mosquito fish/rosy minnows

[zcutbaitSD]

Have you guys ever considered introducing large populations of mosquito fish or rosys to lake wilson? I myself mostly fish lakes stocked with shad, however, shad can be very sensitive to changes in conditions and dieoffs arent uncommon. I figure monnows and mosquito fish might make a nice alternative. They are a more hardy fish and they reproduce quickly, frequently, and under any and all conditions. mature fish range from 3-5" which matches the size of most popular bass lures. Just a thought.

[roadwarriorsvt]

First, welcome to the forum. It is illegal to introduce any additional species of fish to the lake. Plus, we have mendonka's and threadfin shad in the lake already (and almost 30 other species of fish)

[BASSTRACKER]

id have to agree with road warrior on that one, gotta be real careful what one tosses in even with the best intentions. I'm actually quite surprised with the amount of live bait fishing going on there aren't larger numbers of wild feeder fish about. guess they are just too tasty hahaha

[Bozu]

The lake had a healthy population of mosquito fish until the early 1970s.
Then the needle fish fish and other exotics showed up and wiped them
out. No need to buy bait back in the day, just scoop em up in the
California grass. Moral of the story:"Never release your exotic aquarium
fish in ANY body of freshwater in Hawaii."

Bozu

[Ahnkochee]

There are Mosquito fish already in the lake as they were introduced into just about every stream and pond in the state back at the early 1900s along with guppies and swordtails to feed on mosquito larvae to help keep the mosquito population under control. Mosquito fish are related to wild guppies and look very similar except that they lack the pretty colors of the guppy. They just aren't prolific enough being live-bearers to add much to the forage fish population. Though the true Japanese Medaka (meh-dah-kah) a species of killifish are not found here in the state I grew up calling our similar looking but not related Mosquito fish a Medaka. The name Medaka were first given to the Mosquito fish here by immigrant Japanese fishermen who saw the similarity to their home species.
Mosquito fish (aka Medaka) don't school up into large shoals like the much more prolific Threadfin Shad do so in my opinion Mosquito fish not as good a forage species. They ARE pretty tough though so make good live bait especially the larger females.

Mosquito Fish (Gambusia affinis)


Medaka or Japanese Killifish (Oryzias latipes)