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Lake Ewauna is for suckers
Endangered fish swimming where they're not supposed to
published April 21, 2003
By DYLAN DARLING
H&N Staff Writer
There are sucker fish in Lake Ewauna.
Just how many and where they came from still is unclear.
But there are suckers, contrary to what many might have guessed.
Rich Piaskowski, a fisheries biologist for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, started searching for suckers, especially those of the endangered Lost River and shortnose variety, in the lake last year.
Historically, suckers were known to be found throughout Upper Klamath Lake, Lake Ewauna and Lower Klamath Lake. But with all the changes in the last century, from draining to damming to diking, where the suckers still roam is under study.
Using trammel nets, which create a one-meter high wall on the bottom of the lake through a combination of weights and floats, Piaskowski has been catching suckers and then implanting them with radio transmitters.
He wants to figure out where adult suckers move throughout the year to help in planning for a fish ladder on the Link River Dam in 2006. He also is looking at how the sometimes dismal water quality of the lake is affecting the behavior of the suckers.
But his work is just a start.
"This marks pretty much the beginning," he said.
Lake Ewauna isn't a place where many people would have expected to find suckers. Though suckers are tough, the lake is known to have poor-quality water.
In late summer the dissolved oxygen levels in the lake drop to where the water is basically lethal for fish.
Michael Berg, a civil engineering technician for the Bureau, said a thick layer, possibly several feet deep, of organic debris on the bottom of the lake combined with algae growth on the lake's surface in the summer combine to pull the oxygen out of the water.
"There is no chance they could make it in Lake Ewauna," he said.
There is a tremendous amount of nutrients in the lake, making it too rich for most fish.
Only hearty fish, such as tui chubs and fathead minnows, have been known to stick it out in the lake.
While the chubs and minnows stay in the lake, the suckers get out.
So far, Piaskowski's radio transmitters have shown him that the suckers head up the Link River when the water gets bad, where they hang until the water gets better.
Whether this indicates that the suckers once came down the Link River from Upper Klamath Lake is something Piaskowski is trying to figure out. It appears the suckers are trying to do a spawning run of sorts, but there is no evidence that they are actually spawning.
This is the time of year for sucker spawning, and many of those caught in the last week showed signs of being ready for it. If the suckers are spawning in the Link River, the young would probably be swept into Lake Ewauna by the current when they hatch. That means they would be ending up in the lake when the water quality is down.
"The more important question is, 'If spawning is occurring, can the juveniles survive?' '' Piaskowski said.
The Bureau has contracted researchers from Oregon State University to look at the life stages of fish throughout Lake Ewauna and the waters leading down to the Keno Dam this summer. This research should help shed some light on whether the suckers are spawning or not.
Last spring, Piaskowski put radio transmitters that turn on from the start of March to the beginning of October for three years in 37 suckers. After the summer only 12 of those fish were still swimming, with many suckers dying in June when the water quality starts to degrade.
He hopes to learn why so many of the fish died.
This year he has put radio transmitters that will give a signal for 12 straight months. In all he put transmitters in 15 shortnose, five Lost River and two Klamath large scale suckers and two trout. He also is getting signals again from the 12 survivors from last year.
The suckers he has been catching range in age from about 4 years old to almost 30 years old, he estimates.
He doesn't know how many of those years the suckers have spent in Lake Ewauna.
Piaskowski surgically implants the radios in suckers after numbing them with a cocaine derivative. The radios are about the size of a AA battery and cost $250 each. Once inserted into a sucker, the transmitter's have a long plastic antenna that sticks out of the fish's belly.
The five minute procedure of cutting the suckers open and slipping in the radio might have been part of the high mortality rate, but Piaskowski isn't sure of that yet.
"It could be that the lake quality coupled with the radio procedure caused the fish to die," he said.
He has been using the technique for several years, starting as a graduate student at the University of Idaho in 1996. On contract with the Army Corps of Engineers, he used radio transmitters to track northern pike and smallmouth bass in the Columbia and Snake Rivers. In 2001, he started working for the Bureau in the Klamath Basin.
Piaskowski is in the second year of three years of initial research, but he is not alone in studying suckers and other fish in the Basin. The study is just one of many going on around the Basin to try to figure out what the situation of different types of fish.
The various studies are being conducted by the Bureau of Reclamation, OSU, the U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and others.
Reporter Dylan Darling covers natural resources. He can be reached at 885-4471, (800) 275-0982, or by e-mail at ddarling@heraldandnews.com.
published April 21, 2003
By DYLAN DARLING
H&N Staff Writer
There are sucker fish in Lake Ewauna.
Just how many and where they came from still is unclear.
But there are suckers, contrary to what many might have guessed.
Rich Piaskowski, a fisheries biologist for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, started searching for suckers, especially those of the endangered Lost River and shortnose variety, in the lake last year.
Historically, suckers were known to be found throughout Upper Klamath Lake, Lake Ewauna and Lower Klamath Lake. But with all the changes in the last century, from draining to damming to diking, where the suckers still roam is under study.
Using trammel nets, which create a one-meter high wall on the bottom of the lake through a combination of weights and floats, Piaskowski has been catching suckers and then implanting them with radio transmitters.
He wants to figure out where adult suckers move throughout the year to help in planning for a fish ladder on the Link River Dam in 2006. He also is looking at how the sometimes dismal water quality of the lake is affecting the behavior of the suckers.
But his work is just a start.
"This marks pretty much the beginning," he said.
Lake Ewauna isn't a place where many people would have expected to find suckers. Though suckers are tough, the lake is known to have poor-quality water.
In late summer the dissolved oxygen levels in the lake drop to where the water is basically lethal for fish.
Michael Berg, a civil engineering technician for the Bureau, said a thick layer, possibly several feet deep, of organic debris on the bottom of the lake combined with algae growth on the lake's surface in the summer combine to pull the oxygen out of the water.
"There is no chance they could make it in Lake Ewauna," he said.
There is a tremendous amount of nutrients in the lake, making it too rich for most fish.
Only hearty fish, such as tui chubs and fathead minnows, have been known to stick it out in the lake.
While the chubs and minnows stay in the lake, the suckers get out.
So far, Piaskowski's radio transmitters have shown him that the suckers head up the Link River when the water gets bad, where they hang until the water gets better.
Whether this indicates that the suckers once came down the Link River from Upper Klamath Lake is something Piaskowski is trying to figure out. It appears the suckers are trying to do a spawning run of sorts, but there is no evidence that they are actually spawning.
This is the time of year for sucker spawning, and many of those caught in the last week showed signs of being ready for it. If the suckers are spawning in the Link River, the young would probably be swept into Lake Ewauna by the current when they hatch. That means they would be ending up in the lake when the water quality is down.
"The more important question is, 'If spawning is occurring, can the juveniles survive?' '' Piaskowski said.
The Bureau has contracted researchers from Oregon State University to look at the life stages of fish throughout Lake Ewauna and the waters leading down to the Keno Dam this summer. This research should help shed some light on whether the suckers are spawning or not.
Last spring, Piaskowski put radio transmitters that turn on from the start of March to the beginning of October for three years in 37 suckers. After the summer only 12 of those fish were still swimming, with many suckers dying in June when the water quality starts to degrade.
He hopes to learn why so many of the fish died.
This year he has put radio transmitters that will give a signal for 12 straight months. In all he put transmitters in 15 shortnose, five Lost River and two Klamath large scale suckers and two trout. He also is getting signals again from the 12 survivors from last year.
The suckers he has been catching range in age from about 4 years old to almost 30 years old, he estimates.
He doesn't know how many of those years the suckers have spent in Lake Ewauna.
Piaskowski surgically implants the radios in suckers after numbing them with a cocaine derivative. The radios are about the size of a AA battery and cost $250 each. Once inserted into a sucker, the transmitter's have a long plastic antenna that sticks out of the fish's belly.
The five minute procedure of cutting the suckers open and slipping in the radio might have been part of the high mortality rate, but Piaskowski isn't sure of that yet.
"It could be that the lake quality coupled with the radio procedure caused the fish to die," he said.
He has been using the technique for several years, starting as a graduate student at the University of Idaho in 1996. On contract with the Army Corps of Engineers, he used radio transmitters to track northern pike and smallmouth bass in the Columbia and Snake Rivers. In 2001, he started working for the Bureau in the Klamath Basin.
Piaskowski is in the second year of three years of initial research, but he is not alone in studying suckers and other fish in the Basin. The study is just one of many going on around the Basin to try to figure out what the situation of different types of fish.
The various studies are being conducted by the Bureau of Reclamation, OSU, the U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and others.
Reporter Dylan Darling covers natural resources. He can be reached at 885-4471, (800) 275-0982, or by e-mail at ddarling@heraldandnews.com.
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