2003 Biologist Report - Presque Isle Bay

Presque Isle Bay is part of Presque Isle State Park located in northwest Pennsylvania. The bay is a 3,300 acres body of water formed by a sandy peninsula that arches into Lake Erie. Fisheries Management Area 1 sampled the bay from April 21, 2003 to May 8, 2003 for a total of 28 trapnet sets with a total effort of 670.25 net hours. A total of 3,179 fish were caught representing 26 species ranging from the common bluegill to the rare bowfin and the primitive looking longnose gar. Bluegills (1,326) were the most numerous species caught followed by quillback (539), yellow perch (340) and pumpkinseed (246). Yellow perch up to 13 inches long were caught. Good numbers of black crappie in the 8-10 inch size range were also found. Although few northern pike were caught this year, the largest fish was over 35 inches long. Impressive largemouth and smallmouth bass were also found with some fish over 19 inches long.

Presque Isle Bay Spring Trapnet Catch
	2003	2000	1997	1994	1991

Trapnet Hours	670	759	904	569	572

Bluegill	1,326	1,350	1,125	250	524
CPU	2.0	1.8	1.2	0.4	0.9
Pumpkinseed	246	291	204	88	235
CPU	0.4	0.4	0.2	0.2	0.4
Black crappie	153	78	318	12	129
CPU	0.2	0.1	0.4	0.0	0.2
Yellow perch	340	248	607	137	500
CPU	0.5	0.3	0.7	0.2	0.9
Northern pike	12	41	204	7	159
CPU	2.0	1.8	1.2	0.4	0.9

CPU = Catch per trapnet hour