GUYSBOROUGH: The warden for the Municipality of the District of Guysborough (MODG) says he’s pleased with provincial representatives who have taken action on a lake in Guysborough County, closing it to anglers until an invasive species is dealt with.
Following the municipality’s regular, monthly council meeting on Sept. 21, Warden Vernon Pitts suggested the solution to the smallmouth bass issue was something the municipality wasn’t a part of.
“We were not even asked to participate in that,” Pitts told reporters. “Over the years, our municipality has put money into fish stocking every year, it’s not smallmouth bass, it’s speckled trout.”
Smallmouth bass were brought to Nova Scotia in 1942 and stocked in 10 lakes through the 1960s to support recreational fishing, a common practice in fisheries management at the time. Today, due to ongoing illegal stocking, smallmouth bass have now been confirmed in more than 300 lakes.
“We’d certainly be willing to look at helping out the association and citizens in that area down there,” Pitts said, speaking on the Eastern Guysborough County Dobson Lake/Cooeycoff Volunteer Association. “If they requested it.”
According to a press release issued by the province on Sept. 8, staff from the Department of Fisheries and Aquaculture used a fish pesticide called rotenone in Dobsons Lake to kill an invasive species of smallmouth bass and to prevent their spread into other waterways.
Rotenone is a biological pesticide derived from plants and it works by preventing the absorption of oxygen in the cells of insects and fish, has been used for hundreds of years to manage invasive fish species and rotenone-treated water poses no ongoing risk to humans or animals.
A common chemical compound that combines manganese oxide ore with potassium hydroxide, known as potassium permanganate is then used to neutralize the water flowing out of the lake and protect aquatic life in downstream waters.
Information provided by the province, indicate local anglers first reported smallmouth bass in Dobsons Lake in the spring of 2020 and efforts to contain and control the population; including temporary barriers, targeted angling, and electrofishing; have been helpful in the short term but are not sustainable or effective long-term solutions.
The province explained Dobsons Lake will be monitored on a daily basis for several weeks after the rotenone treatment and periodically over the next several months, and the lake will remain closed to recreational angling until it can support a sport fishery.
As for the issue that was brought to the attention by community members, the warden suggested it’s nice to hear a problem that was brought about by a grassroots group of 85 is being addressed firsthand.
“Being solved by the community in conjunction with the province,” Pitts said. “Partnerships, that’s what it comes down to today, if you don’t have partners, you’re going to be dead in the water; maybe not today, but you’ll be dead before it’s over.”