Winter officially ends this month.
For New Orleans Saints fans, the winter of 2009-10 will go down as the most enjoyable season in the entire history of the Bayou State.
For Louisiana’s speckled trout population, however — not so much.
Historians had to crack open the almanacs from 14 years ago to find temperatures as low as those experienced here during a particularly raw snap in January. Nighttime temperatures were in the teens across the state, and only the balmiest of areas had highs in the low 40s.
What was particularly unusual was the duration of the cold. From Jan. 8-10, high temperatures in New Orleans never got above 39 degrees, and nighttime lows from Jan. 8-11 ranged from 23-28.
Speckled trout are stressed in the mildest of winters, when cooler temperatures make food scarce and force fish to stack in areas with the most hospitable water.
But bitter cold snaps are often too much for the mild-climate-loving fish to endure, and many succumb to the conditions.
That happened during this year’s cold weather, and anglers reported spotty kills, particularly in the Pontchartrain Basin.
But all along the coast, even in areas where no kills were observed, speckled-trout fishing has been horrendous, which leaves two possibilities: 1) the fish are there but the cold water temperatures have so slowed their metabolism that they are physically incapable of feeding or 2) they’re dead.
LDWF biologist Harry Blanchet thinks it’s probably the former, but isn’t ruling out the latter.
“I’d be stupid not to be concerned,” he said.
If the kills were, in fact, more substantial than was immediately apparent, speckled trout anglers will be singing the blues in 2010, but the long-term impact will be negligible. Without a similar event next winter, fishing in 2011 will be off the charts, and will only improve in 2012.
All of this will happen without the state spending a bunch of money to grow baby speckled trout and release them across the coast, and this will serve to illustrate how foolhardy most stocking programs are.
Every ecosystem can support only a certain amount of biomass, When nature removes that biomass, she will refill the ecosystem because she abhors a vacuum. If man steps in to refill it, there’s certainly no harm done, but it’s a wasted expense.
If anglers want better fishing (is there any out there who doesn’t?), their tax dollars would be far better spent improving the ecosystem. Nature will happily fill it.
Many trout may have died during the January freeze, but others will take their place. Their numbers will be limited only by the 1,900 square miles of marsh Louisiana has lost since 1930.
Replace that marsh, and the fish lost in the harsh weather will look like a good summer weekend at Grand Isle.
