is that I'll never get to enjoy the beauty and spirit of those brookies in their fall colors again. Damn!

Lost Lake has been lost.
Click to expand...
Tim Lockhart said:
Doesn't matter. This was one of very few where Brookies grew to good size. In my 10+ yr history there, the quality of those fish was consistent...2 seasons ago a group of them had cracked the 20" mark. I had waited and watched for a season or two leading up, and Mooney (Islander) and I took 3 of them between us last fall when we targeted them.

For many of the outings refered to by Ive, we were there together and enjoyed a lot of great memories. I'd hate to see any of that change and, perhaps, we all continue on other waters over there (Freestone you too). Ive, you can yell at me for my dirty grille anytime, long as we're still going!

And to Ive's point, tough to see so many ofherwise outstanding venues disrupted by mismanagement. He cites 4 examples, but I hate to think of how many other lakes across the state are overstocked, underenforced and unfortunately fish that way.

But I'll end on a positive note...
View attachment 35726View attachment 35727View attachment 35729View attachment 35728View attachment 35730
Click to expand...

It's almost as if they don't want a quality fishery that doesn't require intervention. Here you have a unique jewel of a lake with self a sustaining population of well above average quality brook trout only to replace them with the junk fish WDFW loves to produce in hatcheries. That's a crying shame. Somebody spent money to literally wreck a quality fishery. On what planet does this make sense?
 
Smalma said:
This sounds like squeaky wheel management to me; that is WDFW adjusting their lake management to the loudest squeaky wheel.

This probably underlines the need for anglers who wish to maintain or change management of lakes of interest to stay engaged with WDFW staff (preferably the local bios) to assure they have influence on the management of those lakes of interest. This only way I know of staying informed of potential changes and being able to react proactively rather than reactive or even worse just "bitching".

Fair probably not, time consuming for sure but also necessary if potential lake management is to reflect your interests. How many hours a year is it worth it to you to potentially protect your opportunities like the Lost Lake brookie fishery?
Click to expand...
Smalma said:
This sounds like squeaky wheel management to me; that is WDFW adjusting their lake management to the loudest squeaky wheel.

This probably underlines the need for anglers who wish to maintain or change management of lakes of interest to stay engaged with WDFW staff (preferably the local bios) to assure they have influence on the management of those lakes of interest. This only way I know of staying informed of potential changes and being able to react proactively rather than reactive or even worse just "bitching".

Fair probably not, time consuming for sure but also necessary if potential lake management is to reflect your interests. How many hours a year is it worth it to you to potentially protect your opportunities like the Lost Lake brookie fishery?

Curt
Click to expand...
The regional biologist in our area is very approachable and listens to citizens who call. He can’t make everyone happy: no surprise. But he has listened to several of us and agreed with some proposals AND implemented them. Some he’s told me (and others) “ain’t going to happen”. Interesting that a fair number of responders to this thread remember great brookie fishing at “lost” Lost Lake; how many have reached out to the regional biologist for this lake? Is it too late? Stocked rainbow trout aren’t reproducing so maybe this lake could return to former brook trout glory with forum members rallying?
 
I'm not familiar with the lake in question but WDFW's annual stocking plan calls for the planting of triploid brookies, suspect that the brook trout population is not reproducing. Is that correct?
 
It's hard to beat the spectacular leaps of a 4 to 5 pound rainbow in a few of the lakes that have not been obliterated in North Central WA. At the same time Brookies, Cutties, Browns, and Tiger trout represent a nice diversion. Finding browns and tigers this time of the year is especially exciting. If you think brookies are hard to find, just go looking for some browns. It's my understanding that the hatcheries had issues with the Tigers and did not do much stocking of these beautiful, fall-colored bruisers.
 
According to the 2022 WDFW stocking plan 18 Okanogan County lakes were scheduled to be planted with brookie triploids though to be fair most are less than 10 acres.

Curt
 
Rob Allen said:
Well for one, they are free.. and they don't cause any more damage to native species that hatchery rainbows and if one was wanting to eat trout bookies are much better eating.

In all ways wild bookies are better than rubber trout.
Click to expand...
All true ...my biggest concern is unsterilized Brookies ending up in streams with pure genetic fish, such as Cutthroat, and outcompeting them for habitat.
 
Last edited:
Smalma said:
According to the 2022 WDFW stocking plan 18 Okanogan County lakes were scheduled to be planted with brookie triploids though to be fair most are less than 10 acres.

Curt
Click to expand...
Brooke Triploids? Didn't know..
 
Looking forward to fishing this lake next week. The fact they are planting “fry” is interesting. Maybe they have become feeders for the rainbow. Anyway, we’ll give it a go with my super secret never fail brookie fly! 😉
There is also an old saying in fishing, “Just because you’re not catching them, doesn’t mean they aren’t there.”
😁
 
Islander said:
Looking forward to fishing this lake next week. The fact they are planting “fry” is interesting. Maybe they have become feeders for the rainbow. Anyway, we’ll give it a go with my super secret never fail brookie fly! 😉
There is also an old saying in fishing, “Just because you’re not catching them, doesn’t mean they aren’t there.”
😁
Click to expand...
SM imagine the size of our 3 another year older 👍
 
Yeah i may know of the one up north - haven't heard mention for quite a few years
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top