ROANOKE, W.Va.– When the West Virginia Natural Resources Commission agreed to lift the long held restriction of catch and release for black bass at Stonewall Jackson Lake there was some concern the change might impact the bass population in the popular fishing water of Central West Virginia.
Under the restriction, which took effect in January 2014, anglers can keep six bass, but only one over 18 inches in length. The restriction was aimed at freeing up the lake’s population, but also designed to not have any negative impact on bass numbers. More than a year and a half into the new regulation and it appears to be working just fine.
“It’s a little bit early to tell, but at this point we haven’t seen a difference whatsoever,” said District Fisheries Biologist Jim Walker. “People are still releasing bass and not keeping them. We encourage you to do whatever you want with the fish when you catch it, it’s your prerogative, but the majority of anglers are still releasing them and it’s not affecting the population whatsoever.”
Walker and Assistant Fisheries Biologist Katie Zipfel took advantage of the recent warm spell to collect a number of the larger bass in the lake while they were up and in shallow water and fit them with tags to monitor their fate.
“When an angler catches one of these tagged bass, they look at the tag, call us up, and tell us what they did with the fish,” said Walker. “Did they keep the bass or did they release the bass? That information will help us with future regulations.”
Each tag is green in color and protrudes off the top of the fish. It features a tag number and the DNR’s Parkersburg office contact information. Anyone catching a tagged fish is encouraged to help out by reporting the catch to the DNR.
“This is a great lake, one of the best largemouth bass fisheries in the state,” said Walker. “We removed the regulation realizing it probably wasn’t serving a purpose anyway because most people are still releasing the bass anyway. So far, we’re happy with the change.”