LG Stakeholder’s Board agrees with TAG - No grass carp this year

The Lake Gaston Stakeholder’s Board agreed with almost all of the Technical Advisory Groups recommendations regarding noxious weeds in Lake Gaston. The board met last week to deal with things like grass carp stocking, fish tagging, fish longevity studies and surveys. 

The planned all day meeting only lasted until just past lunch time.  This was mainly due to the effectiveness of all the presenters and the recommendations they made.  In what is usually the hottest topic on the agenda the board followed the TAG recommendation of no additional grass carp in the lake unless they were used for the tracking studies being done by Virginia Tech.

Kirk Rundle, of NC Wildlife Resources, stated that due to the decrease of hydrilla that the fall survey indicated the grass carp level is probably well above 10 carp per vegetated acre that the stare targets.  If the study is to be continued then Rundle said the 50 or so grass carp could be used.  He recommends using a similar size as last year, 12 to 14 inch carp.

The telemetry study being conducted by Michael B. Duncan and Brian R. Murphy, of Virginia Tech has revealed some interesting information.  They originally tagged 29 fish for the study, but now only 8 have survived.  This is not unlike other such studies. 

The study revealed that the carp do not travel as far as many people thought they did.  Fish in the upper regions of the lake traveled 1.7 miles from the stocking point while fish in the lower region, by the dam, traveled 5.1 miles.  Their report stated, “These differences are most likely a result of the abundant shallow-habitat surrounding the upper release point, while the lower region of the lake consists of deeper water with limited shallow flats. Fish simply have to move farther in the lower lake to find their preferred habitat.”

They went on to recommend that, “Future stocking plans might consider planting fish at more stocking sites, in order to achieve more uniform dispersal of fish around the lake.”

The stakeholders Board voted to continue the study.

There was also some news on the aging study of the grass carp.  One of the surprises was that the carp are living longer than expected.  Many carp have been in the lake longer than the ten years they felt would be the age limit.  The study has also revealed that, “Age determinations match very well with stocking history.”  This means that very few fish are placed into the lake by private citizens. 

The report on hydrilla flies was not as good as they hoped it would be.  Problems associated with the study include with difficulty in growing monoecious hydrilla under greenhouse conditions during winter, leading to low fly population.  They are also having problems at Caledonia prison farm fly rearing facility.  The facility is operational but they are working through the learning curve. Water quality issues prevented successful rearing of flies in 2007, though problem has not been corrected and production expected to occur in 2008.

One of the more interesting comments from the Feb 13 TAG meeting was regarding the unexpected size of the grass carp.  Rob Emens, North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources (NC DENR) and Secretary of the tag told the group that; “Having very large grass carp in Gaston is a public safety concern. An encounter with a 70 pound carp that is darting in a flight response could result in personal injury. Removing very large carp will reduce the chance of an incident.”  The comment was made during a discussion on the problem with bow hunting for grass carp.