Less algae means more perch, better fishing on lake

OAK HARBOR - With his boat stopped about a half-mile off the shoreline, Dave Spangler took a scoop of Lake Erie water in a clear jar Monday and looked it over.

There was a little sediment there, but Spangler and fellow charter boat captain Dave Whitt could see through the glass.

Most importantly, the jar didn't fill up with cloudy, pea-green globs of algae, as it did in 2015 during a fishing season Spangler described last year as the worst he'd ever seen for algal blooms.

"If we had done this last year, this jar would have been that color," Spangler, owner Dr. Bugs Charters in Oak Harbor, said as he pointed to the jar's green screw-on lid.

Researchers predicted in July that western Lake Erie would experience a much smaller and less severe harmful algal bloom this year compared to 2015.

Spangler and Whitt said that has held true this season as lower rainfall amounts in the spring and less phosphorus runoff from farms in Lake Erie has meant little visible algae.

Gone is the emerald green water stretching more than a mile out from shore in all directions, a sea of algae like none either charter boat captain could remember when they spoke to the News Herald in August 2015.

That's meant a banner year for perch fishing and business in general, Whitt said, although he wonders when the 16-inch walleyes he previously caught in the western Lake Erie basin will return from the east, where fishermen are catching them off of Ashtabula.

"I'd say it's the best perch fishing we've had in 15 years," Whitt said, before he and Spangler departed from Wild Wings Marina for a quick trip to the lake.

In spite of 2015's woeful fishing season, Spangler said,as far as he could tell, there had been no lingering effects of that record algal bloom on business or a reduction in the number of charter boat captains operating on the lake

An algal bloom's severity is measured by the total amount of harmful algae in a bloom, its biomass, for a given year. A measurement above 5 is reason for concern, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The severe 2011 bloom was measured at a 10, while last year's bloom came in at 10.5, the worst ever recorded.

NOAA experts anticipated this year's bloom to measure 5.5 in severity on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the worst. They made that prediction during the annual harmful algal bloom forecast at The Ohio State University's Stone Lab on Gibraltar Island.

Due to several unpredictable factors, the severity of this year's bloom could be anywhere between 3 and 7, a range described in July by Rick Stumpf, NOAA's lead for the Lake Erie bloom forecast, as "fairly large."

Sept 5 marked the first time this summer Spangler had seen any algae on the lake's surface. Spangler saw the algae along the lake's western shoreline near Michigan.

He noted that by the July 4 holiday last year, he and other captains could practically plow through the lake the algae was so thick in the water.

Spangler said it appeared farmers in the Maumee River basin had been taking extra measures to limit chemical fertilizer and manure runoff and the phosphorus with it that flows into Lake Erie.

While the algae has not filled the lake like pea soup this year, extremely hot water temperatures are thought to be the reason for the migration of walleye east toward Cleveland.

Whitt, owner of Coe-Vanna Charters in Fremont, and Spangler said the water temperature has reached as high as 82 degrees this season, where it would normally only get as warm as the mid-to-upper 70s. Several days of 90 degree weather, combined with relatively calm winds and little rain, have contributed to the unusually warm lake water.

"The walleye are pretty fussy when the water gets hot," Spangler said.

Monday, the water temperature off Oak Harbor measured 74.3 degrees.

Spangler said the majority of walleye are too small to be kept in the waters where he fishes and takes customers . Whitt said algae also plays a factor in the movement of walleye, When the algae dies and goes the lake's bottom, the walleye come back, he said.

The disruptions to the walleye's movement has meant later starts to fall fishing, Whitt said, with a season that once started in September or October now starting in mid-November.

That said, Whitt said there was a record hatch for walleye in 2014. Barring any natural disasters or other unforeseen circumstances, Lake Erie is set for walleye fishing for the next decade, he and Spangler said.

Spangler said 2017 should be better for walleye fishing, 2018 will be a "gangbusters" year for the popular fish.

"All of those (walleye) will be legal (size) at that time," Spangler said.

There had been fishernen that had recently caught some walleye off the rocks, Whitt said. He said it had also been a solid season so far for catching smallmouth bass.

dacarson@gannett.com

419-334-1046

Twitter:@DanielCarson7