Char-Sighted: June 2016

This spring and summer I've been living at the University of Wisconsin, Madison's Trout Lake Station and working at the Wisconsin DNR Escanaba Research Station.

Trout Lake Station is operated by the Center for Limnology at UW Madison and located in northern Wisconsin. Graduate and undergraduate students spend their summers at Trout Lake conducting graduate work and individual research studies.

The station was established in 1925 as a place to study the lakes of Northern WI. Edward Birge and Chancey Juday, considered the founders of limnology, founded the station as a hub to determine the shared characteristics of northern lakes.

Escanaba research station

I started at the Escanaba research station in early May working for Dr. Gregory Sass. The Esacanaba station has the longest continuous creel survey within the United States which began in 1946. I've been involved in assessing the five research lakes associated with the station including Escanaba, Nebish, Palette, Spruce and Mystery and helping with the creel.

Escanaba lake at dawn

Each spring and fall, the fish communities are assessed on these lakes using various gear types including fyke nets, gill nets and electrofishing. In July, we will start the cisco survey on the lakes via gill nets.

Jamie and Austin prep of plankton samples

We also conduct limnology studies on the 5 research lakes biweekly. Limno includes phytoplankton sampling via wisconsin plankton nets, chlorophyll a readings to assess productivity, dissolved oxygen/temp profiles and secchi readings.

Checking fyke net on Sandford experimental lake

Another long term study being conducted on Sanford lake is looking at the effects of the addition of course woody debris (CWD). This spring, the fish community was assessed pre-CWD addition. The lake will be reassessed every five years to look at how fish populations change.

Dissolved oxygen and temperature profile readings

Additionally, Dr. Sass, Dr. Hrabik and I have written a grant for the WI DNR to fund a study on the effects of water quality, light intensity and temperature on walleye foraging. This study currently has three objectives: 1) Determine foraging characteristics of adult walleye including reaction distance, angle of attack, and foraging success for ecologically relevant light intensities, temperatures, and water clarities, 2) determine effect of these variables on foraging success for young of year (YOY) walleye, and 3) assess YOY walleye predator avoidance of Large Mouth Bass under these variables. Currently, the status of the grant is pending.

Lastly, I have been analyzing creel surveys to look at angler demographics. Specifically, we are interested in whether there are harvest rate differences for angler sex, age, travel distance and seeing how these change over time.

Above photos show taking Chlorophyl a readings (left) elctrofishing on Nebish lake (middle) and collecting phytoplankton (right)

This week I also presented some of the research we've been doing at UMD for the weekly Trout Lake seminar. Research topics covered included siscowet vision and foraging, lake trout vision, walleye vision and the proposed walleye foraging study.