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Big Rideau Lake Association - BRLA

Environmental Programs| Past Projects | Angler Diary

During the 2000 lake trout season, the Big Rideau Lake Association continued the Lake Trout Volunteer Angler Diary program for the second year. The diary format was modified this year to obtain more data that will provide information such as catch-per-unit-effort (CPUE), fish age, and length frequency distributions. Twenty-two anglers participated in the 2000 diary program and a total of 289 interviews were made.

Introduction

This season, a lake trout aging study was implemented to determine the validity of the stocking data, as there have been some discrepancies in the MNR stocking data. Anglers were asked to collect and submit heads and scales from fish they caught. Fisheries staff removed the otoliths from the collected heads. In, October of 2000, fisheries staff aged 140 fish by the otoliths and scales that were collected.

Results

Anglers spent 1145 rod-hours and harvested (catch-and-keep) 269 fish (Table 1). It took anglers approximately 1 hour to catch one fish. The catch-per-unit-effort in 2000 was 0.788 (Table 1). The mean total length of the fish sampled was 523 mm (20.6 inches).

Table 1: Big Rideau Lake Association's 2000 Volunteer Angler Diary program.

Forty percent of the fish caught during the 2000 lake trout season were of hatchery origin. The mean ages of stocked and native (not of hatchery origin, including fish hatched from the Big Rideau) lake trout were 6.5 and 7.4 respectively (Figure 1). The rate of catch-and-release was high during the 2000 season as 70% of the fish were released. Of the 903 fish caught, 31.4% were from hatchery origin, where 68.6% were native.

Figure Figure 1
Age and length distribution. Average age of all fish angled was 7.1 years and a mean total length of all fish was 523 mm. (Ages taken from the 2000 BRLA study).

The Lake Trout Fishery on The Rideau Lake

This year was the first year that the angler diary provided information on catch-per-unit-effort and harvest. This data will be used as a baseline in future years to determine trends in effort, catch/harvest, and angler success. The overall health of the fishery cannot be determined based on this year's data as there is no data to compare it to. However, anglers in this study had great success during the 2000 season, as it took on average only 1 hour to catch one fish.

The stocking data illustrates that fish stocked in 1995 had a left pectoral clip to identify it. However, anglers noted that they were angling many fish with left ventral/adipose clips. The stocking data did not show any fish stocked with these clips since 1989 (12 year old fish). By aging the fish with LV/AD clips it was noted that these fish were six years old, which would mean that they were stocked in 1995. According to the data, fish stocked in 1995 had LP clips and not LV/AD clips, therefore indicating that MNR staff mistakenly clipped many fish. The aging study validated the discrepancies in the MNR stocking data.

Conclusion

The second year of the Rideau Lake Trout Volunteer Angler Diary Program was a great success. With changes to the format of the diary, information such as catch-per-unit-effort and harvest was calculated. The BRLA would like to thank all the anglers who participated in the volunteer diary program and look forward to working with them again in the future.

Lake Trout Volunteer Angler Diary Final Report, 2000.