Something unusual has happened here at Lake Jennings. Thanks to MWD's water replenishment program we will not be lowering the lake level significantly this fall - assuming no emergency or decline in water quality from our other sources. I am told that this should save Helix some money on imported water expense, which is great. It is even better if you were a fish or other aquatic creature that hatched this year! Maintaining the high water level does several things. The flooded shoreline provides escape habitat that keeps the smaller fish and creatures from being eaten. This should allow them to grow bigger to where they are a size that limits the size of predators that can eat them. When we drop the lake the amount of hiding spaces decreases. The young of the year are generally eaten.

This tends to skew the numbers to larger size fish as is the case here at Lake Jennings. Ideally you want a mix of large and small. A simplified example: if you had 100 lbs of fish you would like 25 lbs of fish over 5 lbs. 35 lbs of fish between 2 and 5 lbs, and 40 lbs of fish under 2 lbs. Since I don't have a way to measure our population size tier I will have to guess and based upon what I see caught here I would guess that 75 % of our fish are over 3 lbs. That guess does not include the 32,000 lbs of fish that we stock. I am solely talking about fish born in this lake.

So the upside to having a full lake should give us more fish in the 1 to 2 lb. range 2 years from now. It will temporarily improve the catch rate of bass, red ear sunfish and bluegill.

The question is: would I like this to be permanent? Actually no. One advantage from dropping water levels is it allows us to improve habitat to a depth of 25 ft. This habitat attracts the fish during our trout and catfish seasons and makes it easier to locate those fish. It also allows us to maintain shoreline access. Most of the lakes in the county have 15 % or less areas where the shore is accessible to anglers.

The wet weather has resulted in a banner crop of bunnies and mice. If you drive between the recreation entrance and the campground entrance it is easy to count 50 bunnies or more. Another thing that I find interesting is the small number of rattlesnakes and other snakes in general that we have encountered this year. I attribute this to the fact that the snakes have all that they can eat and don't have to spend a lot of time hunting. This year I think we have only relocated 3 rattlers from the campground. Last year it was at least 8. We don't kill them because they do good work by keeping the squirrels down at the Treatment Plant. (Just kidding TP staff.:)

We have a rookery! The last several years, the eucalyptus trees due west of the boat dock have been the site of a single great blue heron nest. This year there are 3 nests. When you look at the nest you would think that it is too small to raise babies but as you can see they somehow manage.

We are moving back to our sunrise to sunset recreation program right after Labor Day. I hope to start trout stocking about the 3rd week of October if the Lake is cool enough. In the meantime some of the best catfishing of the year is the next 2 months.

See you soon.

Ranger Hugh