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river status few hundred years ago question


6 replies to this topic

#1 FishyJackson

FishyJackson
  • NANFA Guest
  • Long Island

Posted 09 May 2017 - 09:17 AM

alright guys, the entity of Freshy Jackson has only existed for a year, so I'm still trying to understand the Sciences of the Salt-less Waters.  

 

 

The Delaware River ,in New York, predatory game fish here would be: Muskies, Smallmouth and Largemouth Bass, Channel Cats, Walleye, Northern Pike, Bowfin, Bullhead and Pickerel, that might be it.  

 

Aside from the Black Basses, I don't like the idea of catching these other game fish in non-native waters too much.  Muskies, Cats, Pike, Walleye, Bowfin, Smallmouth & Largemouth Bass are not native to this watershed.

 

So if you went back in time a few hundred years, were Rivers like this just extremely lame, with Chain Pickerel, Bullheads, migrating Shad and White Sucker being the only fish with any size in this whole river?  Or am I missing something?



#2 Michael Wolfe

Michael Wolfe
  • Board of Directors
  • North Georgia, Oconee River Drainage

Posted 09 May 2017 - 12:35 PM

Not sure I like the descriptor "lame", but I love this question since it gets to the idea of what our rivers looked like before we moved bass and catfish around so much.

The diversity of small to medium fishes is exciting to me.
Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing. - Benjamin Franklin

#3 Josh Blaylock

Josh Blaylock
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  • Central Kentucky

Posted 09 May 2017 - 03:10 PM

I agree, I wouldn't say lame, but it's hard to say if there were other native species that existed prior to the introduction of competing species, or before pollution/etc...


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#4 FishyJackson

FishyJackson
  • NANFA Guest
  • Long Island

Posted 09 May 2017 - 04:12 PM

Agreed poor choice of words saying it's lame lol, because I certainly appreciate all of the smaller fish like everyone else here. But i had just finished coming to the conclusion that essentially every predatory fish there is not native and I was pretty disappointed. I mean if you were a Minnow in that river like 250 years ago you wouldn't have a worry in the world it seems.
There are tons of Bowfins in that Bashakill Marsh (which is an amazing place) and now I dont really want to bother fishing for them there.

#5 FishyJackson

FishyJackson
  • NANFA Guest
  • Long Island

Posted 09 May 2017 - 04:57 PM

This Atlas of Inland Fishes of NY I posted link to below is great, shows which watersheds NY fish are found in and which they are native to.  Lake Champlain is quite the honorable watershed.  Majority of these fish are native there, Freshy Jackson is making the trek there June 10th, weather permitting.  

 

Regarding the Delaware, perhaps the ancient Chain Pickerels grew larger than Pikes and were just utterly dominant beasts back then?  Or maybe brute 60 lb Striped Bass ruled the waters and it was a power struggle between the Stripers and the mammoth Pickerels?  Or perhaps it was always just the Motherland of Minnows...

 

 

http://www.nysm.nyse...?token=b82XBNR4

#6 Matt DeLaVega

Matt DeLaVega
  • Forum Staff
  • Ohio

Posted 09 May 2017 - 07:19 PM

Maybe had a more seasonal fishery with larger numbers of anadromous species? Not only stripers and shad, but cold waters fishes as well.


The member formerly known as Skipjack


#7 gerald

gerald
  • Global Moderator
  • Wake Forest, North Carolina

Posted 09 May 2017 - 07:51 PM

Don't underestimate the predatory prowess of a big fallfish. 


Gerald Pottern
-----------------------
Hangin' on the Neuse
"Taxonomy is the diaper used to organize the mess of evolution into discrete packages" - M.Sandel




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