Watch out you Linesides!
- This topic has 15 replies, 6 voices, and was last updated May 21, 2006 at 3:56 am by
.
-
Posts
-
If you have a beater 6 or 7 wt with sinking line bring it. I’ll see if I can also get you a Sauger on the fly. I’m sure that would be a another first for you.
We will also be Skipjack fishing. If you haven’t done it before you’re going to have a freaking ball. These are basically little 1-3 pound Tarpon and they are there in the thousands. You will catch on almost every cast!What are you lining the 10 with?
I keep losing posts!
I have a Teeny 425 on the new TFO and I do have a #7.
Also, check your PMs. This trip could be good for something besides fishing.
Zach
Hey dunfly –
What they call skipjack and what you and I are used to calling skipjack (aka ladyfish) aren’t the same thing.
I really don’t know the history of Skipjack but I think they came from the gulf to spawn and have since been landlocked by the dams. Hard to believe but up north they are considered endangered.
They look an awful lot like a ladyfish and for all I know could be one.
Stripers think of them as Prime Rib.
Skipjack are from the herring family, too. I’d think it would be pretty easy to get on the books with one as most people throw them back or use them for bait. Anything over two pounds is a pretty nice fish.
Skipjack herring (Alosa chrysochloris) are a different species from ladyfish (Elops saurus). They are generally similar in appearance, but if you had them side by side, you would know that they are different fish.
“Skipjack” as a nickname is used to refer to different fish in different places; in the salt I’ve heard the name used in reference to both ladyfish and some smallish sort of fish that looked like it was from the tuna family.
The skipjack herring Mike is talking about is a freshwater species. They are a true herring, in the family Clupeidae, which also includes sardines, menhadens, and the gizzard and threadfin shad so common in Tennessee. It should be noted that despite superficial similarity in appearance, tarpon are a more distant relative, in the family Megalopidae.
Mike, as far as I know, skipjack always spend their entire lives in fresh water and are not a landlocked anadromous species. There are two different shad species on the East Coast that look very similar – American Shad (Alosa sapidissima) and Hickory Shad (Alosa mediocris). Both of those fish are anadromous, meaning they live in the salt and migrate to fresh water to spawn. These are the “endangered” fish you are thinking of from up north; their populations have been severely impacted by dam building. They are definitely not the same as skipjack though – they are actually a popular food fish, whereas I’ve never heard of anyone eating a skipjack.
Zach, now you have received more information than you ever wanted to know about skipjack. And all this time, they said my Natural Resource Management degree would never be good for anything.
bd
Hmm I could have sworn I read about Skipjack being endangered so I did a little goggle and turned up this.
http://www.dnr.wisconsin.gov/org/land/er/factsheets/fish/Skpher.htm
Status: State Endangered (1989).
“Natural History: A migratory species, skipjacks assemble below dams in spring (probably in an attempt to return upstream from the gulf or the lower Mississippi to spawn).”
The skipjack is nearly extirpated from Wisconsin, along with the ebony shell (Fusconaia ebena ) and elephant ear (Elliptio crassidens), both state endangered mussels for which the skipjack is the sole host. Mussel larvae cling to the herring’s gills until they mature. Two additional mussel species use the skipjack as a host, although not as exclusively as the ebony shell and elephant ear.From the Minnisota DNR
Special Concern
Alosa chrysochloris (Rafinesque) — skipjack herringThere were many states up north with skippies on the list. I bet you had no idea you were treating an endangered species with such disrespect.
I stand corrected. I guess the state endangered lists up north are kind of below my radar screen – most of what I read about are federally listed threatened or endangered species.
When you say skipjack to me, I think of it as a bonita, which is a saltwater fish similar to tuna.
It’s always interesting to read threads like these.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.