K and I were talking about where to go bowfishing in the waning days of 2008. Seeing as how we're all enjoying the effects of global warming, Florida is looking pretty good.

Anyhow, closer to home we have the Mackinaw River which is now infested with silver carp. We decided it was probably iced over which brought us to another couple of questions.

#1. Duane has told us that silvers feed even in the cold temps. Would they seek out open water in a small river system that otherwise freezes over?

#2. If they're under the ice and you smack the ice with a big metal pole, will they all freak out and kill themselves when they try to jump andbonk their heads on the ice? [8D]

"#2. If they're under the ice and you smack the ice with a big metal pole, will they all freak out and kill themselves when they try to jump andbonk their heads on the ice? [8D]"

LMAO, good one



"K and I were talking about where to go bowfishing in the waning days of 2008. Seeing as how we're all enjoying the effects of global warming"

I remember those famous words spoken back in the 1800's when a bowfisherman asked the same questionto Horace Greeley and he said, " Go south young man"

Question 1: They might look for open spots, but I'm not sure. Often in our system, the low water velocity areas are the parts that ice up first, and stay iced up longest. Silver carp will almost always be in slow moving water, unless they are spawning, so they tend to be under the ice. On the other hand, I have noted that my fish with radio tags in sometimes move into very shallow water on sunny days in the winter, perhaps looking for water that is a degree or two warmer. (this is an unusual behavior in fish. Fish often avoid warm water in the winter, because it increases energetic needs in a fish that is nearly shut down for the winter, but if a fish is going to be active and feed, it makes sense to look for warm water. So it does make sense in a fish that feeds a lot in the winter.) I'm not sure that you could effectively approach a silver carp in shallow water with a boat. I sure had trouble getting a tight fix on those tagged fish, because mychase boat would spook them a long way off.

Question 2: Yes. And how. I sometiimes broke ice up to 4" thick for miles (maybe I'll post some pictures) with my work boat, which could pretty much slowly drive through the stuff and chop it up. We'd do this to locate tagged fish in tributaries. And sometimes, when trying to recapture a tagged fish in the winter, we'd use the boat to bust up all the ice behind a wing dike so that we could lay nets.During these processes, we could look over the side of the boat and watch the fish trying to jump and whacking themselves on the bottom of the ice. You could see the blood spurt when they hit sometimes. Sometimes the water would actually turn a bit pink from all the blood in it. And sometimes they hit the cracks between bergs and end up landing on the ice. Sometimes they could not get back in before they froze. I also have pictures of silver carp sitting up on the ice. Once an eagle came and scooped up a silver carp flopping around on the ice. Incredible.

PS - I don't know how many of them die from the impact, but wow - that has got to hurt. Probably going at maximum velocity when they hit, which isat least 15 -20 mph for a large fish.

And I don't know if a big pole would work or not, but breaking up the ice with a boat definately does. If you are traveling along through a frozen stream, instead of coming up on a bunch of ice, you won't see the fish hitting the ice because you make so much noise getting there that the fish are allgone by the time you get there. But you can see the blood in the water from where they started jumping when they first heard you.

Have you ever been so sadistic as to drill a couple verysmall holes in the ice, send a couple wires down below and give it just a little juice. Now that could be messy.

You are mean. I like it.

Probably get the same effect just pulling up next to the ice sheet and dropping the probes in the water. Have not tried electrofishing under the ice, though.

Thanks for the info Duane.

We may have to go out there and figure out how to give the silvers a rough time. The Mak is too small for our boat, but we'll figure something out.

Any stories or pictures you have, pleaseshare them with us. You have the neatest stories and info.

Well, it looks like we waited too long. (cold bugkept usin at Christmas time. Still not over it. [:@])

Now the rain and unseasonably warm wind took out the ice and I hear the Mak is running high from the run off. Guess it's just one more way '08 has been tough for bowfishing.