Little Long Lake

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Little Long Lake is in Ecological Lake Class 5, which consists of 64 lakes in northeast Minnesota that drop off steeply along the shoreline and have clear and soft (unmineralized) water. Little Long Lake was thermally stratified on 08/30/2004 with a surface temperature of 64 F and a bottom temperature of 50 F. Adequate oxygen for fish (more than 2 ppm) was retained to a depth of 32 ft, where the temperature was 55 F. Two small inlets drain local swamps. The outlet to Bass Lake has beaver dams and rocky rapids that limit fish movement. Lake bottom substrates along the shoreline are 48% boulder, 27% rubble, 10% sand, 8% gravel, 6% muck, and 1% ledgerock. Aquatic plants are sparse and confined to shallow bays. The 2004 fish population assessment consisted of four gillnet sets, nine trapnet sets, and four small mesh smelt gillnet sets. Nine previous investigations, dating back to 1955, used 4-5 gillnets and 3-12 trapnets. Smelt were first observed in 1987, and smelt gillnets have been used in five investigations from 1989 through 2004. Shoreline seining was done in 1955, and small mesh trapnetting for young-of-year fish was done in 1978 and 1994. Night electrofishing for bass was done in the spring of 1994. Fish populations in 2004 were dominated by bluegill sunfish and walleye. Good populations of smelt, rock bass, northern pike, black crappie, smallmouth bass, and largemouth bass were also present. Notable by their relative absence in this lake are perch and white sucker. No perch were captured in 2004 and both perch and sucker were absent or present in very low numbers in previous investigations. Bluegill numbers in 2004 (130.6/trapnet) were higher than normal (in the fourth quartile) for this lake class, and were higher than the median catch of 64.3/trapnet in all investigations on this lake. Bluegill sizes in 2004 averaged 6.4" (0.21 lb), which was in the third quartile for this lake class and was larger than the average size of 5.3" in all investigations on this lake. Most bluegill were age five (28 percent) or age six (52 percent). The largest bluegill captured in 2004 was 10.0". Bluegill growth was somewhat slower than normal (in the second quartile) by area standards. Walleye numbers in 2004 (12.0/gillnet) were in the fourth quartile for this lake class and were higher than the median catch of 2.3/gillnet in all investigations on this lake. Walleye sizes in 2004 averaged 20.5" (4.3 lb), which was in the fourth quartile for this lake class and was larger than the average size of 18.6" in all investigations on this lake. The largest walleye was 26.7". The walleye were very fat and had been eating smelt. Walleye fingerlings have been stocked biennially in Little Long Lake since 1985 and most (perhaps all, depending on scale reading errors on older fish) of the walleye captured in 2004 were from fingerling-stocked year classes. Growth of walleye captured in 2004 was faster than normal (in the fourth quartile) by area standards. Smelt are an Atlantic Ocean fish that have been in the Great Lakes for decades. They were introduced to adjacent Burntside Lake, probably by anglers, in the 1970s. They were first observed in Little Long Lake in 1987. Smelt numbers in 2004 (27.2/smelt gillnet) were lower than the average catch of 160/smelt gillnet in recent investigations on this lake. The reason for this apparent decline is not known, although walleye and northern pike are foraging heavily on smelt. Smelt were likely responsible for apparent recruitment failure of cisco in this lake, as smelt are known to out-compete cisco for invertebrate forage and to prey on young fish. Cisco appear to be disappearing from this lake, and the only cisco captured in recent investigations was large (17.8"). Black crappie numbers in 2004 (11.3/trapnet) were in the fourth quartile for this lake class and were higher than the median catch of 1.2/trapnet in all investigations on this lake. Crappie sizes in 2004 averaged 7.5" (0.27 lb), which was in the second quartile for this lake class and was at the average size for all investigations on this lake. The largest crappie was 12.6". Most crappie captured in 2004 (73 percent) were age three. Crappie growth was faster than normal by area standards. Largemouth and smallmouth bass numbers in 2004 were higher than normal for this lake class. Bass are known to be "net shy" and their abundance is underestimated by their numbers in gillnet and trapnet catches. Many large bass carcasses were observed during the 2004 survey at Shig Wak Resort on the east end of the lake. The largest bass captured in our nets were a 16.3" largemouth and an 18.0" smallmouth. Sample sizes were small, but largemouth growth appeared to be slower than normal (in the first quartile) and smallmouth growth appeared to be faster than normal for young fish. Many of the game fish examined in 2004 were infected with neascus. Neascus (black spot) is a common parasite that is native to the area. It cannot infect humans, is often removed by filleting fish, and is killed at temperatures used to cook fish. Rusty crayfish were first captured in the 1994 investigation, entangled in the gillnets. Their numbers have grown from 1.6/gillnet in 1994, to 18.2/gillnet in 1999, and to 45.2/gillnet in 2004. This increase is similar to other lakes in the area to which rusty crayfish have been introduced. Rusty crayfish are native to the Ohio River Valley and were likely introduced to the area by anglers. They often out-compete and displace native crayfish, remove aquatic vegetation, and eat fish eggs and small fish. They are aggressive and can nip the feet of swimmers. They could affect Little Long Lake by removing the aquatic vegetation that sunfish and crappie depend on for hiding cover and habitat.

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