Regards Fred & Peter
The water level of the lake was lowered in December 2001 in an attempt to remove some of the possion chat which inhabit the water. We arrived at the lake on Saturday the 8th at 8.30am in the morning in what was to be the most trying day my family and I have had since we moved over here in April 2000. Never did I anticipate that the problems which were to come!
We had been slowly draining the lake for the last 3 days and on Saturday morning the water level was down to about 2 feet over most of the lake. We had brought along with us two French friends who had promised me that it was a piece of cake and that we would have rid of all the possion chat by late afternoon. The truth of the matter was that at 9.30pm with the rain now belting down and the wife none to pleased that she had hardly eaten all day we were still in the drink trying to capture these little gritters with our home made 50 meter seine net. The problem was we were just so ill prepared it was laughable so we decided to call it a day and postpone things until tomorrow morning.
<,br>After a good shower and spending th night in a nice warm bed we were back at the lake at 10.30am to do battle with the little gritters once again but this time a better thought out plan of attack and equipment on hand. By 4.30pm the job was done and although
we did not get them all, over 90% are no longer!. To have completely removed all the possion chat we would have had to take the water level down by another foot or so which would have put the stress level and lack of oxygen issues at to much of a risk for the Carp and Cats. We still leave cages out baited with food for the possion chat but our return at the end of the week is minimal. As of to date there has not been any problems with them so it looks like job well done, there will also now be more available food for the carp which will help to substain their growth weights and keep this lake going in the right direction.
The draining of this lake was some what a piece of cake compared to our other lake it took place the week before Christmas when fortunately the weather was much better. Over 2 ton of fish were removed from this lake which included small carp, roach bream, perch and black bass. We have kept a good head of the above mentioned fish in this lake
to keep the interest in the lake for the general all round course fishermen. There has been an
additional input of carp put into this lake ranging from 16lb to 40lb with two catfish of just under 40lb. We believe now that his lake is correctly balanced both in the nature of the fish stock and for the carp and match anglers, a good head of 20's are caught most weeks and a couple of 30's have already shown this year {13th April 2002}. This lake like Etang Merault was not drained down completely as this would have put to much of a risk of oxygen starvation and stress related problems for the fish that were not removed, thankfully everything went well and we are really looking forward to seeing how the fish progress now that the lake is correctly balanced.