Rain

[bulletbob]

Originally Posted by dakota560

As we continue the cycle we're in of larger, more frequent and stronger storms, the pressures on these systems are intensifying. The attached article discusses the impacts not only on the Susquehanna, but since it empties into the Chesapeake Bay, the impacts it's having downstream on the Bay's water quality, habitat and fisheries including the all important blue claw crab.

https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/im...chesapeake-bay

Look at the sediment flowing in fron the Susquehanna in the attaced aerial image. Reality is all these big systems when we get the kind of rains we've been getting for the past so many years, they all turn the color of coffee and are being filled with urban runoff, increased farmland runoff filled with herbicides, pesticides and urban sediment.

The impacts are changing the ecological factors in the systems and introducing risk factors many of these fisheries never before encountered. As Bob pointed out, the Susquehanna in high weather flows is a turbulent coffee colored river of mud, debris and sediment carrying who knows what toxins into the system. If agriculture, increased urbanization and weather patterns don't change, the challenges facing these great rivers will only intensify and the bodies of water they feed into will face the same challenges.

No different than the Delaware middle to lower sections, Schuylkill, Allegheny etc, any big system surrounded by farming and urban development. Don't know what the answers are but greed, more mouths to feed on this planet and continued destruction of habitat due to urban development are posing serious threats to these great rivers and bodies of water. Combine that with changes in weather patterns most likely driven by climate change and these systems and the species calling them home are being pushed to the brink.

For decades, it was nothing to stand on the same rock and catch 5 or 6 ,even up to a dozen or more Walleyes on a good early evening of casting from shore.. Caught 26 one sunny afternoon in september around 1993-94, all keeper size between 15-19 inches. Then they were gone.. I caught ONE walleye in the past year, and only a few a year in the previous 4 or 5 years...

SMB, same story.. about 3 years ago I was catching 20 or 30 on jigs on a good 2-3 hour afternoon session .. This year??. Maybe 3 or 4 bass for the entire YEAR...
the weather is NOT helping at all.. This river fishes better with clearer water, which it only has in oct -nov,, and maybe an odd week or two some spring seasons, but something is horribly wrong with the weather here these days...
The fishermen are gone.. almost non existent in my area of the southern tier of NY... Even in good weather when the river has a chance to clean up a bit... When I do see a guy I know thats been fishing here all his life, I get the same story... No Walleyes, a bass here and there, and maybe a story about a Musky that broke them off... Something has changed in the ecosystem of this river... The life is gone.. No perch, no sunnies, no rock bass, no walleyes, and the smb that were everywhere are becoming more scarce each year... NYSDEC has teir head in the sand, saying "our last survey showed no problems".. Until OOOPSS, they sheepishly told me "Oh yeah, our last electrofishing survey was in 2004"... Terrific.... bob