Smallmouth Bass hunting & eating gobies
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- Опубликовано: 11 май 2020
- Round gobies entered the Great Lakes in the mid 1980s. They are a bottom fish native to the Black and Caspian seas. They were brought here by a freighter and dumped into the St. Clair River (first identified specimens were found in the lower SCR and immediately downstream in Lake St. Clair.)
As a small bottom fish goby are the perfect food source for smallmouth bass. It just took awhile (like 20 years!) for the bass to figure out that gobies tasted really good and were fun to hunt.
For the last few years, it's been an open season on goby in the St. Clair River which has resulted in record-breaking bass. Gobies can no longer roam the bottom freely like they own the place! And that is helping all the smaller native species like crayfish, darters and sculpin to recover.
It's taken over two decades, but at least at the introduction site, native Great Lakes fish are taking back control!!!!
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Thank you. It’s individuals like yourself that are helping to keep nature beautiful for the next generations
You might enjoy Kathy's new monthly column, "I Speak for the Fish" at www.greatlakesnow.org/2021/05/i-speak-for-the-fish/
@@PolkaDotPerch thanks for that!!! Good read
In Lake Michigan the lake trout have also adapted to eating gobies. As a result, they are more bottom-oriented and also taste better than when they ate mostly open-water schooling baitfish like alewives. Interestingly, the same has not happened with the salmon, which are still dependent on the cyclical availability of the alewife. We still see the smallmouth eating a lot of alewives, however, and crayfish baits/flies work great. But they are undoubtedly also going after gobies. Lake Michigan smallmouth, carp, and lake trout (and brown water snakes!) are all eating gobies because…nature! Opportunistic predators…😅😊 For what it’s worth, I think the brown water snakes are really cleaning up and proliferating due to gobies…
Good to hear how the Lake Michigan fish are managing. Thanks for sharing! Totally agree with your assessment of the snakes. We've spent many enjoyable hours filming them on the Little Manistee River and we've heard the Lake Erie waters snakes are rebounding (in part) from having an abundant food source with round goby. Really appreciate your feedback!
Great video. I loved seeing the bass hunting. They're way faster than I realized.
Superfast! Bass are bottom hunters. They like to eat things that live on the bottom like crayfish, catfish, and sculpin. It took a couple of generations but once they figured out they liked goby it's been a whole new game!
Yeah, it gives me more confidence in fishing lures quickly.
You don’t see the tail they have? With a tail that big, it’d be a shame if they weren’t fast
Really glad to hear the gobbies are under control and bass are exploding great video
Thanks for watching and commenting!
Thanks for this! Hopefully native predator fish will get the upper hand/fin!! Love this site! Love the lakes!!
The battle may play out differently across the basin, but there is no question that natives are making a strong comeback in the St. Clair River which is where gobies were first "introduced."
Gobys give a perfect experience of what its like fishing in a stocked lake or pond
Great footage. Smallmouth are awesome predators.
It's interestimg to note that the invasive round goby are natural predators of invasive zebra and quagga mussels. They consume the larval vilagers that settle on hard surfaces and grow into adult mussels. You can see the gobies grazing on bottom surfaces in your video, likely eating tiny zebra mussel vilagers.
Edit: Surprised at the black colouration of some those smallies, despite that clear water and lightly coloured bottom. I've only seen them that dark in tannin stained dark-water lakes.
You're 100% right about gobies eating mussels. We produced a piece for PBS about that very topic. If you're interested here's a link to the story ruclips.net/video/E6gwzIR9nsA/видео.html
We do see quite a few almost black smallmouth every season. You make a good point about them being very dark when the St Clair River is typically very blue!
Whenever I catching gobys I use em as walleye bait! I swear it hooks em every time no matter what! Goby is one of the best baits I promise you won't regret using them! Even bluegill will chase after em and try to bite em 😂
@ Jacob Chavez - the tables have even turned, right?!
At first, gobies gave fishers such a hard time by eating their nightcrawler bait before it could snag a walleye.
Now, gobies ARE the bait!
Thanks for watching and commenting!
lol yeah....its like opposite fishing. the gobie is wiggling non stop and when he does stop ITS A BITE!!!
What ya catch golbys on ?!?
@@normastoecklin628 nightcrawlers
That's SOOO illegal...You're lucky DNR doesn't know about your violations or you'd be paying hefty fines in MICHIGAN
Great video. Makes me think I need to move my goby baits much quicker. Thanks for the fantastic video
Very nice!
Thanks! We love seeing our native fish owning the invasives!
Great vid. Dig the underwater footage
Thanks 👍Appreciate you watching and commenting!!
Such a cool video. It’s always crazy to see a Wolfpack of bass doing their thing. As a fisherman, even when we are “hammering them” and catching a bunch of them out of a school, guaranteed there are far more down in that school than we think.
Amazing footage!
Amazing video!!! I fish the St Clair River often and grew up in Port Huron. The darker they are, the bigger they are lol! I am amazed at their lightning speed chasing the goby.
Right?! The gobies have no chance now. If you watch some of our older videos you will see gobies everywhere! Sitting out on top of rocks, cruising along the bottom without a care in the world. But that all changed the day the smallmouth bass decided they taste good :)
PolkaDotPerch I love that they developed a taste for them. Sturgeon too! Is this by the horse statue in PH? I see divers that way quite a bit.
@@andrewgaul5142 Glad you're enjoying our channel. You're close on the location. This was shot just downstream, on the line between Pt. Huron and Marysville.
I lived in Port Huron in 1960. Beautiful little town. We pulled a few sheepshead out of the St. Clair. It was heavily polluted then, I might add. Sure looking better now.
So cool!!! Great video!
I agree
Awesome video man! Great editing too. Tight lines!
Thanks so much! It's been really interesting seeing the transition from gobies arriving in the Great Lakes to now! Thankfully, the natives won this round!!
Awesome video thank you for doing this.
Our pleasure! Thanks for watching and commenting!
Fantastic video. Give nature time and it figures it out in this case. Thanks so much for this great news
Thanks! Nature is amazing!! It's so good to see our native species rebounding!!
Fish are amazing!
Lake st clair is the coolest lake! Love that whole deep blue fishery!
Totally agree! It's a freshwater paradise!! Thanks for watching and commenting.
great video, even better narration!
Thanks for watching!
Great vid from Buffalo.
Awesome thank you!
Awesome video.
Thanks for watching and commenting!
Great video 🎣
Thanks 👍
I like this one. Another good video. Thanks for sharing. I should really like to come down there and dive the river. Seems like it has a lot going for it.
The St. Clair is honestly one of the best dive sites in the world! Clearwater, abundant fish, a kickass current and 1000 foot freighters passing overhead...what's not to love?!
We recommend anyone new start downstream of Marysville.
@PolkaDotPerch Understood. where was this recorded? Was it Marysville?
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Beautiful fish, used to be my fav hunt in fresh water. Super healthy.
We know they only follow us around for a shot at an easy dinner. But it still makes us feel special, lol
SO: Let;s put it in Perspective: Lake Erie was hopelessly contaminated at the end of the 1960s, when they
passed the Clean Water Act. And, people thought it wouid take 800 years for the Lake to be purged of the
horrific amount of toxic waste and sediments on the bottom. Many people called Lake Erie a ' Dead Lake '.
Then, the Zebra Mussel arrrived, an invasive species, and began to reproduce uncontrollably. They clogged
up water inlets, clogged up docks, and formed huge, ugly reefs of mussels on the boats and other structures.
But, they were filter feeders, and each little mussel was sucking up the water, and removing the toxic sludge
and bacteria, The water of Lake Erie became clean, and transparent. 800 years worth of pollution removed
in less than two decades.
Then, the Round Gobies arrived, another invasive species, and began to devour the Zebra Mussels. In droves.
Soon, the Zebra Mussels were almost gone. And the Round Gobies were getting fat. And they began to compete
with the Crayfish.
But, then the Smallmouth Bass, A NATIVE SPECIES, after about 20 years, figured out that the Round Goby was
edible. And, they have begun to eat them. Rapidly.
So, the Lake has been cleaned up, The Zebra Mussels are almost gone, the Round Gobies are disappearing
fast, and the Bass are reaching record size. As Alfred E. Newman, the mascot for MAD Magazine used to
ask, " What ! Me Worry ? "
we caught and released a 26" long smallmouth in port huron....thats a monster fish. we were targeting walleye.
the gobies have fallen off and now the main forage of the walleye is "log perch"
Very cool :)
Thanks for watching and commenting!
You're a great lector, by the way!
Thanks! We're working on a new series where we share some of the cool stuff we've learned along the way. Like why sturgeon eggs are sticky and how young sunfish get larger males to guard their eggs for them.
Wow you are great Lady!
Aww, thanks! Appreciate the positive feedback!
Now I know how to fish the gobbie lures😮
LOL, glad we could help!
Hello from Roseville Michigan near Lake Saint Clair,13 Gratiot, I'm a new subscriber 🎯
Welcome and thanks for subscribing we really appreciate it!
I always use worm to catch gobies and then use those gobies to catch huge bass and pike on them
I love this video, I must have shared it 100 times!
Does anyone know why some of these big smallmouth end up looking straight up BLACK? I've never seen that anywhere else but great lakes fish.
it’s kinda like the common carp they dominated at first and destroyed fisheries but after a couple of decades they mad a place in the ecosystem and everything adapted
Exactly, it doesn't always work everywhere. But at least at the introduction site (the St. Clair River) native species are definitely back in charge! Thanks for watching and commenting!!
It's never easy to anticipate what will happen when species are introduced to an area... obviously the great lakes would be much better off without us dropping weird things in it from all over the world, but it's really remarkable to see how things course correct over time. They are finding that the gobies help prevent the spread of invasive mussel species now!
The carp are also eating gobies and achieving record size. I fly fish for them in Lake Michigan and target carp exceeding 25 pounds. 😊
We love PolkaDot Perch
❤️☮️
Thanks! We appreciate you taking the time to watch and comment!!
MORE OF THIS PLEASEEEE
OK! We've got sunfish nest-building and a new sturgeon piece in the works!!
Nature uh uh uh finds a way
Awesome video! Keep it up! Keep us posted on what other environmental changes that you observe.
Will do! Thanks for watching!!
I've never heard any deep concern for the decline of Lake Erie's formerly peak small forage fish, the Emerald Shiner. Emerald Shiners were , a few decades back, so ubiquitous and plentiful, you could scoop a bucketful right at the shoreline. They fed the once prolific and large yellow perch population, now decimated. Gone are almost all of the Smelt and a few other small forage species that once supported Northern Pike, Blue Pike, Muskellunge, Lake Trout, and way more Smallmouth Bass than the Gobies are currently feeding.
You're right that the loss of forage species is very concerning and does not get enough attention!
My only complaint is that this video isnt longer
Awesome I wish the gobies were in lake Georgetown Texas this video is top quality
Appreciate it, posting a new piece today about jigging for walleye! If you like our content, we'd love you to subscribe!!
No you don’t gobies suck
Recently all I've been catching are round gobys... So I "dispose" of them...
That's what the DNR recommends
@@PolkaDotPerch No it isn't. You should double check that fact.
It is now illegal to dispose of them.
In 2015 the DNR wanted fisherman to dispose of them. As of 2018, the DNR realized that they are an incredible food source for a lot of species.
@Northern Mike, took your suggestion and did some fact checking. We found nothing from any state DNR that states disposing of round gobies is "illegal." Can you please share a link with us if you have one?
We should also have been more specific in our reply since there is no singular DNR. Each state has different regulations. As does Canada. So, even if one state has decided to give gobies a pass that doesn't mean they all do. The Minnesota DNR website currently lists round goby as an invasive species and does suggest disposal. www.dnr.state.mn.us/invasives/aquaticanimals/roundgoby/index.html
@@PolkaDotPerch I am specifically referring to Michigan so I understand what you mean as far as all the other states laws (although MI does have the most Great Lakes shoreline).
I just spent 30 minutes online at michigan.gov/fishing and michigan.gov/dnr (dept of natural resources). I can only find information that says you cannot transport or posses them. I find that odd so maybe I'm not looking in the right place.
Worst case scenario for me to prove this is to get a picture of a MI DNR sign at the 9 mile pier. In 2015 this sign said "all Goby's must be disposed of" and as of 2018 the sign now reads "all Goby's must be returned to the water immediately."
I will most certainly be out there within the next couple of weeks so if you have an Instagram acct I can send you the pic if you'd like.
@@PolkaDotPerch btw if you did your dives on the USA side of Lk St Clair I assume that you are familiar with the 9 mile location.
The walleye population in Green Bay has shifted to eating them, as well as the Whitefish. Its why their populations and size has exploded. Its awesome that nature responded to this
Being at the introduction sight gives us an advantage in terms of the native's response.
We've tried to spread the word that if things haven't shifted in your area yet, be patient and give the natives a chance.
I had no idea bass were so darn fast!
Bass are wicked good hunters, lol! Thanks for watching and commenting!
I gave up fishing the pine river because of gobies. After seeing this maybe I’ll try again.
How’d you do ?
There is so much misinformation in the comments. The invasive goby used to be considered a nuisance and the MI DNR used to recommend killing them. Then they found out that so many species were eating them so they put a ban on killing them. They are now considered to be an integral part of the ecosystem.
A lot of fisherman have said the predator fish taste better since the goby acclimation (walleye, salmon, trout).
I'm a Bass fisherman and there is no question that the Smallmouth are on average bigger now.
@Northern Mike thanks for commenting. The majority of comments on this video are from people happy to learn what you've already seen, that the bass and other native species are benefitting from the gobies. Occasionally, people get stuff wrong... and so do we!
We try our best to correct any errors whether ours or from other viewers. Thanks again for watching.
Today I went fishing and caught 31 round gobies let’s say they didn’t get to soak in the water again, (little lake butte des mottes)
@Brittney Kaid most random but cool thing ever lol
What on
@@normastoecklin628 small jigs with worms close to bottom
Yeah boy! Go get them gobbies you lunker bronzebacks!
Strip club music
We'll have to take your word for that, lol
@@PolkaDotPerch 😉
Gobies...even here in belgium (europe) it is a pest
Thanks for watching from Belgium! In many ways, the Great Lakes was fortunate to receive gobies along with the zebra mussel delivery. Without the gobies eating mussels things could have gotten a lot worse here. And now that our native fish are eating gobies, well, ...we think it's time to give gobies their green cards! lol
@@PolkaDotPerch
Northern Germany here , same problems around here with gobies .
They came here , since a waterway was built , that connected the northern waterways with the Danube water system down south .
Also the gobies moved north from the Caspian Sea and Black Sea area through the Russian Volga river system and got into the Baltic Sea from there , the partially low salt content of the Baltic lets some freshwater species survive.
But one thing in the video I have to disagree with:
I do not think , that local predatory fish like bass , trout , perch , pike , zander(European walleye) , catfish , silure(European catfish) etc. would take years to discover gobies to be good forage for them .
One fall season two or three years ago my wife and myself had fished for stocked zander and naturally existing perch in a gravel pit , that does not connect to any other waters and therefore does not hold any gobies either.
We did not have any other baitfish but a few gobies from a canal in our vicinity , so we poked those dead gobies onto our hooks and cast our bottom sinker rigs out into the deepest hole of the pit about 36 feet deep .
We had strikes on those gobies , even though we are sure , that the predators in the gravel pit had never seen any gobies before , caught one zander and a few perch that cold day in fall .
Very nice an enjoyable underwater footage , thanks for posting !
@@61diemai You're right that gobies make good bait. The Michigan Department of Natural Resources found they were the most productive for catching lake sturgeon on set lines. The researchers tried a wide variety of bait but caught the most sturgeon with gobies. This is noteworthy as lake sturgeon don't really eat adult gobies. Sturgeons sometimes suck-up little gobies when feeding off the bottom, but they don't normally go out of their way for a goby... unless it's on a hook.
Apparently, gobies with piecing are irresistible, lol
We recently produced a piece for the Detroit Public Television program Great Lakes Now about gobies in the Great Lakes. In the program, a researcher discusses the learning curve for bass/goby predation (link below.)
Many of our bottom species like sculpin and crayfish use stillness as a defense against larger predators like bass. For example, if a sculpin is uncovered it will remain motionless to evade attention. When hiding doesn't work, bottom prey usually make a straight dash for the next closest point of shelter.
When a goby gets scared it bolts away in a highly unpredictable panic.
So first, the bass had to determine that gobies were worth targeting when not on the end of a hook. And then they had to learn how to catch them.
You're right that some bass probably figured it out very quickly!
But, it did take about ten years or a couple of "generations" before enough bass were targeting the gobies to have an impact on the gobies' behavior and numbers.
Now, this is just the way it happened here. Maybe the St. Clair River bass are just slow learners, lol.
For more on gobies in the Great Lakes check out ruclips.net/video/E6gwzIR9nsA/видео.html
@@PolkaDotPerch
Thanks for the clarification about that 10 years period , really makes sense .
Some two months ago or so I've watched a German video about the same topic of invasive species into our waters , and if I recall right , it was about the same being said there .
It would take some years , before local predators might be able to push back the invasion to a certain extend in order to kinda level the balance of the ecosystem again .
At least , one biologist stated there , that local predatory fish like perch , zander , silure , and pike would have learned , how to deal with the gobies and therefore they possibly might not increase in their numbers anymore .
By the way , we also have these zebra mussels here , I guess , these and the gobies go together , as it was shown in the very interesting video , that you had linked , thanks for that.
But , apart from their significant impact on local ecosystems , these invasive species naturally also have a straight impact on our daily angling as well , as it is really nerve-wrecking and disturbing , if they constantly chew up the bait meant for other , local species.
Gobies are relatively new to us German anglers , as for many decades we've already been familiar to mitten crabs , also brought here in the ballast tanks of freight ships during the early 20th century from eastern Asia .
Here a clip in English from the UK :
ruclips.net/video/QxpN6Si1Wgg/видео.html
Mitten craps really are an angler's nightmare , as they chew up any bait(they even chew up snagged plastic lures) laid on the bottom , no matter whether baitfish or earthworms , they are even able to cut off the hook or sever your main line , if stretched out the bottom .
But also local species became used to this invasive species , as mitten crabs(or parts of them) , especially in a soft condition after just having thrown off their shell in order to grow bigger , have proven to be the best bait for eel , also big perch gladly take them on occassion .
I had already found small mitten crabs inside the guts of perch and also caught a few good ones as bycatch during eel fishing.
Biggest problem for the average angler is to obtain them for bait , only way is to set traps at the tidal stretch of our local river Elbe in the vicinity of Hamburg/northern Germany or try to gather some below the embankment rocks at low tide , which is very hard work.
Or you keep them in tanks(by the end of video) in your garden like this father and son in an older video issued by a German angling magazine:
ruclips.net/video/1I9pVyUlRAU/видео.html
They are a deadly bait for eel , and best of all is , that mitten crabs do not seem to be too cannibalistic , they most likely do not touch this bait .
But because of this two invasive species , mitten crabs and now more recently gobies as well , bait fishing , especially for night active species like eel , zander and silure , has become a nightmare over here.
Because of this last year I had started to experiment with new , rather uncommon rigs utilizing subfloats to present the bait about 1-2 feet above the bottom(supported by a subfloat it hangs down from the line put under tension between the rodtip and a heavier disc sinker at the end of a thinner piece of line)to possibly get it out of reach of the bottom-located gobies and mitten crabs.
First tests during daytime came out promising , I caught some perch on gobies and earthworms with this rig , so during the oncoming 2021 season I'm going to do further experiments , also at night .
Ok , to end this comment , here is a clip from Japan , goby fishing obviously has a long tradition there , and as you can see , they are good eating as well .
I will definitely try to cut goby fillets in this Japanese way , as gobies taste similar to zander and perch.
ruclips.net/video/74Zpw_q8VFA/видео.html
@@61diemai Thanks for sharing the video from Japan about eating gobies. We tried them once. Pan-fried them. As you note, they taste a lot ike walleye or perch. But, they're more like a smelt in that it's a lot of cleaning for a very small bite of food, lol.
Thanks for all the info!
I don’t think the smallmouth find the gobeys taste good more that there’s a ton of them and they have no spines so there easy prey
Hi @ Keiran Rooker, sorry we missed your comment!
You might be right about the bass.
Only in the St. Clair River, there aren't a ton of gobies like there used to be and they aren't the easiest prey for bass to get.
Plus, gobies definitely have more meat on their bones than another bass favorite like crayfish and we're guessing they go down a lot smoother too!
Maybe bass don't "like" gobies so much as they are a plumper payoff for the bass' efforts?
When we will as a people ever learn to stop allowing invasive species to be brought into our Country? History has shown us just how destructive these species are to our native ecology!