I fished Wickiup this summer for the first time when the water was at 52%. Caught 1 big Kokanee. All the locals I talked to at the ramp were so sad about what’s happened with the reservoir. I hope we can bring it back to glory!!!
I've been fishing Wickiup since 1976. It was the best place in our area where you could do such a variety of things in one place. You had the recreational boaters, water sports, trout, kokanee, bass, swimming, camping, all in one lake. I'm glad you put this together, so maybe a few more people will hear about what those Frog Humpers did to our lake.
Ok thanks I'll have to go up there and see it again, they have done the same thing on Greenpeter reservoir to save the salmon and steelhead this year, pretty sure the Kokanee fishery has been destroyed there also.
The dam was built to hold water for farming and water flow. Without farming there is no food, no food means you dont eat and price of food is high. I hope the frogs replace 10s of thousands of tons of food not created. So sad to see.
This was different. Crane above it (also a reservoir) was at like 90%, yet instead of equalizing the two reservoirs, spotted frog regulations wouldn't allow it so they just let wickiup die and in turn it destroyed one of oregons best fisherys.
@@inandonthenet The Oregon and the Colombia are both native to the area. I'm assuming you're talking about the Oregon which was put on the endangered species list in 2014 after dissapearing from northern Califiornia and the Willamette valley in Oregon. What is never native to an area is a reservoir.
@russellaustin4988 so let's knock out the dam, take 10 years to realize we're screwed without water, then after 10 years someone will have a brilliant idea to put in a reservoir. That sounds like a great plan to me 👍
To be clear, it is overallocated water rights to irrigators and dryer years that account for the vast amount of water drawdown. Yeah, cry me a river (maybe you can help fill the reservoir) that the law has to be followed and an artificial fishery has to give way to a healthy ecosystem.
Curious question, in April of 2018 wickiup was at 103%, yet in Sept 2018 it was 1%, now, in 2017 we started with less water, yet wickiup diddnt drain. In respective the following year 2019 it started with less water as well, but fall of 2019 she again diddnt drop as low as 2018. So why is it that the year in the middle, which started with 103% capacity was the year it was drained the lowest? In my opinion the facts and data show that they willingly killed wickiup. The biggest evidence of that is that crane sat above it at 80%, they COULD have let out more water from crane to save fish in wickiup yet they diddnt. They willingly let wickiup die.
See cause once wickiups fishery was destroyed, now it's not a topic of debate and no longer an obstacle when talking about releasing more water for frogs, cause it's already dead.....oops that was convenient
As you said in your video, Kokanee and brown trout were introduced to the reservoir. In my opinion, a native species such as the spotted frog (and the tiny population of bull trout) deserve more conservation efforts than those two introduced species. The increase in winter CFS is to mitigate the damage done to the ecosystem by the man made dam, which drastically flips the seasonal CFS of the river. Also, it is misleading to anyone who watches this video because you cherry picked video clips of the end of one of our worst drought years, which of course is gonna make the lake look empty. Maybe if COID modernized and piped their canals, and the local govt. renegotiated water rights, the reservoir would be more full. In a perfect world, we would be able to protect the frogs downstream and sustain the fish upstream.
It’s also worth noting that about 50% of all water taken out of the deschutes by COID infiltrates as ground water, and is unable to be used by farmers. If COID piped their canals, NUID farmers would get more water and the reservoirs/rivers would retain more water. However, COID holds senior water rights and has no interest in piping their canals since their clients needs are met… which means NUID farmers get little to no water comparatively (so the rivers/reservoirs/frogs/fish all take the fall)
We could have released water from crane to save wickiup but we didn't. Drought has little to do with it when a reservoir sits at 2% while 3 miles up another reservoir in the system sits at over 80%. They willingly let wickiup die.
It should also be noted that in early 2018 (April) the reservoir was over 100% it was flooding into campgrounds and was at 103% full, so drought is tough to say was a cause when they started the year over 100%. It only took 5 months and it was at 1%. That's mismanagement at its finest
They can pipe every inch of those canals and its not going to do anything to make a big enough difference to make up for the amount of water there letting go through the dam you people move here and screw up everything you have completely ruined this once perfect place to live you need to get over yourselves no common seance
You were correct that one species was being traded for another. A native species was being traded for introduced, non-native species. Now that has been turned around. I fish. I love fishing. I also understand the value of reservoirs. That said, I prefer free-flowing rivers and native species, including native species that I will neither catch nor eat. I'm sorry that you fellas lost a honey hole for big fish, but I do think that there are times when other considerations take priority, and I think that this is one of those times. Not trying to be mean or offensive to anybody who misses the reservoir or the fishing it offered, simply sharing my thoughts from another perspective.
@@inandonthenet, that is really strange. I might look into it a little further. Usually when there is some sort of environmental mitigation or remediation effort it is intended to help maintain or re-establish native species. That is odd that the authorities would have gone to such significant and expensive effort for protection of a non-native species. Typically it is just the opposite. Huge sums of money are spent to eradicate non-natives, sometimes in spite of the fact that the efforts are likely to be futile - a boondoggle in every sense. I wonder what their rationale was. And thanks for engaging in a friendly manner. I know this issue is a real sore spot for you and your friends.
@@jonathanstoffregen390 it's because the spotted frog is an endangered species. So regardless that it's not native they'll go to extreme lengths to help it's species.
Ah, that makes sense, then,@@inandonthenet. I figured there had to be something more to it. I know when I was a kid my folks took us camping out west. I caught something called a Mountain Yellow-legged Frog. They were all over the place. I was so excited. They were really cool. I had never seen a frog like that before. I returned there years later as an adult hoping to see some more of them and relive a childhood memory. I couldn't. They were all gone. Some locals had never even heard of them, but when I visited as a boy you couldn't miss them. I had the good fortune to visit Costa Rica some years back. I had hoped maybe to see the Golden Toad of Monte Verde that had famously vanished, but nope, they're definitely gone. I figured I could at least see some of the really cool and brightly-colored Harlequin Toads, which by all accounts used to be abundant, but everywhere I went where they had been documented in the past, I was told they had not been seen for five or ten years. Interestingly, in one spot they had disappeared shortly after they started stocking non-native Rainbow Trout. I caught a few - the same stocked fish that I could have caught in Wisconsin. Nice enough, but not the special thing that could only be found there, the thing that was supposed to live there, the thing that I had come to see. I traveled out west for a time on an extended months-long fishing adventure (I REALLY like fishing), with an emphasis on finding and catching native fish - bass, Cutthroat Trout, some different kinds of Sunfish, a few others. I was disappointed to find that Cutthroat Trout were not nearly as widespread as I had believed they were. In many places, they were gone, with only introduced Rainbow Trout and Brown Trout to be found in their place. The same was true of some of the native basses I was chasing - greatly reduced range and tricky to find. I know it's a bit of a different thing, but as a boy, my brother, our neighborhood buddies, and I would thrill to see the annual migration of Monarch Butterflies and various Dragonflies that every year would fly over our houses. Apparently, we were right under their flight path. By the time I was in high school, those migrations had dwindled to a fraction of their former numbers. My brother and our buddy still live there on that street in those same houses. They don't ever see those migrations anymore. They're all gone. What all these things have in common is that things that used to live there are gone now, and frankly, it feels kind of crummy. It makes me feel pretty bad that I can't see or experience those things anymore, or even if I couldn't go see them, to know that they were there.
I know that doesn't bring your big Kokanee or fat Brown Trout back, but maybe it counts for something that a species that is on the verge of winking out has a little bit better chance at making it. I suppose it's a matter of deciding what matters to us, and that's going to mean different things to different people. In my case, I used to want big fish and more of them. Pretty much didn't matter what kind, where, or how they got there. I look at things differently now. Thanks for hearing me out, and taking the time to read this. Good luck fishing, wherever your travels take you. Be well, my friend. - j
@@inandonthenet If it was non native they wouldn't have done the restoration for it. It was NOT introduced. Some bad info on TH-cam comment section there. Not only does that statement make no sense, it's easily disproven by 5 seconds of googling.
I fished Wickiup this summer for the first time when the water was at 52%. Caught 1 big Kokanee. All the locals I talked to at the ramp were so sad about what’s happened with the reservoir. I hope we can bring it back to glory!!!
I've been fishing Wickiup since 1976. It was the best place in our area where you could do such a variety of things in one place. You had the recreational boaters, water sports, trout, kokanee, bass, swimming, camping, all in one lake. I'm glad you put this together, so maybe a few more people will hear about what those Frog Humpers did to our lake.
The frogs are gonna have to move along because this place will have to what use there municipal water to supply 100+ water flow.
Very sad seeing it the water so low, and it’s low almost all year round now. Thanks for making this
Have they screwed up Crane prairie reservoir too for fishing and what will the farmers do for irrigation now in the summer?
Crane certainly isn't the same anymore but not destroyed yet, and the farmers the last few years have been forced to reduce water amounts they use
Ok thanks I'll have to go up there and see it again, they have done the same thing on Greenpeter reservoir to save the salmon and steelhead this year, pretty sure the Kokanee fishery has been destroyed there also.
That's sad....
The dam was built to hold water for farming and water flow. Without farming there is no food, no food means you dont eat and price of food is high. I hope the frogs replace 10s of thousands of tons of food not created. So sad to see.
I miss the big Kokanee!
Every reservoir was dry 5 years ago cuz the drought. Keyword in "reservoir" is the reserve part
This was different. Crane above it (also a reservoir) was at like 90%, yet instead of equalizing the two reservoirs, spotted frog regulations wouldn't allow it so they just let wickiup die and in turn it destroyed one of oregons best fisherys.
So how are the frogs doing?
😆 terrible lol they don't belong here, they are non native invasive species to our area. But because they're endangered.....we loose a lake 😆
@@inandonthenet The Oregon and the Colombia are both native to the area. I'm assuming you're talking about the Oregon which was put on the endangered species list in 2014 after dissapearing from northern Califiornia and the Willamette valley in Oregon. What is never native to an area is a reservoir.
@russellaustin4988 so let's knock out the dam, take 10 years to realize we're screwed without water, then after 10 years someone will have a brilliant idea to put in a reservoir. That sounds like a great plan to me 👍
@@inandonthenet Don't know how they did it before the dam was built....Probably ate frogs.
@@russellaustin4988 probably less people
I think I used to catch those in a remote reservoir in Colorado in the late 80's
To be clear, it is overallocated water rights to irrigators and dryer years that account for the vast amount of water drawdown. Yeah, cry me a river (maybe you can help fill the reservoir) that the law has to be followed and an artificial fishery has to give way to a healthy ecosystem.
Curious question, in April of 2018 wickiup was at 103%, yet in Sept 2018 it was 1%, now, in 2017 we started with less water, yet wickiup diddnt drain. In respective the following year 2019 it started with less water as well, but fall of 2019 she again diddnt drop as low as 2018. So why is it that the year in the middle, which started with 103% capacity was the year it was drained the lowest? In my opinion the facts and data show that they willingly killed wickiup. The biggest evidence of that is that crane sat above it at 80%, they COULD have let out more water from crane to save fish in wickiup yet they diddnt. They willingly let wickiup die.
See cause once wickiups fishery was destroyed, now it's not a topic of debate and no longer an obstacle when talking about releasing more water for frogs, cause it's already dead.....oops that was convenient
As you said in your video, Kokanee and brown trout were introduced to the reservoir. In my opinion, a native species such as the spotted frog (and the tiny population of bull trout) deserve more conservation efforts than those two introduced species. The increase in winter CFS is to mitigate the damage done to the ecosystem by the man made dam, which drastically flips the seasonal CFS of the river. Also, it is misleading to anyone who watches this video because you cherry picked video clips of the end of one of our worst drought years, which of course is gonna make the lake look empty. Maybe if COID modernized and piped their canals, and the local govt. renegotiated water rights, the reservoir would be more full. In a perfect world, we would be able to protect the frogs downstream and sustain the fish upstream.
It’s also worth noting that about 50% of all water taken out of the deschutes by COID infiltrates as ground water, and is unable to be used by farmers. If COID piped their canals, NUID farmers would get more water and the reservoirs/rivers would retain more water. However, COID holds senior water rights and has no interest in piping their canals since their clients needs are met… which means NUID farmers get little to no water comparatively (so the rivers/reservoirs/frogs/fish all take the fall)
The spotted from is a non native species to central oregon
We could have released water from crane to save wickiup but we didn't. Drought has little to do with it when a reservoir sits at 2% while 3 miles up another reservoir in the system sits at over 80%. They willingly let wickiup die.
It should also be noted that in early 2018 (April) the reservoir was over 100% it was flooding into campgrounds and was at 103% full, so drought is tough to say was a cause when they started the year over 100%. It only took 5 months and it was at 1%. That's mismanagement at its finest
They can pipe every inch of those canals and its not going to do anything to make a big enough difference to make up for the amount of water there letting go through the dam you people move here and screw up everything you have completely ruined this once perfect place to live you need to get over yourselves no common seance
Fish angainst irrigation
You were correct that one species was being traded for another. A native species was being traded for introduced, non-native species. Now that has been turned around. I fish. I love fishing. I also understand the value of reservoirs. That said, I prefer free-flowing rivers and native species, including native species that I will neither catch nor eat. I'm sorry that you fellas lost a honey hole for big fish, but I do think that there are times when other considerations take priority, and I think that this is one of those times. Not trying to be mean or offensive to anybody who misses the reservoir or the fishing it offered, simply sharing my thoughts from another perspective.
Sad thing is, for our area the spotted frog is a non native species.... it was introduced
@@inandonthenet, that is really strange. I might look into it a little further. Usually when there is some sort of environmental mitigation or remediation effort it is intended to help maintain or re-establish native species.
That is odd that the authorities would have gone to such significant and expensive effort for protection of a non-native species. Typically it is just the opposite. Huge sums of money are spent to eradicate non-natives, sometimes in spite of the fact that the efforts are likely to be futile - a boondoggle in every sense. I wonder what their rationale was.
And thanks for engaging in a friendly manner. I know this issue is a real sore spot for you and your friends.
@@jonathanstoffregen390 it's because the spotted frog is an endangered species. So regardless that it's not native they'll go to extreme lengths to help it's species.
Ah, that makes sense, then,@@inandonthenet. I figured there had to be something more to it.
I know when I was a kid my folks took us camping out west. I caught something called a Mountain Yellow-legged Frog. They were all over the place. I was so excited. They were really cool. I had never seen a frog like that before. I returned there years later as an adult hoping to see some more of them and relive a childhood memory. I couldn't. They were all gone. Some locals had never even heard of them, but when I visited as a boy you couldn't miss them.
I had the good fortune to visit Costa Rica some years back. I had hoped maybe to see the Golden Toad of Monte Verde that had famously vanished, but nope, they're definitely gone. I figured I could at least see some of the really cool and brightly-colored Harlequin Toads, which by all accounts used to be abundant, but everywhere I went where they had been documented in the past, I was told they had not been seen for five or ten years. Interestingly, in one spot they had disappeared shortly after they started stocking non-native Rainbow Trout. I caught a few - the same stocked fish that I could have caught in Wisconsin. Nice enough, but not the special thing that could only be found there, the thing that was supposed to live there, the thing that I had come to see.
I traveled out west for a time on an extended months-long fishing adventure (I REALLY like fishing), with an emphasis on finding and catching native fish - bass, Cutthroat Trout, some different kinds of Sunfish, a few others. I was disappointed to find that Cutthroat Trout were not nearly as widespread as I had believed they were. In many places, they were gone, with only introduced Rainbow Trout and Brown Trout to be found in their place. The same was true of some of the native basses I was chasing - greatly reduced range and tricky to find.
I know it's a bit of a different thing, but as a boy, my brother, our neighborhood buddies, and I would thrill to see the annual migration of Monarch Butterflies and various Dragonflies that every year would fly over our houses. Apparently, we were right under their flight path. By the time I was in high school, those migrations had dwindled to a fraction of their former numbers. My brother and our buddy still live there on that street in those same houses. They don't ever see those migrations anymore. They're all gone.
What all these things have in common is that things that used to live there are gone now, and frankly, it feels kind of crummy. It makes me feel pretty bad that I can't see or experience those things anymore, or even if I couldn't go see them, to know that they were there.
I know that doesn't bring your big Kokanee or fat Brown Trout back, but maybe it counts for something that a species that is on the verge of winking out has a little bit better chance at making it. I suppose it's a matter of deciding what matters to us, and that's going to mean different things to different people. In my case, I used to want big fish and more of them. Pretty much didn't matter what kind, where, or how they got there. I look at things differently now. Thanks for hearing me out, and taking the time to read this. Good luck fishing, wherever your travels take you. Be well, my friend. - j
@@inandonthenet If it was non native they wouldn't have done the restoration for it. It was NOT introduced. Some bad info on TH-cam comment section there. Not only does that statement make no sense, it's easily disproven by 5 seconds of googling.
This is hilarious, it’s 6 months later the 20” Kokanee are doing just fine and this video is total nonsense. You can stop crying now.
Size isn't the issue, numbers are. In the 90s you could pull a 5 person limit of 20 inch kokanee in an hour, now you hunt all day for 1
@MN-sr7nc stop the lawsuits, give us our water back 😉
Nothing wrong with farming