Well, the warmest day we've had all year came yesterday. Actually the warmest we've had since the first week of December. Yesterday was sunny and the high temperature reached 67 degrees around the house. I was hoping to be able to wet a line, but a window survey of various bodies of water ranging from 0.3 acre up to 300 acres revealed that it just wasn't going to happen. Everything was still locked up solid, save a large opening in the middle of the biggest lake. All shorelines and coves were still froze over with ice. But temps remained warm overnight and several of the smaller bodies of water had nice portions of open water in them when I headed off to work this morning. Add to that temps in the 50's and a now steady rain and things should open up fast. Whether they'll hold or not for the weekend will have to be seen, as a cold front is expected into the region later today and lows later this week will be back down into the teens for a couple nights. Why won't this winter end?
Back on a research note, one more Indiana study gleaned from the Spring Technical Session last week. From a presentation entitled "Smallmouth Bass (Micropterus dolomieui) of the Eel River Near North Manchester Indiana: Life on the Edge", data collected in 2006-2007 during spawning season (May-June) showed smallies "clearly preferred spawning sites in back eddies of outside meanders" on this particular stretch. Current velocities in these areas was always <0.5 m/sec. and average spawning depth was 12"-16". One of the interesting things about this research was the big difference in weather patterns between years, 2006 being a very wet year and 2007 being very dry.
In 2006, only 7 nests were documented during 5 different spawning attempts, and overall success rate was only 25%. Average stream discharge that year was 14.2 m^3/sec. In 2007 though, they were able to document 20 nests with 100% successful hatch. Stream discharge that year averaged 6.9 m^3/sec. Their conclusion was "that smallmouth bass year class strength, and prey selectivity is highly dependent upon favorable low flow conditions during spawning."
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