Birds of a feather…

Posted October 26, 2009 at 4:25 pm
Filed Under Outdoors | Leave a Comment

…flock together.

I spent a recent Friday flocked with others of my kind — outdoor writers.

The Louisiana Outdoors Writer’s Association hosted its annual conference in Lake Charles, and writers from around the state including LOWA president Lyle Johnson and writers Joe Macaluso and John Flores were on hand for the event.

About 15 writers attended the conference.

Invasive tilapia in the Mississippi River, great silvania at Lake Bistineau, tracking of speckled trout on Big Lake and in Barataria Bay, the reorganization of the state department of Wildlife and Fisheries and new Berkley products were topics of discussion throughout the day.

I am usually required to stay in the five-parish readership area or within the bumper parish area with my stories, so it was great to hear outdoor news from other corners of the state. I had already at least heard about all the topics, with the exception of the tilapia problem near Port Sulphur, through my outdoor work.

“We are fairly certain where the fish came from,” McElroy said. “The fish were put there by someone, but we are not 100 percent sure who.”

The fish overwintered in the river and also inhabited a lagoon, ditch and marsh in the area.

“These fish have a high salinity tolerance but are a freshwater species,” McElroy said. “They can withstand poor water quality. They also carry their eggs and their young in their mouth, so this also helps the fish survival rate.”

And not only are the tilapia a potent fish, they also cause problems for local fish.

“The tilapia reproduce so much, they overwhelm the native fish,” McElroy said. “Even the native predators can’t withstand them.”

But in the end, the tilapia even snow themselves under.

“There are thousands and thousands of tilapia in the area, and they reproduce so fast that they stunt themselves,” McElroy said.

To treat the problem, the area was treated with Rotenone, an EPA-approved fish toxicant, through various techniques.

“About 1,400 gallons of the toxicant were applied in the closed areas,” McElroy said.

The first round of Rotenone was sprayed on June 9, and the next day, dead fish littered the waters of the area.

“We found one native fish in a 7.5 mile stretch of water,” McElroy said. “The last tilapia to die from the Rotenone treatments were muddy because they had burrowed into mud in an attempt to escape the toxicant.”

After a second round Rotenone was applied on June 29, the area was restocked with native fish like bowfin, spotted gar, sunfish, catfish and largemouth bass.

“We will monitor the area, retreat if needed and continue to stock area with bowfin and alligator gar to control any remaining tilapia,” McElroy said.