Bradys Run Lake looks good for bass, not so good for panfish

Posted on: September 20, 2017 | Bob Frye | Comments

Largemouth bass are benefitting from teh presence of gizzard shad in Bradys Run Lake.

Bradys Run Lake is home to a nice population of largemouth bass that should only get better, say biologists.
Bob Frye/Everybody Adventures

Bradys Run Lake is back as a good place for bass fishing.

Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission biologists surveyed the 26-acre Beaver County lake earlier this summer. Results were just made available.

Crews handled 88 bass per hour, “which is really good,” said Tim Wilson, a biologist in the commission’s area 1 office in Linesville.

“And some of them were up to 18 inches, so they’re growing,” he added. “And we saw two good year classes, from last year and the year before. So it looks like it’s on its way to being recovered, at least for bass.”

Indeed, the Bradys Run Lake fishing should get better in the next few years, Wilson said. While there were good numbers of fish 12 inches and larger, the biggest cluster of fish was those between 6 and 7 inches.

That bodes well for the future, Wilson said.

The other story

The outlook for the panfish swimming in Bradys Run Lake is less rosy, however.

“It appears the crappies might be stunted,” Wilson said.

The blame for that for goes to gizzard shad.

When Bradys Run Lake was drained in 2010-11 so that repairs could be made to its dam, all of the fish were obviously removed. The commission and Beaver County, which owns the lake, re-stocked it with bass, crappies and other fish.

But gizzard shad and carp re-colonized the lake on their own, apparently swimming into the lake from Bradys Run, the creek.

That’s good for bass. Shad can really boost a population.

The impact on panfish has been a “slow growing, overabundant population.”

“So the lake is still in what I would call the recovery phase in that sense,” Wilson added.

The commission electroshocked the lake twice last year to remove as many gizzard shad as possible. Crews removed loads of fish, Wilson said.

But it didn’t make a dent, so that’s not going to be attempted again.

Instead, the commission may stock blunt-nosed minnows in the lake to provide competing forage, he said.

Bob Frye is the everybodyadventures.com editor. Reach him at 412-838-5148 or bfrye@535mediallc.com. See other stories, blogs, videos and more at everybodyadventures.com.

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