Lake Erie Grows Eerie With Increase In Water Snakes

Thanks to the hard work of Richard King, an associate professor in biology at NIU who has spent 30 years studying the Lake Erie water snake (Nerodia sipedon insularum), and his star student Kristin Stanford the species has now been removed from the threatened species list. Over the past 11 years they have tracked the population of this one-of-a-kind species found only in Ohio’s Put-in-Bay Harbor. Together they have been tagging and monitoring the species population and have successfully recovered the species. It’s a good thing too, because as it turns out the snakes are feeding on the invasive European goby and are slowly bringing balance back to their ecosystem.

You can also visit the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service website to learn more about the Lake Erie water snakes.

Megan Seymour, a wildlife biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, says King and Stanford are primarily responsible for the recovery of the species. Seymour says there were 1,520 to 2,000 adult Lake Erie water snakes when the population was first counted in 1999. Today, King says, there are more than 12,000 Lake Erie water snakes.

The snakes are a key predator in Lake Erie’s aquatic ecosystem — feeding on species such as mudpuppies and native fish such as walleye and smallmouth bass. Since the 1990s, the Lake Erie water snake has preyed upon an invasive fish species from Europe called the goby. The snake has played a vital role in decreasing the goby population, which competes with native fish for food and space.

via USA Today

Bay of Quinte Report, July 9 2006

Gillian and I decided to take a quick trip to the Belleville, Ontario to do some shore fishing in the Bay of Quinte with a couple friends. Very windy conditions and heavy boat traffic made locating walleye and bass very difficult. We ended up targeting small pan fish. We caught a variety of fish, including rock bass, sunfish, bluegill and for the first time I caught a goby. The goby is an invasive species that can be found throughout the great lakes. They take over prime spawning sites traditionally used by native species, competing with native fish for habitat and changing the balance of the ecosystem.

We fished well into the darkness and my friends landed a couple nice bass and a big crappie before we packed up and headed home for a few beers.

A Different Kind of Fishing – by Adam Guy

How do you catch fish in water over ten meters deep using a rod that does not have a reel, or even guides for your line? Simple: fashion the rod from bamboo, hollow out the centre and run the line through the middle and out the very end of the rod. Wrap your spare line around a couple of pegs at the other end, and you are ready to indulge in the traditional Japanese fishing technique known as tebane.

I first started using this technique to catch a fish known in Japanese as haze. Its scientific name is Acanthogobius flavimanus; however, there appears to be a lack of consensus over its common name in English, with references calling it spiny goby, yellowfin goby or spotted goby. For the sake of simplicity, from here on I will refer to the creatures as just ‘goby’. Gobies are a small, seasonal fish widespread throughout Pacific Asia, and grow up to 20cm in size; they favor muddy habitats and are tolerant of a wide range of temperature and salinity. The traditional goby fishing season starts in September, when the fish migrate from rivers and estuaries to the sea, in order to spawn. Boats packed with goby fans leave port early in the morning from all over Tokyo and Yokohama, and head to sheltered coves and bay areas where the gobies are known to congregate; although the general regions are fairly well known, each skipper has his own secret spot, usually well-managed and handed down from generation to generation by word of mouth. The best goby points are those that are inaccessible from land, preventing others from casting or throwing nets from the shore, and where the waters and tides are relatively calm. When I go fishing for goby, I always use the services of a boathouse called Fukagawa Fujimi, which is located in the southeast of Tokyo. Fujimi is one of the longest-running such businesses in Japan: they have been a family-run affair since before the beginning of the Edo Period, over four hundred years ago. The skipper, a lean, sun-tanned Tokyoite known to regulars as ‘Captain Beard’ due to his whiskers, is famous for both his prowess at catching gobies (which is quite fearsome) and for his no-nonsense, old school approach to not just fishing, but to life in general. Although his countenance is often intimidating to newcomers, he is always happy to take the time to teach beginners – in his thick, east Tokyo accent – the science of traditional goby fishing with bamboo rods, and as a novice I count myself lucky to be able to learn from his vast experience.

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