MyFishFinder Forum
MFF US Northeast => Maine => Topic started by: Pikin Aint Easy on Nov 19, 2020, 11:09 AM
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Hello Everyone,
The Belgrade Lakes fishery is fantastic and my buddies and I absolutely love traveling up from NH several times a year to take advantage of their awesome bass and pike fishing!!
We have done well on Great Pond, Long Pond, and Messalonskee. However, I would have to say my favorite is Great Pond with all the endless opportunities the 8,000 acres has to offer! My friends and I consistently catch 3lb & 4lb SM and the occasional 5lb LM every season there, while flirting with double digit lb. pike in the same waters. I understand Pike are invasive in the Belgrades, however the first time I was onto an 8lb Pike on a bass rod I was hooked for life! Now add another 10+ lb.'s on that 8lbs and you may wet your pants on light tackle! The Pike are there to stay;) This place is loaded with life as I have included on the Sonar below and it's also fun watching all the loons smoke the bait balls!
Please share your favorite Belgrade Lake as I know many must have awesome experiences there just like we do!
(https://i.postimg.cc/dZh5jZPX/LM-4-8-LBs.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/dZh5jZPX)
(https://i.postimg.cc/cKdT5bGf/SM-4LB.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/cKdT5bGf)
(https://i.postimg.cc/kDLsd4dJ/SM-James.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/kDLsd4dJ)
(https://i.postimg.cc/qNxxnx6q/Life-on-Screen.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/qNxxnx6q)
(https://i.postimg.cc/jwLHpVgn/Pike-Rob.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/jwLHpVgn)
(https://i.postimg.cc/qhSs0mSb/PB-Pike.png) (https://postimg.cc/qhSs0mSb)
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Prob long
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Prob long
Agreed. My PB pike came on Long casting a 1/4 oz mepps deep agila for rainbows. Didn't have a tape but based on the rocks I was standing on, she seemed to be around 35"-38".
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They're all fantastic.
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Long is Sweet, really enjoy the stream to ingham and the small amount of Belgrade Stream you get to fish!
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all those fish your catching are invasive. used to be a good salmon lake. especially long
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Good point deerhunter. Believe, me I wish there were no pike in the system and Long Pond was still a world class salmon fishery. I heard brookies got huge in Great Pond too.
But what to do now? I've been vacationing in the Belgrades for close to 20 years now and have spent lots of money in that area. I've had some great pike trips over the years, though that has sort of run it's course. I do still enjoy the bass fishing and just the area in general. For what it's worth, I don't think the largemouth and smallmouth bass are truly "invasive" in the context of illegally planted, I think they were stocked by IF&W many years ago like lot of lakes were in New England. Same with the brown trout and alewife forage to sustain the quality fishery for them.
If we're to be truly honest, the landlocked salmon were stocked fish. None of the Belgrades had them naturally like Sebago did, for instance.
Surely the pike and crappie are invasive, maybe the white perch too.
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White perch were planted heavily in land for forage by F&G departments and colonial people is what I have read. The idea was to provide forage for people as they tamed the wilderness.
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White perch were planted heavily in land for forage by F&G departments and colonial people is what I have read. The idea was to provide forage for people as they tamed the wilderness.
I had a hunch about the white perch that way. I think the bigger problem with perch is that they've been indiscriminately (or accidentally) spread over the years. Haley Pond in Rangeley is a good example of how dangerous yellow perch can be to an outstanding coldwater fishery. Wasn't long before they were in the big lakes.
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White perch were planted heavily in land for forage by F&G departments and colonial people is what I have read. The idea was to provide forage for people as they tamed the wilderness.
Same with Pickerel, used to only be really found on the coastal area, but were spread because they could provide food to settlers, due to being easy to harvest, were forage-adaptable, and could live in almost any body of water.
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I don't think the largemouth and smallmouth bass are truly "invasive" in the context of illegally planted, I think they were stocked by IF&W many years ago like lot of lakes were in New England.
If we're to be truly honest, the landlocked salmon were stocked fish. None of the Belgrades had them naturally like Sebago did, for instance.
Surely the pike and crappie are invasive, maybe the white perch too.
Highlighted that for emphasis. 1868 were the first smallmouth stockings, and they were in Belgrade adjacent areas, like Cobbosseecontee and Cochnewagon. There were probably also LMB mixed in at that time. 1897+ Largemouth were established, with Messalonskee and Great being among the first lakes that DIFW stocked. IFW is also the reason there are Walleyes in the Belgrades. Was stocking bass in prime trout habitat a great idea? Probably not, but I'm assuming they didn't know how voracious a bass could be, seeing as most bass waters were either devoid of trout or were filled with genetically larger trout/salmon species (for example Smallmouth grow large in the great lakes, but the trout/salmon there are larger on average - Coasters, Lake Trout, Kings). On the other hand, does it make complete sense to expand a fishery for a species that has an ultra narrow forage preference, habitat requirements, and is well know to stunt and/or crash its own population by decimating their one forage preference, and to make that the basis of the fisheries management? As far as I'm concerned, also no. Let it also be known that MIFW and NHIFW stocking salmon and lake trout (and the smelts needed for them to survive) at the request of the anglers who fished those waters is what led to the extinction of the Sunapee trout in NH/VT and the wiping out of the Rangley strain of the Blueback Trout, as well as causing the once giant Brook Trout of Rangley to have to adapt to the loss of their main forage (the bluebacks) and fresh competition, resulting in their overall size trending smaller.
Now on to what Deerhunter said, it really is a travesty that many lakes where Salmonids thrived are now basically devoid of a naturally reproducing population. Bucket biologists need to be more severely punished, the fines are not high enough (although no amount truly can be to offset the ecological damage an introduction causes) and the Warden Service rarely can get enough convictions to make a dent in it. However, they are already in the Belgrades. We can't reclaim it like a 10 acre kettlehole pond. So we adapt: we mourn the fish we loved to fish for, we hate those who introduced the pike, but we fish for what we can. The guides in the Belgrades have switched from trolling for Salmon all day to having their clients cast to rock piles for Smallmouth (which like I have said, have been in there almost as long if not longer than Salmon) and to weedlines for pike and largemouth. We can also do our part by fishing for these species and harvesting if we find a new introduction. I still drive up from Portland to fish Pushaw Stream multiple times per year and every pike I catch becomes critter food, because the I grew up on the Penobscot and while we won't be able to wipe out the Pike at this point, I can do my part to dent their population.
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all those fish your catching are invasive. used to be a good salmon lake. especially long
Sounds like you don't have a favorite Belgrade lake then?
New Question "Since the Belgrades are absolutely loaded with Pike and Bass, and always will be, what is your favorite Belgrade Lake in modern era?"
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Sounds like you don't have a favorite Belgrade lake then?
???
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???
DeerHunter was mentioning it use to be a good Salmon Lake and says everything we are catching now are invasive....so I was stating I guess you don't have a favorite belgrade lake anymore then :laugh:
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Deer hunter I was under the impression that the Rangley lakes were planted with salmon by a private club -- not a state agency, which then wiped out the stunted bluebacks that the double digit brook trout fed on. Am I wrong?
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first time I ever heard about that. im a salmon trout guy. have been my whole life. its fun catching pike and bass but its just not a salmon. nothing fights better. id say annebesic would be my favorite Belgrade lake
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I have only fished Great pond. I have had some success trolling for Brown’s and a occasional Pike.
(https://i.postimg.cc/yWcMRqbL/2-EC7-DD68-A735-400-A-826-B-0641718-D6-C40.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/yWcMRqbL)
(https://i.postimg.cc/zVN9Stm8/6-F066679-9079-4-B2-A-89-BF-CECE0-E61-A5-FD.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/zVN9Stm8)
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Deer hunter I was under the impression that the Rangley lakes were planted with salmon by a private club -- not a state agency, which then wiped out the stunted bluebacks that the double digit brook trout fed on. Am I wrong?
first time I ever heard about that.
Pretty sure I read it in the following book. I'd check to be sure but lent it out and never got it back.
Fascinationing book about brook trout if you've never read it.
(https://i.imgur.com/LYSKveWm.png)
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first time I ever heard about that. im a salmon trout guy. have been my whole life. its fun catching pike and bass but its just not a salmon. nothing fights better. id say annebesic would be my favorite Belgrade lake
Annebesic?
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Annebesic?
Annabessicook?
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Annabessicook?
Annabessacook. Not in the Belgrade region tho.
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Pretty sure I read it in the following book. I'd check to be sure but lent it out and never got it back.
Fascinationing book about brook trout if you've never read it.
(https://i.imgur.com/LYSKveWm.png)
That may be the case, I could also just be misremembering the details since its been a while since I did research on that. Either way, that wasn't meant as a hit job on IFW, just the fact that the stocking of "desirable" fish (Salmon, Togue, Smelt) can have just as catastrophic results as the illegal introduction of bass or pike.
It sucks either way.
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Oh yeah fish and game agencies have been some of the biggest violators when it comes to introducing exotic species. Now the pendulum seems to be swinging in the opposite direction with a big push to reestablish native species. This in some cases where naturalized species that have been in watersheds for decades and provide a fishery where no other viable one would exist, the naturalized species are prohibited and eradicated.
The common carp was introduced by the federal government.
The other carps including the bighead carp were given the green light for reasearch before they escaped into pubic waters. The Illinois DNR was going to sue Malone and Sons fisheries of Lonoke Arkansas for allowing one of those carp species into their state until the owner of Malone and Sons produced bills of sales showing their own DNR has purchased them for research years ago. Oops! (I know this because I am involved in aquaculture and an privy to first hand accounts. I could tell you some crazy stuff the government has done.) For the most part I support our wildlife agencies, have worked for one, and have friends there, but have run into double standards which is frustrating.
The biggest polluter in this country is actually the government especially the military.
My state was all giddy about reintroducing otters. Now they are a nusisance and you can get a permit to remove them. If you have a pond anywhere near a river system they can wipe your pond out. A friend in Illinois had $30,000 worth of largemouth bass wiped out on his farm by otters. When he complained and wanted to get permission to control them they told him it wasn't their problem and if he did any harm to them he would regret it.
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Annabessacook. Not in the Belgrade region tho.
yep. lol but its close
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yep. lol but its close
Sorta haha