by Bruce Middleton, May 10, 2011

The terms fishing and habitat management when applied to bass fishing is centered around habitat, food, genetics and harvesting. Habitat is everything from the water bass live in, its temperature, ph, vegetation, food and anything else that is needed by the bass to survive found in the water. This includes reproduction, places to hide in, and places to find food and places to protect itself from harm or from other predators both in the water and above it.

Bass management also refers to the management of the bass itself. Whether or not we release or keep bass. It includes what a selective harvest is and the affects that that has upon other bass in the body of water we are fishing no matter if that is a river, lake or reservoir and the type, size and numbers of bass living in them. A selective harvest is set into place so that smaller fish will be taken with just a few larger fish being taken. This ensures that more than likely the largest fish in that body of water are the ones most likely to breed. It also sets up limits as to how many fish may be taken by a person. Selective harvesting is aimed at reducing the number of over all fish taken out of a body of water too. Again this helps ensure that a viable stock of breeding fish is left to continue the cycle of life for the foreseeable future. This can also include the stocking of lakes with beneficial food or other fish.

Food is included because this is what directly correlates to the growth habits of the bass as well as the final size they will become. The number of fish per acre that a lake or other body of water can support is very important to understand. If there are too few fish per acre then it may need to be stocked with beneficial fishes in order to increase its productivity. If too many fish per acre is found then it will need to be fished for a longer period of time in order to reduce these numbers. Either way the state will generally make this decision. Also too, in large bodies of water that can support large numbers of fish, those lakes are set aside to be able to fish them all year round. Generally these lakes are over 250 acres and the fish in them are plentiful enough to reproduce without being stocked. Some stocking may take place however depending on the type of fish being stocked. In most cases the stocked fish are trout and not other types of predator fish.

Genetics is for what a lineage the bass passes on to its fry. I, E. a huge bass that spawns will generally have fry that are predisposed to grow large themselves and a small bass will pass on its genes to grow smaller bass.

If you go out fishing in one of your favorite lakes or other bodies of water and you catch a couple of bass you can learn a great deal about their habitat and how rich or poor it is. If the bass are skinny and under weight for their size this is a sign that there are either too many fish in that particular body of water, there is not enough food there to support this many bass or that the genetics of the bass is very poor.

You also should be able to catch various weights of bass verses catching bass of all the same size. This again is a sign of something being off balance in their habitat. A bass needs to take in about 3% of its body weight every day in order for it to grow normally. If the body of water hasn’t a sufficient amount of food available to them then all the bass will be about the same size and virtually no bass will be large ones. If you catch various weights of bass and all of them look fat and healthy, this is a sign of a well-managed body of water.

Now as to spawning bass, it is a fact that only 10% of all bass beds will produce fry and out of that number over 90% of them will not make it to be two years old. It is a primeval world out there under the water. It is eat and be eaten until you will no longer fit into the mouth of any predator that may try and make you a meal. Also a bass needs to feed on ten pounds of food to put on one pound of weight. This ten to one ratio is some what modified as to the year round temperature of the water where in cold water the bass’s metabolism slows down and they can get by with less food without any detrimental effects on them.

Normally speaking a bass needs about 12 hours to digest a meal under the best conditions. However the temperature of the water can greatly influence this time. As an example, in winter when the lake water is in the 30’s it can take a bass five days to digest the same meal. The temperature of the bass themselves controls all of this. You have to remember also that a bass doesn’t have to eat if there is nothing in its stomach. What triggers a feeding response in a bass is the amounts of sugar and fats in the blood as shown by several University studies. When these levels fall below a curtain point the bass begins to look for something to eat. Being this sensitive to the water temperature and therefore its own body temperature, you can see what a cold front does to a bass’ metabolism and why their strike zone shrinks so much and why they seem to stop feeding almost all together.

To have a balanced fishery it is important to understand that a ten-pound bass doesn’t get any bigger if you eat it or take it to a taxidermist to have it mounted. Once that big fish is removed it will take years to replace it. If you are going to take bass out for eating it is much better to keep the one and two pound bass and toss back those that are any bigger. If you are interested in having a trophy to mount on the wall all you have to do is measure the length and girth of the bass. A good taxidermist can make an exact copy of your fish with this information. A few pictures don’t hurt either. But the real point is to return this big bass back into the water. These big fish are the ones you want to spawn and pass on their genetic material, not the little ones. As for those of us who practice catch and release on every bass caught, this in no way impacts the bass except for a small mortality rate which I will get into later on. You are having no impact on the numbers of bass and that is some times as important as returning the big ones. The only down side to this is you aren’t improving the number and size of the bass in that water either. Catch and release can be the salvation of some bodies of water where every bass is needed to keep the breeding of them going because of the mortality rate. And returning small bass on some bodies of water may mean you are not helping to improve the size and numbers of bass that need to be culled in order to establish a better balance of small and large fish.

The better the food chain is the bigger and faster the bass grow. The food chain starts with phytoplankton that feeds algae which feeds small crustations and works it way all the way up to the top predator. Something as small as a bag of common fertilizer can cause the water to have more organic material in it so the phytoplankton and algae grows better and faster which then moves up the food chain to the bass. Remember to use just fertilizes and that it doesn’t have weed killer or moss killer or any other bad things that can harm the algae. Just straight 10-10-10 is perfect. The affect of having a rich source of food available is so important to creating healthy bass and bass that grow large and fat. Also too, gin clear water is usually the only place that needs this type of enrichment. This fertilizer also clouds the water making it harder for herons and other big birds from feeding on bass since they can’t see them very well. Clouding the water also changes the way we fish for bass in that body of water. The bass will stop sight feeding and do more hearing feeding and that is something you will have to adjust to. But a warning is needed here. Never fertilize any body of water without permission of the fish and wildlife dept. of your state.

For very large bass to grow up they must have the perfect combination of luck, food, good habitat and genetics that allow it to grow that large. Releasing these big bass and knowing they live in the same area year after year, means you can come back and catch them again and again. And fighting a really big bass is like no other thrill in the world of fresh water fishing. But again, every thing must be perfect for a bass to grow to double-digit sizes. These bass are smart and wily. But they have a brain that is smaller that a thimble. What you are doing is trying to over ride what that bass perceives as food and therefore tricking her into biting your bait or lure. A bass has keen senses and uses them to survive and the bigger and older they get the pickier they become about what they are eating. This is why so few truly big bass are caught on any given body of water. I myself have seen several bass that would break the Washington state record of 11 pounds and 2 ounces but I didn’t have a rod and reel with me or they just sat there staring at me or more often just swam away. These instincts are a great part of the genetics that these big bass pass on to their fry. Small bass don’t have that much experience to pass on and may not even have the genetics to produce big bass. So you can see again why you want to have the biggest bass spawning and not a bunch of small ones. They just don’t live long enough to make big bass.

Another thing that great bass fishermen know about fishing for bass is everything they can find to read up on and know everything there is to know about the prey baitfish the bass feed on. If you know the spawning habits of the prey bait fish you can take advantage of this just like the bass do. Sunfish, Blue Gill, Perch, Rock Bass, Crappie and other baitfish spawn at different times verses the bass. But the bass know exactly when they spawn and move in to the shallows to fed on them. These spawning times tell you exactly where and when the bass will be in a particular part of the lake of other body of water. You know in advance what is about to happen and start from the very beginning of these spawns right through to the vary ends of them. This means more and larger bass in your live well. These facts are especially true in bodies of water that aren’t all that deep. In a lake that is 25 feet deep or less at the deepest part will have bass swimming in the shallows most of the year because that is where the baitfish are.

After the spawn these bait fish move to different parts of the lake and since you know all there is about their habits, you can follow them and therefore the bass all through the year. A little knowledge can be of immense help in locating and catching bass. Knowledge of the life cycle of all of these fish puts you in a place to take advantages of the instinct of these big game fish. The life cycles of crawfish is also a very important item to know everything there is to know about them. If you look at my past articles you will find an article about this subject that can help you immensely.

Now there are a lot of things you can do to improve the habitat of any lake. Adding man-made reefs is one great way. Adding trees and cinder blocks under docks is one. A “Porcupine” is another way to provide that reef. This is a metal structure that stands on the bottom and has fingers that stick out in all different directions. The beauty of this Porcupine is that it is made of smooth metal rods so none of your lures can get snagged up with it. Another way is to drop rocks, cement cinder blocks, logs or other large materials onto the bottom in a pile so as to make an underwater structure that will hold bass to it. Even old tires can be made to make an artificial reef. The tires are usually tied together and weighted so they sink rapidly and stay in place once they are one the bottom.

Weed control can also help the habitat of the bass. In really weedy bodies of water by eliminating areas of weeds you create open spots for the bass to back up into so they can ambush prey. You can even lay a large tarp on the bottom covering the weeds. This can then have an artificial reef or reefs added to it to make an outstanding area that will attract great numbers of bass. As a scuba diver I did this out in front of my parents house on Kitsap Lake by laying out a 20 by 30 foot tarp and then making three reefs at three different depths spaced 10 feet apart. The result was an area that attracted huge numbers of bass and other fish like crappie.

In other lakes you may need to add some vegetation to the lake so the food chain is improved. This however is best done under the supervision of the state authorities, so make sure it is done right.

As stated before a bag of fertilizer can be added to the water to make it cloudier and to encourage the growth of algae. But this should only be done where it is needed. Adding fertilizer to a body of water that doesn’t need it can do a lot more harm than good. Check with the state before doing this though.

B.A.S.S. clubs are known for their work in making bass habitat better for any number of lakes they are close to. These clubs may concentrate on a single lake or several. They catch bass and tag them to monitor their health and movements. They build reefs and do all manner of things to improve the fishing on these lakes. Some of the projects are small and some are very large and are in conjunction with state and regional agencies. Lakes may even be poisoned to eliminate undesirable species and then restocked with beneficial species. This is a huge under taking. By using a shocking device these agencies can take a census of the fish population to help get an idea of its health and the numbers of fish in a given body of water. All so you can have a better and more enjoyable fishing trip.

The state also stocks lakes with various fishes so the sportsman can have a varied number of types of fish to try and catch and all for the meager price of a fishing license.
Now I know that this is
just a brief look into bass habitat management but it is an important topic to know and understand. Anything about bass and their environment you need to know so you can take advantage of it to put more fish in your live well. So do some research and learn!

100% catch and release doesn’t insure that all the fish will survive…

Most catch and release bass anglers think that every fish they release will live. Sadly this is incorrect. But catch and release is an important part of fish management and so needs to be addressed. In order to release a bass alive once caught so it will live being caught, handled and stuffed in a live well and then released at the end of the day, a lot has to happen on your part to insure that that bass survives. Modern bass boats have live wells in them to keep bass alive so you can hold them for a while for a myriad of reasons. You may want to keep them there for a weigh-in later like in a derby. You may want to keep them so they don’t give off pheromones that scare off other bass or you want to keep them in the live well while you look for your camera or to show them off to other anglers at the launch. For whatever reason you hold a fish in the live well this contributes to the mortality rate when they are released.

Now all of us who practice catch and release would like to think that we have a 100% live release and it stays that way. But in fact a few fish will die no matter what even if you don’t drop them in live well. There just is no such thing as 100% living catch and release. There are many reasons for this. You could have a contaminated live well that harbors bacteria or viruses that can kill the fish. You may have injured the fish by damaging its gills, damaged an eye or you may have damaged the fish with the hooks in some other manner. Now we would all like to think we know how to disgorge a hook safely without hurting the fish in any way but stuff happens especially while fighting the fish. What goes on under the water that we can’t see, we have no real control over but it happens. We may have damaged one of the fish’s eyes or stuck a hook into the side of the fish allowing bacteria to invade and kill the fish. Again you just can’t tell.

In the live well however there are several things we can do to help keep the fish happy and safe until it is released. For one we can disinfect the live well to kill any harmful agents that have grown there. We need also to have a good recycler of water constantly flowing into the live well. During the hot summer months a live well and the water temperature in it can rise drastically causing great stress to the fish. By keeping a good flow of fresh, clean and oxygenated water flowing in the live well we insure the best possible environment to hold the fish in. Without a recycling system you will need to pump down the water levels and then refill it at least every hour or so, so fresh water and oxygen are supplied to the fish. An oxygenator is another way of keeping the bass happy while holding it.

Handling a fish can also cause the fish to die. Throwing it back into the water too hard is one. Breaking the fishes jaw by holding it up and tilting the jaw too far is a real way to kill a fish. This also goes for tearing the fish’s mouth up so bad that it can’t feed itself correctly contributes too. You should always handle a fish with wet hands so you don’t wipe off the slime or any scales off the fish exposing soft tissue underneath. Using a net too can cause a lot of problems if the fish is big and really fights a lot after it is landed. And if the landed fish flops around the deck of the boat it can harm itself too. There just are a lot of ways a fish, you or some other circumstance can harm a fish so badly that it will fail to survive after it is released.

You can catch a fish, remove the hook and gently drop it back into the water and it will still die for some reason unknown to you. One problem is tiring the fish out too much when fighting it. The bass may be stressed beyond its limit to recover correctly and quickly. This can cause the fish to turn belly up and die either then or within a short time. You should try to oxygenate the fish’s gills by holding it in the water and gently moving it back and forth before letting it go. This helps eliminate some stress and gives the fish a chase to rest while breathing. Over stressing a fish is probably the biggest hazard that face fish that are caught, especially larger ones.

Enjoy!


Bruce Middleton

bpmiddleton@peoplepc.com