From the stick:
"Why do I catch a lot of 9 inch YP and BC ice fishing year after year in Bremer Pond? Each year I think next year they will be the next size bigger, but not. What is happening to the 9 inchers from the year before, and why are there always that size?"
Dwight addressed this a bit with his light beam theory and also acknowledged the fact that there is some fishing pressure throughout the year on the pond, but at some point you do need to ask the question why arent the fat panfish growing any longer and the stick asked the question. Big panfish are consistently caught through the ice on lakes and ponds that have quite a bit more fishing pressure than Bremer Pond.
If all the fish are fat, I am not convinced there is an over supply of stunted panfish, plus if Dwight and co needs to become the top predator to replace the pike they sure can. If done correctly, they could actually be much better predators than the pike.
Coming from my experiences with pike and musky they are a great tool up to a certain size (for certain goals of course), but then I do everything I can to remove them once they get too large. Basically we don't catch and release them very often. Once they get big they just become too good of predators in midsized ponds. They eat seriously big panfish, and pretty much at will.
Now I am not discounting anything that Ewest has said while kind of debating with him a bit. There is good information here to think about, but remember this is not one size fits all management and the stocking/removal of big predator fish needs to be done thoughtfully and is very site specific. there are major ramifications. I just want those of you who don't know that Ewest and I are good friends, and I actually enjoy debating with him, makes me think...
