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Paddlefish in Florida?

Started by Guest_Moontanman_* , Apr 23 2009 01:23 PM

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31 replies to this topic

#1 Guest_Moontanman_*

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Posted 23 April 2009 - 01:23 PM

has anyone seen this new initiative to stock paddlefish in Florida?

http://floridapaddlefish.com/

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#2 Guest_Newt_*

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Posted 23 April 2009 - 03:11 PM

That seems silly. Who knows though, maybe they'll get their way.

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#3 Guest_andyavram_*

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Posted 23 April 2009 - 03:26 PM

Wow, this seems as ill-thought out as the Tiger Muskies in New Mexico post from a few weeks back.

Paddlefish have zero negative impact in the environment (Environmentally Sound) and are in fact beneficial.

I especially like this quote - yeah right.

Andy

Edited by andyavram, 23 April 2009 - 03:31 PM.

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#4 Guest_rjmtx_*

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Posted 23 April 2009 - 07:29 PM

This is beyond ridiculous. Someone's actually wanting to intentionally drop another nonnative in Florida. Someone just lost a lot in the market and is looking for a quick buck, I think.

"This idea is similar to the Oklahoma project accept on a different level." I don't see the similarities. Maybe I'm just closed minded.

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#5 Guest_Moontanman_*

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Posted 23 April 2009 - 08:59 PM

Well this is the State that introduced Peacock Bass, at least Paddlefish are from North America. I'm not sure where I stand on this, of course those of you that know me probably remember me wanting to introduce Pseudoscaphirhynchus hermanni to a NA river to keep from losing such a unique fish so maybe I am not exactly neutral on this sort of thing.

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#6 Guest_Katydid_*

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Posted 25 April 2009 - 12:03 PM

Wow, I live her in Florida and this seems like a rather ill thought out idea.

Here's My Favorite:

"The normal Mississippi river system has virtually no connection to the Florida everglades (Florida Panhandle excluded). If there were a connection then the paddlefish would already be in south Florida."

Yup. Since there isnt a cnnection, seems like it might be a good idea not to put a 100 pound fish where it isnt native. THinks it might be time ot soot of a note to the Florida Game wildlife people! Yikes. FLorida is ful of oddities. We really dont need any more!

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#7 Guest_Katydid_*

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Posted 25 April 2009 - 12:32 PM

Oh yes, and I live 22 miles from The Magical Kingdom. Those tourists could care less about Fish, they want Mickey, Minnie, Belle, Ariel and a bang up fireworks show....(Can see it occasionally from my house...). Not a 100 pound fish with no teeth. Feeling very grumpy, but glad this was brought to my attention.

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#8 Guest_Carptracker_*

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Posted 27 April 2009 - 10:28 PM

Hoo boy - That website is right up there with the guy who thinks the earth axis just tilted. Bizarro.

Incidentally, there are records of paddlefish jumping and hitting boaters and skiers here in Missouri, but it is rare. They jump randomly, like sturgeons (which also take out the occasional boater, sometimes in Florida) not in response to boats like silver carp.

Gotta love it! SWIM WITH THE PADDLEFISH! What a HOOT.

One local business here in Missouri is "providing" pond owners with paddlefish to "clean their ponds" on the condition that they can come and catch them back out in a few years, and harvest the caviar (I think only females are being stocked). There is no evidence that paddlefish have any positive effect on water quality. Paddlefish certainly don't eat algae (too small for their gill rakers), unless you think they might eat colonial algae. I don't think so. They might eat bluegreens like microcystis just because they are out there in the water when they ram feed, but Microcystis is not really a farm pond problem very often (although it is a problem in aquaculture sometimes). It would be just as logical to state that paddlefish remove crustacean zooplankton that would be eaten by other species, and thus essentially take up fish productivity that could be otherwise converted into bass, bluegill, and catfish. Basically, this guy is getting farmers and pond and lake owners to let him use their private waters as an extension of his aquaculture facility. And he is having substantial success.

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#9 Guest_bigfishfarms_*

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Posted 23 June 2009 - 03:34 PM

Where to begin........This guy has just enough info to make him dangerous. We have been practicing reservoir ranching for almost eight years and no one has ever asked to swim with our fishes. We do sell quite a few to dive quarries but that's a different concept.

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#10 Guest_Gambusia_*

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Posted 24 June 2009 - 04:26 PM

Paddlefish are established in the Apalachicola system.

He ought to go there.

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#11 Guest_Moontanman_*

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Posted 24 June 2009 - 05:33 PM

Does anyone know what the range of the paddlefish was before people adjusted the ecology to suit us? Was it pretty much all of the Mississippi river system and it's tributaries or just certain parts of the Mississippi river system?

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#12 Guest_rjmtx_*

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Posted 24 June 2009 - 08:22 PM

In Tx, add in San Jacinto, Trinity, Neches, Sabine, and Red drainages. Not sure how far east they go off the top of my head, but I know where they were in Tx, historically. I think they are trying to reintroduce them in the San Jacinto and I know they are still in the Red.

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#13 Guest_farmertodd_*

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Posted 24 June 2009 - 09:18 PM

Not always correct, but Natureserve.org Explorer gives this:

GetImage.gif 33.31KB 0 downloads
_{NatureServe. 2009. NatureServe Explorer: An online encyclopedia of life [web application]. Version 7.1. NatureServe, Arlington, Virginia. Available http://www.natureserve.org/explorer. (Accessed: June 24, 2009 ).}

I'm interested to check up on those Great Lake records. I don't recall ever seeing that anywhere.

Todd

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#14 Guest_Moontanman_*

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Posted 24 June 2009 - 09:45 PM

Not always correct, but Natureserve.org Explorer gives this:

GetImage.gif 33.31KB 0 downloads
_{NatureServe. 2009. NatureServe Explorer: An online encyclopedia of life [web application]. Version 7.1. NatureServe, Arlington, Virginia. Available http://www.natureserve.org/explorer. (Accessed: June 24, 2009 ).}

I'm interested to check up on those Great Lake records. I don't recall ever seeing that anywhere.

Todd

Thanks Todd, it's interesting that some of the range seems separate from the Mississippi river drainage, if I'm reading it right the range in Alabama is separate. I have many times tried to find out info about the river I grew up on in WV with little or no results, I'm betting that at one time the Pocatalico River in WV has populations or at least spawning runs of sturgeons, shovelnose, and paddlefish but i can't any info about the rivers history or even it's present state.

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#15 Guest_rjmtx_*

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Posted 24 June 2009 - 09:53 PM

All of the ones in Tx, except for the Red, also run directly into the Gulf. It's the old biogeography game of an ancient type of fish that has moved around via stream captures and fluctuating sea levels.

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#16 Guest_farmertodd_*

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Posted 24 June 2009 - 10:13 PM

With its proximity to the lower Kanawah and the Ohio mainstem, I wouldn't be surprised. But it seems to be a pretty small stream, and might not have been productive enough to support those fishes except as a patch habitat.

Stauffer's Fishes of WV is one I still need to pick up. That might be somewhere to look.

Todd

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#17 Guest_Moontanman_*

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Posted 24 June 2009 - 10:30 PM

With its proximity to the lower Kanawah and the Ohio mainstem, I wouldn't be surprised. But it seems to be a pretty small stream, and might not have been productive enough to support those fishes except as a patch habitat.

Stauffer's Fishes of WV is one I still need to pick up. That might be somewhere to look.

Todd

The Poca is a small river, possibly 100 miles long, but it tumbles down from the WV hills in a long series of long often very deep "holes" separated by often rough white water or riffles. When I was young it was a very productive river until gas wells wiped out the fishes with salt water dumps. I hear it has come back big time in the last 40 years and at some point it would be great to do some collecting along it's length to see what is there and what is not.

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#18 Guest_farmertodd_*

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Posted 25 June 2009 - 08:01 AM

So I looked into this Great Lakes thing. Man, that might be a worthy, charismatic species, reintroduction effort. I wonder how Wabash stock would fare in the lakes? Erie and St. Clair may even be better habitats for them currently than they were historically. Might be a good way to get some ecological resilience prior to silver and black carp introductions.

Todd

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#19 Guest_Gambusia_*

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Posted 25 June 2009 - 10:33 AM

West Virginia is restoring paddlefish.

So is Pennsylvania.

I think most paddlefish range is gulf of Mexico drainages.

Edited by Gambusia, 25 June 2009 - 10:34 AM.

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#20 Guest_Nocomis_*

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Posted 30 June 2009 - 02:20 PM

2 things:

1) paddlefish do not occur in the Apalachicola!!! Check any map they are a Gulf drainage species (e.g., Mobile, Mississippi drainages)

2) Florida has no intentions of stocking them either. Let's just say I have an active ear in what the FWCC stocking committee does.