Muskies, are also bringing back a great trout fishery
It has always amazed me to hear anglers say "muskies are eating all the Trout in the lake" or "we don't like those muskies, they will eat all our game fish." Nothing can be further from the truth. I'm not going to tell you muskies won't eat trout or other game fish, it's simply not true. However, NMDGF has sampled stomach contents of every Muskie that died during netting surveys. Out of about 200 specimen stomach samples only one fish was found to have a Trout in it's belly! (surveys can be found at NMDGF Research page) The fact is these fish rather feed on slower moving, thinner profiled cylindrical, schooling bottom feeding fish.
Another thing to remember, (when it comes to Bluewater Lake) is that we don't have a trout hatchery in that area anymore. Therefor the lake doesn't get stocked with near as many trout as it did in years past. Another important factor is that has hampered the ability to sustain the trophy trout fishery Bluewater used to be, is the water levels. The lake holds less than half of the surface acres of water it did back in the mid 80's, choking out much of the trouts previous habitat/range.
Then the goldfish came along and the trout completely lost all habitat and room for growth. This fish were competing with the trout for the same food base. In 1996 the average size of the trout in Bluewater was below 12"! 2003 was the beginning of a new era for Bluewater. The muskies were stocked to try and gain control of the trash fish populations in hopes of obtaining the trophy trout fishery the lake once was.
During the Spring of 2009 some nice trout were
being caught but come October New Mexico anglers out muskie fishing
started catching trout in the 3-6 pound range! Outside of the obvious
dwindled goldfish and white sucker populations, these trout are proof
that the muskies are doing there job and are revitalizing a lake that
was in much disarray only six years ago!-Matt Pelletier
Here are a few pictures of the Trout caught in October of 2009!!
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A short summary of the interaction between Muskellunge and other game fish. What do Muskies really eat.pdf
A short summary of the benefits and impact of stocking muskellunge in our fisheries. Why Stock Muskies.pdf
How to tell the difference between a male and a Female Muskie.
Unlike many coolwater, freshwater species it is possible to visually determine the sex of mature muskellunge. In adult female muskie the urogenital region resembles the shape of a pear, while in adult male muskellunge the shape of the region resembles a keyhole (Figure 2) (Lebeau and Pageau 1989). Sexually dimorphic growth occurs with muskellunge, as females reach larger ultimate sizes than males. Another interesting fact about the muskellunge is that there is evidence that muskie have a different sex-determining system than northern pike. While northern pike appear to use an XY system similar to ours (with males being XY and females being XX), research by Dabrowski et al. (2000) uncovered evidence of a WZ system (with males being ZZ and females being WZ) in muskellunge. Simply stated, in northern pike, males determine the sex of offspring, while in muskie, females determine the sex of offspring.
Figure 1: Picture of female (left) and male (right) muskellunge urogenital region (Lebeau and Pageau 1989, for additional information visit the Trent University web site).
Targeting Muskies on the Fly, ask about fly fishing radio with Bill Butts
http://www.askaboutflyfishing.com/speakers/robert_tomes/robert_tomes.cfm
Targeting Pike on the Fly,ask about fly fishing radio with Barry Reynolds
http://www.askaboutflyfishing.com/speakers/barry/barry.cfm