Cheboygan Tribune
DNR issues new baitfish regulations
By MARK SPENCLEY
Tribune Staff Writer
The Michigan Department of Natural Resources is warning ice fishermen to be aware of the species and origin of the baitfish on their hook.
For several months now the DNR has been instituting a program to halt the spread of viral hemorrhagic septicemia, or VHSv, a deadly fish virus that was first discovered in a Clare County lake last June.
The program is designed to suppress the spread of the virus by regulating the species of baitfish that can be used for fishing. Anglers can visit the DNR Web site www.michigan.go/dnrfishing to find an updated list of prohibited baitfish species.
Gary Whelan, DNR fish production manager, is urging fishermen to check the Web site often because the prohibited species list will be updated regularly.
In addition, Whelan is reminding anglers that the regulations vary based upon designated management areas, which have been identified to help in controlling the spread of VHSv throughout Michigan's waters.
State waters have been broken down into three basic management areas, which include the VHSv Free Management Area, the VHSv Surveillance Management Area and the VHSv Positive Management Area.
The VHSv Free Management Area includes Lake Superior and all the waters within the Lake Superior watershed.
Waters of the VHSv Positive Management Area include the Great Lakes from Lake Huron to Lake Erie, the St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair, and the Detroit River, as well as all tributary streams up to the first barrier that blocks the movement of Great Lakes fish into inland waters. VHSv was found earlier in fish off Cheboygan County shores.
Many waters are covered by the VHSv Surveillance Management Area, including all waters in the Lake Huron, St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair, Detroit River, and Lake Erie watersheds above the first barrier that blocks the movement of Great Lakes fish into inland waters, as well as the St. Mary's River and the waters of Lake Michigan up to the first barrier that blocks the movement of Great Lakes fish into inland waters.
For fishermen, these three management areas dictate which baitfish can be used inside each of the three established areas. This all hinges on where the baitfish were collected and whether they received disease-free certification.
If baitfish have been certified as disease-free they can be used in any waters across the state. A key issue arises though, when anglers collect their own baitfish.
Baitfish that are collected in the VHSv Free Management Area are free to be used in all state waters, but the same does not apply for baitfish harvested in the other two management areas, noted Whelan.
He went on to explain that baitfish collected within the VHSv Positive Management Area, they have to be used within that management area. Baitfish harvested in the surveillance area can be used in both the surveillance and positive management areas.
“An easy way to determine the management area classification of a particular water body is to determine if Great Lakes fish such as Chinook salmon, coho salmon, steelhead, walleyes or suckers can get to that water body. If so, then that location has the same classification as the Great Lake water into which it flows.” said Whelan.
He also said fishermen should carry receipts to verify the certification of their baitfish.
If anglers purchase bait from a retail shop, they will need to carry receipts for any species of baitfish or roe that is found on the Prohibited Species list, said Whelan. Some of the key baitfish species that anglers will need to have receipts for include: emerald shiners, spottail shiners, and white suckers, as well as for roe from Chinook salmon, coho salmon, and steelhead.
Each receipt should contain five pieces of vital information.
€ The name of the licensed retail bait dealer and dealer's license number.
€ The date of sale.
€ The prohibited fish species sold and amount.
€ A transaction number.
€ Whether the bait is certified or not.
The information on the receipt is essential to allow DNR staff a chance to trace back any problems, such as a VHSv outbreak.
“Anglers are likely to see a variety of ways the information is provided on or attached to a receipt, since we are trying to be as flexible as possible in working with retailers. As long as the information is made available to the angler, everything will work out just fine,” said Whelan. “Anglers may see cash register printouts with all of the information, cash register printouts that have some of the information on an attached sticker (such as an address or photo slide-sized label) or ink stamp, or cash register printouts with some of the information and a second piece of paper attached to the receipt with the rest of the information.”
DNR officials are also warning anglers to be skeptical of large price increases attributed to testing requirements, citing that the price to test each fish in nominal.
“It is critical that anglers follow these regulations because we need their help in preventing the movement of fish diseases. Without their help, their fisheries could suffer avoidable losses,” said DNR Fisheries Division Chief Kelley Smith.
Bayfield Ontario
Monday, February 4, 2008
Botulism is killing Great Lakes birds
Botulism is killing Great Lakes birds
Botulism is killing Great Lakes birds
Some 8,000 died in 2007, including 2,000 loons
February 4, 2008
BY TINA LAM
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER
Counting dead birds along Lake Michigan's Upper Peninsula shoreline last November was mind-numbing, even emotional for wildlife biologist Joe Kaplan. Hundreds of loons, cormorants, gulls, long-tailed ducks and grebes were scattered across the sand, washed up and rotting.
Then he spotted a familiar bird. The yellow band on its lifeless leg showed it was C3, a loon that had lived for 14 seasons at Seney National Wildlife Refuge in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. The adult male was 22 miles from the refuge, headed for his warmer winter home, when he was caught in a botulism plume spawned by foreign invaders -- two species of mussels and round gobies, a fat minnow-length fish.
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Kaplan and other researchers say as many as 8,000 native and migrating waterfowl -- including 2,000 loons, cherished for their haunting, sweet calls -- may have died of toxic type E botulism along the lake's northeast shore last fall, the second die-off in two years on Lake Michigan from the neurotoxin.
The outbreak also claimed four endangered piping plovers and at least one bald eagle.
The creatures likely ate botulism-infected gobies, a bottom-feeder susceptible to E botulism. Scientists say they think the botulism, which is native to the Great Lakes, comes to life in rotting cladophora algae and is absorbed by invasive zebra and quagga mussels that have taken over the lake bottom. Gobies eat the toxic mussels, and the birds eat the gobies.
Until 2006, there hadn't been a major bird die-off from E botulism in Lake Michigan in more than two decades.
The interaction of the algae and the three invaders, which came from their native Black Sea in ocean ships' ballast water, has given birth to a new cycle of deadly botulism. As the critters spread, so does E botulism.
Scientists say the die-off in Lake Michigan is likely to be repeated this year and to spread to areas including Lake Huron.
More than 50,000 birds have perished in E botulism die-offs on Lakes Erie and Ontario since 1999. No humans have been affected -- cooking the meat of fish or ducks, for example, kills the botulism -- nor has the problem spread to inland lakes.
The life of C3
Doting father C3 had stayed behind at Seney as other loons left, to tend to his chick, hatched in July -- late for a loon chick.
He'd been banded in 1993 as an adult at Seney and spent each spring, summer and early fall through 2005 there with the same mate, the longest pairing ever recorded at Seney, said biologist Damon McCormick.
They broke up between 2005 and 2006 when he found a new mate (his ex took up with one of their sons). Loon parents share chick care equally, and C3 helped raise 17 chicks before his death, a refuge record.
To see the much-studied C3 as one of the botulism victims was moving for Kaplan.
"It gives you an odd sense," he said, "that something is wrong in the lake."
Something is wrong, said Tom Cooley, wildlife biologist for the Department of Natural Resources, who analyzes bird carcasses to verify that they died of E botulism.
"Once you have the right conditions, the botulism becomes more prevalent," he said. "There's no way to stop it."
In 2006, biologists and volunteers counted 2,900 dead birds in a 14-mile stretch at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.
In 2007, the bird carcasses were spread over 400 miles of shoreline from Empire to Escanaba and on islands like South Fox and North and South Manitou.
No one knows the ultimate effect on bird populations. Many dead waterfowl likely were migrating from Canada, but some, like loon C3, were Michigan-based. Just how many loons were lost won't be known until spring, when they should return to Seney and other nesting areas.
Spreading invaders
The unchecked spread of gobies and mussels, along with warmer water and lower lake levels, has created a dangerous soup, the biologists say. Lake Superior remains too cold for mussels.
But in the shallower, protected waters of Lake Michigan, gobies are so abundant they're like ants on the lake bottom, said Mark Breederland, an educator with Michigan Sea Grant. Near the mouth of the Platte River, where the 2006 botulism die-off occurred, there are an estimated 40 million gobies.
Quagga mussels have created huge beds on the lake bottom, even outcompeting zebra mussels. While Lake St. Clair is infested with the invasive mussels and gobies, the botulism hasn't been as big a problem because currents keep the water moving. The algae tend to grow best in still waters.
Cladophora algae bloomed in the Great Lakes in the 1960s and '70s, nourished by phosphorus from fertilizer runoff and poor sewage treatment. Bans on phosphorus and improved sewage treatment reduced algae growth in the 1980s and '90s.
Now, invasive mussels filter so much water they've made the water clearer, allowing the sun to penetrate deeper into the water and the algae to flourish. The mussels add another important ingredient to the mix -- their feces fertilize the algae.
"There are a whole bunch of things happening on the lake bottom that are scary to a biologist," said Ken Hyde, wildlife biologist for the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. "When birds start washing up onto the beach, it's scary to the public."
Contact TINA LAM at 313-222-6421 or tlam@freepress.com.
Botulism is killing Great Lakes birds
Some 8,000 died in 2007, including 2,000 loons
February 4, 2008
BY TINA LAM
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER
Counting dead birds along Lake Michigan's Upper Peninsula shoreline last November was mind-numbing, even emotional for wildlife biologist Joe Kaplan. Hundreds of loons, cormorants, gulls, long-tailed ducks and grebes were scattered across the sand, washed up and rotting.
Then he spotted a familiar bird. The yellow band on its lifeless leg showed it was C3, a loon that had lived for 14 seasons at Seney National Wildlife Refuge in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. The adult male was 22 miles from the refuge, headed for his warmer winter home, when he was caught in a botulism plume spawned by foreign invaders -- two species of mussels and round gobies, a fat minnow-length fish.
Advertisement
Kaplan and other researchers say as many as 8,000 native and migrating waterfowl -- including 2,000 loons, cherished for their haunting, sweet calls -- may have died of toxic type E botulism along the lake's northeast shore last fall, the second die-off in two years on Lake Michigan from the neurotoxin.
The outbreak also claimed four endangered piping plovers and at least one bald eagle.
The creatures likely ate botulism-infected gobies, a bottom-feeder susceptible to E botulism. Scientists say they think the botulism, which is native to the Great Lakes, comes to life in rotting cladophora algae and is absorbed by invasive zebra and quagga mussels that have taken over the lake bottom. Gobies eat the toxic mussels, and the birds eat the gobies.
Until 2006, there hadn't been a major bird die-off from E botulism in Lake Michigan in more than two decades.
The interaction of the algae and the three invaders, which came from their native Black Sea in ocean ships' ballast water, has given birth to a new cycle of deadly botulism. As the critters spread, so does E botulism.
Scientists say the die-off in Lake Michigan is likely to be repeated this year and to spread to areas including Lake Huron.
More than 50,000 birds have perished in E botulism die-offs on Lakes Erie and Ontario since 1999. No humans have been affected -- cooking the meat of fish or ducks, for example, kills the botulism -- nor has the problem spread to inland lakes.
The life of C3
Doting father C3 had stayed behind at Seney as other loons left, to tend to his chick, hatched in July -- late for a loon chick.
He'd been banded in 1993 as an adult at Seney and spent each spring, summer and early fall through 2005 there with the same mate, the longest pairing ever recorded at Seney, said biologist Damon McCormick.
They broke up between 2005 and 2006 when he found a new mate (his ex took up with one of their sons). Loon parents share chick care equally, and C3 helped raise 17 chicks before his death, a refuge record.
To see the much-studied C3 as one of the botulism victims was moving for Kaplan.
"It gives you an odd sense," he said, "that something is wrong in the lake."
Something is wrong, said Tom Cooley, wildlife biologist for the Department of Natural Resources, who analyzes bird carcasses to verify that they died of E botulism.
"Once you have the right conditions, the botulism becomes more prevalent," he said. "There's no way to stop it."
In 2006, biologists and volunteers counted 2,900 dead birds in a 14-mile stretch at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.
In 2007, the bird carcasses were spread over 400 miles of shoreline from Empire to Escanaba and on islands like South Fox and North and South Manitou.
No one knows the ultimate effect on bird populations. Many dead waterfowl likely were migrating from Canada, but some, like loon C3, were Michigan-based. Just how many loons were lost won't be known until spring, when they should return to Seney and other nesting areas.
Spreading invaders
The unchecked spread of gobies and mussels, along with warmer water and lower lake levels, has created a dangerous soup, the biologists say. Lake Superior remains too cold for mussels.
But in the shallower, protected waters of Lake Michigan, gobies are so abundant they're like ants on the lake bottom, said Mark Breederland, an educator with Michigan Sea Grant. Near the mouth of the Platte River, where the 2006 botulism die-off occurred, there are an estimated 40 million gobies.
Quagga mussels have created huge beds on the lake bottom, even outcompeting zebra mussels. While Lake St. Clair is infested with the invasive mussels and gobies, the botulism hasn't been as big a problem because currents keep the water moving. The algae tend to grow best in still waters.
Cladophora algae bloomed in the Great Lakes in the 1960s and '70s, nourished by phosphorus from fertilizer runoff and poor sewage treatment. Bans on phosphorus and improved sewage treatment reduced algae growth in the 1980s and '90s.
Now, invasive mussels filter so much water they've made the water clearer, allowing the sun to penetrate deeper into the water and the algae to flourish. The mussels add another important ingredient to the mix -- their feces fertilize the algae.
"There are a whole bunch of things happening on the lake bottom that are scary to a biologist," said Ken Hyde, wildlife biologist for the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. "When birds start washing up onto the beach, it's scary to the public."
Contact TINA LAM at 313-222-6421 or tlam@freepress.com.
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