My concern.

[Guest]

Ok, that really ticks me off, but oh well. I had written a LONG story, but since I don't feel like going through the whole thing again, I will give the short version.

I caught a spotted bass at Sloppy Floyd State Park on Saturday, this past weekend. I confronted the DNR ranger about it, and he proved to me that there is a severe lack of intelligence and concern about why the spot was there.

Long story short, they were ignorant as to the type of fish it was, repeating several times that it was a largemouth, or in one instance, that it was a smallmouth, and they did not seem to recognize the concern that I was trying to address for the ecosystem of the lake, seeing that this is not a natural fish that was originally stocked, or has been stocked at all, in either lake.

 

[Guest]

Find out who the local DNR biologist is and forward the info to them. In my experience, most game wardens come from a wildlife background rather than fisheries.

 

[Guest]

The Georgia Dept. of Natural Resources has a blanket coverage in that the Parks and historical sites are under their umbrella. That is about as far as it goes. The rangers at Ga state parks are neither biologists nor are they game wardens. As a matter of fact most park rangers don't even get along too well with the local game wardens. The park rangers go through different training than the law enforcement division does. Park rangers are for the most part campground managers with a gun. They are probably not much better at identifying species than the average angler.
I'm not making light of your concern John but I doubt that a spot or two would harm the ecosystem of an 18 acre lake that receives heavy fishing pressure such as Sloppy Floyd Lake.

Cheez

 

[Guest]

That's where my main concern lies.............just how many are in there? If I caught the freak of the lake, then that's all well and good. However, most biologists do not plan the management of a lake, or in this case, two lakes, with the idea that spotted bass, either planted by illegal means or introduced by accident through a stocking program, will become part of the equation.

With that being said, while the largemouth and the spot are both part of the black bass family, and while having them in the lakes would honestly do more good than harm (at least in my opinion), I just want to make sure that the place is going to be able to tolerate a sustainable population of a new species of fish, that wasn't intended to be there, or either to have that species removed completely.

I have the fellow's name, if I could just remember it. I could look around and find out more about the biologists for The Floyd, and I might voice my concerns about this situation.