Boni Veiwing Station Report and Q?

wetaline · 08-20-2002, 07:50 AM

Stopped by the dam to take a look at the one that got away yesterday.... Even when the counts are low it makes for a good time... Saw a couple nooks that had to be pushing mid 40's .... and some large steeli's too..... Made a couple observations while I was there though.....

many many steelhead had net scars.... and in the 30 minutes i was there... saw at least 8 steeli's missing their dorsal fin (the whole fin or 3/4's - i've never seen this before)... Is there a hatchery clipping these? seems there were to many to be a miss clip? is it damage from the nets? Just never seen anything like it - looking for some insight.

[ 08-20-2002, 08:50 AM: Message edited by: wetaline ]

wetaline · 08-20-2002, 02:08 PM

anyone have an idea what happend to the dorsal fins?

Lured In · 08-20-2002, 02:43 PM

First on the net scars...

I caught a hatchery hen steelie last week that looked like it had been bbq'd because it had so many scars on it. Caught a native a few days before that had a few. According to Killertraylor (sp) the steelies just 'swim' on through the gillnets. Since I got a could look at the hatchery we kept, I was able to notice a few other things. Much of the scales were missing around the net scars. The scars did not look 'fresh' but were certainly not that old. It may be possible that some of these fish were in nets out in the ocean a few months ago and they just happen to be running together, hence the seemingly large number that have net scars.

As far as the dorsal fin goes, it is another way to possibly identify hatchery fish (nooks too). When they are in the rearing ponds, they are often stacked together and rub on one another. This can 'sand' down the dorsal fin a bit over time as they are raised. I guess it is also possible that it was from a net of some sort. My guess is that if you looked at the fish with the funky dorsal fin, most would be adipose fin clipped as well.

wetaline · 08-20-2002, 03:57 PM

I suppose the rubbing on the top of the nets is possible.. but i've caught a lot of hatchery steelhead and never seen the adipost totaly or mostly missing... and why would there be 8 of them together going through the windows in about 30 minutes... I guess what i'm saying is it seems like if theres that many of these "missing dorsal fin" fish (based on my 30 minute observation) i would have or one of my fishing buddi's would have caught one.

fishuntr2 · 08-21-2002, 01:50 PM

Several of the steelhead I have caught so far this year looked like they had a healed over, clipped dorsal. The gamie working the ramp said that is common for hatchery fish.
Bob

ultramag · 08-21-2002, 02:15 PM

I have caught a lot of fish this year on the Deschutes with big net scars both native and hatchery.I have also caught some hatchery fish missing their dorsal fin and am curious as to how that happened.