Clear Lake Stinks

[Skeeterman]

Fox40 news reported a virease thats killing the carp but the dgf don,t what it is. No other fishes are dyeing just the carp.

[Dave Wilson]

There was a big carp die- off at Lake Mead a couple weeks ago too- the
Fish people were just becoming aware and studying the problem. Hopefully it's not some parasitic disease that can cross species into other game fish.

[Bill K]

It is just nature at work, various fish/animals go through a cycle and have a decline or die off every year. This is just a cycle the carp go through, just like the shad do every year or so. Jack rabbits and other animals have a cycle also. Nothing usually out of the ordinary, just a cycle mother nature use's to handle her system. Bill K

[BassManDan]

I heard Spring viremea, but I've never heard of it in CA, can anyone confirm this?

[David Rogers]

Around June I was sight fishing at Clear Lake, I was on to a good spot with lots of spawning & active bass but right there just off shore from all those bass were hundreds and hundreds of carp just waiting for those bass to do there thing so they could move in and eat and this was only about a 2 hundred yard stretch. I have seen a dye off every year for 17 years but this is one of the biggest but not by to much, I have seen one almost this big about 8 years ago. I am not sure but if it is nature, its awesome because there are way way to many carp in that lake with no preditors to get rid of them except a man with a bow once in a while

[DC488VS]

We just got back from a long weekend at CL. The dead carp really were blanketing the shoreline. When the wind and chop came up it pushed them back out into the lake and the damn things were everywhere. The smell was pretty bad as well. Running on the big motor was like slalom skiing trying to dodge the floating mines. I was amazed at how big the CL carp can get. They need to start a program to clean those things up. It can't be healthy having decaying fish all over the lake.

[Narcdogk9]

I heard it was because of the spraying the DFG is doing to get rid of hydrilla. The spray is actually a pellet that goes into the grass and the carp eat those pellets. They are spraying 25 areas of the lake. I also heard 2 to 3 weeks ago there was a dye off of 10,000 bass in soda bay, all 2 to 4 lbs., where they had over srayed. Any truth to that rumor.

[Greg_Cornish]

Any truth to that rumor.

No.

[BassManDan]

Carp eating the pellets, it wouldn't surprise me.

And yeah, with that many dead fish, water quality will suffer (frankly, I don't know by how much considring its RELATIVELY few fish over such a HUGE area), but the water quality will take a hit, at least in concentrated areas of them big dead minners!

[Brian]

Hmmmm maybe we will get lucky and the A/C and the ABA will move the T.O.C.s to the Delta.

[Brian Ruthman]

I read that durring the summer the water at a lake is colder on the bottom and the warmer water is on the top from the summer heat , in the fall when there is a rappid change in air temperature this rappid cooling brings up the colder water from the bottom of the lake to the top which has no oxygen and this sudden change can kill fish in this top layer of water where most of the carp might be living if they dont relocate to more oxegen rich water , so the fish can die rather quickly due to rapid suffocation . Maybe that is what happened .

[Phil Burgess]

DEAD CARP ROTING AND FLOATING TO THE BOTTOM MEANS LOTS OF CRAWDADS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11


WOOO HOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!


ITS THE WONDER OF NATURE BABY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[TopJimmy]

Was out this morning and its not nearly as bad as just a week ago . So long as it's not hurting any other wildlife let it run its coarse and make crawdad food, which makes big Bass food. with the size of this years hatch they are gonna need plenty to eat come spring. Just Mother Nature taking care of business. So those looking to do some finger pointing give it up and pick on something else . And as far as Fox 40 you all know the media will make up what ever they can just to stir the pot and make it stink even worse . Those guys tell more lies than fisherman and used car salesmen combined. Clearlake will be just fine.
The bite still sucks but it will pick up it always does.

[lionkiller]

can't be lack of 02, as carp can 'breathe' air....& survive in very low DO levels. Virus or bacteria, most likeky.

Bass will eat carp minnows -when they're deep enough in the grass to find 'em. So will heron, osprey. It sure doesn't impact the population, tho... As was said earlier in the thread, populations tend to peak & trough. Just look at the shad, crappie, silverside populations up here...

Stinks around the Lakeport shoreline, but I saw only one dead fish that wasn't a carp....a catfish. Oh, & a dead muskrat...with its head cut off. & a big pile of bear s___, which my dog tried to eat. Well, the dog that wasn't off rolling in dead carp...

We'll see how it smells out there tonight.....

[big_limits]

This may sound dumb but... does the massive silverside population have anything to do with it? They share the same water and level in the water column. Do the silversides eat the same food as carp? Just a thought. Those who have tenure on the lake, was there a correlation between the two in the past?

[Zedonis]

Big limits,

Probably not. It is likley a species-specific incident and not related to the silversides. As mentioned earlier, and in another thread of about a week ago, the dieoff is likley a disease or virus of sorts. It is possible that a compound of some sort has selectively chosen the carp but typically a fish dieoff would also have other species.

I think that all we can do is await CDFGs opinion. Jay do you have any new information to share with these concerned bassaholics, including myself?

Thanks,

Paul

[12lblargemouth]

So what I want to know is, has anyone thrown a Frog across the Carp Mat to see if they get a Blow Up????

[Jay Rowan]

Nothing yet.
I talked with one of the pathologists today. He called the lab at UCD yesterday and they didn't have a hit on anything yet.
He said all the fish we got for them were in pretty bad shape inside and out so we should see something soon.
It normally takes 7-14 days for anything to show up, but if results are not certain it could take as long as 28 days.
They basically introduce some tissue from the sample fish to some healthy cells and wait for the healthy cells to start dying off. Tomorrow would be 7 days assuming they got the tests running the day after I got the fish so I'm assuming we'll know more early next week.

[fishdaddy]

First Post: If the over population of carp in Clear Lake are leading to their die off. What does this mean for US!

[Jay Rowan]

Results are in from Pathology.
It was Koi HerpesVirus that was killing the carp in CL.
See link below if you want to read up.
http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/whatsnew/ ... fm?id=1378

It appears to have run it's course although typically the die off's tend to occure in a bell shaped curve with a lot of mortality near the start of the outbreak then the numbers taper off.
I was out this weekend and saw one doing a death sprial out by Anderson but didn't see any freshly dead fish floating around anywhere we went.

[Turkeyman]

I knew wakeboarders had something to do with this. HA HA

[Tin Can]

I knew wakeboarders had something to do with this. HA HA

Hopefully you break out with the carp herpes for this joke!

[lionkiller]

Wow, interesting article. 80% mortality? I have seen a lot of dead carp here, but... Still kinda stinky here in spots, even with the cooler weather.

Jay, thanks for your follow-up.

[David Rogers]

I was up there 2 weeks ago and I saw no new dead carp just carp that had been dead for a while, there were none that I saw dieing, they were already dead, are carp still dying? There were alot of dead carp but not 80%, if it were 80% there would be carp every square inch of bank at Clear Lake and that is not what I saw.

[Zedonis]

Jay thanks for the update. Good to have a local CDFG biologist chime in on these matters.

Paul

[Johnny C]

Back in June Hitman posted a picture with a 25 lb. carp from Clear Lake..My question is, "Do you think he may have kissed it?"

[Phil]

Its natures way of feeding the young cycle ...it is that simple !

[jemoon27]

My guess it might be Aluminum. Al3+ is a chemical that attatches to the surface of a fish's gill, and literally suffocates it. It interferes with the ion exchange and depletes the fish from salt consumption. Fish release mucus to try to remove this Al on their gills, and end up suffocating themselves. Where is the Aluminum coming from? It could be from the acid rain of the extremely bad fires this summer?? I was just throwing this out as an idea, not saying that this is the problem, because why wouldn't it kill off the bass and other fish too?

[Greg_Cornish]

I heard the weed pellets have copper content, but I do not know if that's true.

[Terry]

The fish collected from Clear Lake by Jay Rowan had koi herpes virus. Carp specific and not transferable to humans. Appears to be pretty much over now with cooler weather.

Has anyone sen any new dead fish?

Terry Foreman
Fisheries Branch
CDFG

[lionkiller]

Haven't seen any new dead or dying carp in a week. There are still some stinky spots around, though...

With as many hidey holes as there are here, I don't expect we lost 80% of our carp....though I wouldn't cry if we did.

Oh yeah, Cornfish, copper. & it's "not harmful to fish..." (Except in a loss-of-habitat sort of way...) According to the people who spread it.

[Greg_Cornish]

The fish collected from Clear Lake by Jay Rowan had koi herpes virus. Carp specific and not transferable to humans.

Terry Foreman
Fisheries Branch
CDFG

HERPES? Maybe not transferable, but I still glad I never dated one.

[Skeeterman]

Next thing you know they'll being dieing of aids. Nothing is safe anymore.