during fall sampling.
Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks
It's getting to be that time of year again, when paddlefish are getting antsy to make their big spawning run. For paddlefish anglers, it's time to sharpen snagging hooks and dig up old sparkplugs.
Along with the paddlefish's spawning run comes the snagging season, which lays down a gauntlet of 10/0 treble hooks attached to lead or weighted with old spark plugs (a lot cheaper) that the fish have to navigate through on their way to spawning grounds.
Some folks might be scratching their heads about treble hooks and lead as a means of catching fish.
Well, paddlefish won't hit on worm harnesses or dough balls. The paddlefish is a filter feeder that feeds on microscopic organisms (plankton), so bait really isn't an effective means of catching them.
Paddlefish find areas that contain plankton and open their mouth real wide and let the water pass through their mouth and out their gills. As the water passes over the gills, the plankton gets filtered out and gobbled up.
Luckily for the Missouri-Yellowstone Adopt-a-Fish Program, we haven't lost any of our radioed fish to a snagging hook, but some have sustained battle scars in their movements.
For example, take the case of 2006 paddlefish #2. Some of us call him NoBill because this paddlefish lost its paddle in early life development or came in contact with a big snagging hook. Who knows exactly? But he has no paddle out front.
Paddlefish are spring spawners that migrate up both the Missouri and Yellowstone rivers.
The spawning run starts slowly as paddlefish make their way up the lower Missouri River from Lake Sakakawea in early spring to just below the confluence of the Yellowstone River.
From there, they wait until a spring pulse of snowmelt or spring rain comes flushing downstream which triggers the fish to start moving up the Missouri or the Yellowstone.
The paddlefish are on the move starting around the end of April through May, when most of the kids are still in school so they get to see the big movement of these fish.
After the first week of tracking, we took our relocations from last fall and looked at relocations from this spring and found that some of the paddlefish are starting to stretch their fins and move around a bit.
Paddlefish #1 moved about 9 miles so far this spring and paddlefish #3 moved about 10 miles - not real big movements - but it's a start. As for paddlefish #2, he has slipped under our radar the past couple of weeks. Our last relocation on him was last fall below the confluence of the Yellowstone. We figure that he and a bunch of his bachelor buddies headed downstream into Lake Sakakawea for the winter and decided not to come up yet. We'll see.
Just a reminder, before you set out on your snagging adventures be sure to double-check the changes in the fishing regulations on the paddlefish season this year.
To learn more about Missouri-Yellowstone Adopt-A-Fish and follow radio-implanted fish and turtles, just go to www.pikemasters.com and click on the Adopt-A-Fish link. Teachers can sign up their classes for the program, name their two adopted fish and join in on the fun.
Ryan Lott is a fisheries biologist with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks at Fort Peck.