DING DING DING Winner Winner Chicken Dinner the first PB YP Ribbon winner!!
Let the fun begin!
BCRaley - if you can, google your sunrise and sunset say for yesterday or today and calculate the total amount of time elapsed. We can see if those south of you also will get ribbons or if your momma perch are just anxious to let loose on those eggs early!
My photoperiod today is still 5 minutes shy of 12 hours.
Just went for a walk around my pond. I have the first YP ribbons on sunken Christmas trees. Today was the first day since Friday that I walked... so I'm guessing they dropped them either Saturday or Sunday. We had nice warm sunny weather in the low 50's the past two days. Central Ohio. Didn't get a water temp.
Looks like your the winner with the first reported sighting! If your seeing them there, then I would think I could be seeing some or at least have some now. But it has been cloudy and rainy around here most of the time for 6 days or so. I thought I was going to see some good rain over that time but not so. I think I've had some sprinkles everyday but It don't even add up to 1".
PS I had walked away from my computer while typing this and I didn't see that Canyoncreek had already RANG THE BELL! lol!
I still believe photo period at peak spawn will be 12+ 10-15. I also believe normal spawning begins at near 11;45+ 10-15. With WAE (very close cousin) this is very predictable. Temp can cause the peak to vary a few days either way but generally temp only affects hatch time-in general-not saying this is absolute on YP. Glad someone is seeing ribbons.. mine have been a few days earlier than today and my water temp is "normal". 11:55 today
This seems to be one of the PB threads that receives many, many data points every year!
I have a rookie question for the people that watch the YP spawn so closely. How much does severe, sustained cloudiness affect the spawn?
If photo period was the only controlling variable, then the YP spawn would occur on the same date every year. Let's call this the "astronomical photo period". For periods where clouds decrease the amount of sunlight perceived by the YP, let's call this the "effective photo period".
Do you experts think the controls on the YP spawn are:
Astronomical photo period > effective photo period > water temperature?
OR
Astronomical photo period > water temperature > effective photo period?
As of today I have 11 hours 57 minutes of sunlight from sunrise to sunset.
The ribbons are on the east bank near the southeast corner. We had a good north wind with sun yesterday so it would have been blowing warm water to that corner of the pond.
Attached a pic... not easy to see but best I could do given the cloud cover today.
It might be the water quality? BCRaley has beautiful green/aqua water in his picture. I need to put some structure out if there are no ribbons today. Had a cold wind last 2 days, but sunny again today so any place where there are oak leaves on the bottom in the shallows they tend to choose these spots. Probably having a warm bed to place the eggs gets them in the mood..
Didn't get a chance to walk around yesterday, but tonight, after supper took a look and, WE HAVE RIBBONS!! last year ribbons spotted on 3-16 (probably were there on 3-15). Today spotted on 3-17 but probably happened last night so within a DAY of last year.
This year weather is a bit colder, water level is WAY down (3 feet by now), and I did an early rake of the shallows so very few leaves left on the bottom. I didn't have any branches in.
Also strange that this year they are on the east/SE side of the pond in 3 locations. Some very nice large strands probably from my larger size females.
I put a bunch of sticks out now on the south side, we'll see how many more we can get. We have a unusually cold and windy spell coming in the next 2 days but no more freezing planned. Maybe the wind will give some natural water flow over the eggs. Hopefully conditions will be good for a successful fry event. Would like to really boost the young perch population naturally. Many more SFS than last year, not sure if they will eat the swimming fry or not. My GSH seem to be gone, can't seem to catch any anymore (original stockers would have to be 7 years old by now!)
Collected 7 yellow perch ribbons this afternoon Mar 17 in NW Ohio, 35 miles south of Michigan state line. I did not look yesterday but maybe I had a couple ribbons March 16.. Water temp was 51F 12" deep, temp on bottom 12" deep 52F. Temp 6ft deep 46.5F.
Last edited by Bill Cody; 03/17/2108:03 PM.
aka Pond Doctor & Dr. Perca Read Pond Boss Magazine - America's Journal of Pond Management
Augie, all the bigger rain has missed me, I think it has rained a little everyday here for the last week but until yesterday morning it all added up to only about 1.25". Not enough to bring the pond up but enough to muddy things more. Since yesterday morning I've got about 1.85", that should bring things up a bit but it will make it even more muddy. I think we might get some sun tomorrow so maybe that will help with the spawn.
It is definitely going to be harder for me to see anything now. The pond came up about 20" since yesterday and still had water running in. So my branches I put in are under even more muddy water. Hopefully not too deep now. Since my pond was low, there is now a lot of grass/weeds under water that maybe they'll use?
Finally experienced some good things at the pond..perch ribbon sighting today! Our first ever!! And after a winter kill no less. Water temp is 46°.
Happy that some good news is coming from your pond Dr. Luke! it amazes me that YP get a bad rap. 'they will only work in a sandy bottom pond', 'they will only work in a cold water pond', 'they will only work in a pond that is at least 16' deep', 'they will only feed in low light conditions' --- Hogwash!
YP are the energizer bunny and have many advantages -apparently they can resist winter kill conditions better than your panfish -they weren't fussy with the makeup of your pond bottom (or mine) -they pellet train fairly easily -they eat in any light condition in my pond -they don't seem to get hook shy -They eat snails and crayfish, both a plus for many people -probably one of the better tasting fish in northern ponds! -lay eggs faithfully regardless of whether the bottom structure, or temps, or daylight time, or whether the water levels are quite different from the year before
I still haven't seen any YP ribbons but I did see some type of small egg sacks in my sediment pond. Does anyone know what they might be, I thought it was early for frogs?