Walleye - Muskie relationships

[understudy]

Hello all, I'm new to the Forum (although I've Lurked some)

I've put together a bit of underwater video of Muskie and Walleye hanging out in the Niagara river. It really is kind of a radical concept. ****, I thought the muskies would eat them. At first, I would see the fish together, and consider it strange behavior. You see, I had believed many an old fish story, and had a lot of pre-concieved ideas as I am a longtime Fisherman.

After many observations, I sort of came to the conclusion that this was a somewhat common behavior, and a walleye and muskie sometimes formed a friendship, or bond.

So, anyway here's A link to a video on you tube. It's about 5 min long (in case your goofing off at work reading this). It shows about a dozen different instances.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRIE5nCdES8

Feel free to comment and ask questions, I'll check back later.

Sure, next I'll discover there isn't a Santa-- Jim K

[K Gonefishin]

Your video's are AWESOME. Thanks for sharing

[JimL]

I liked that!

[Bill Krejca]

Interesting video.

Some random thoughts:

- It seems like the walleyes are sort of staying down stream (behind) the muskie most of the time (I could be wrong). Kind of reminds me of the adage "keep your friends close, and your enemies even closer." Could it be that the walleyes feel safer with the muskie in sight than it being where they can't see what is happening!?

- In clear water the walleyes have (I think) a better chance of getting away from the muskie and/or the muskie understands it has a lesser chance of catching the walleye, just due to a better early warning situation (ability to see farther in the clean water).

- It is not that unusual to see prey and aggressor quietly coexisting....until it is dinner time. Although sometimes it seems that small fish are in a constant stage of alert, I think they, too relax, for a while, seemingly convinced that the threat of becoming dinner is over for the time being. The entry into the scene of a wounded walleye may act as a dinner bell.

- Everything has to be somewhere.

- Perhaps the muskie, like the walleyes, is concerned about the presence of the bigger new fish on the block - that is, the scuba diver.

- It is a great video, and the producer should be commended for his efforts and energy expended to create it. Consideration of the introduction of potential variables in future picture taking would certainly be appreciated by me, and, I would think, most fishing folks. Well done, hope to see more!

Bill Krejca

[tv4fish]

Very interesting. My group's observation while fishing on Lac Seul is this - we would be "nailing" the walleyes (we vertical jig with live bait while drifting primarily) - All of a sudden, for no apparent reason, the bite would stop. Sure enough, one of us would then catch a decent northern, or we would get "bitten off" since we wouldn't have a leader on. Our theory would be that a northern came in, spooked the walleyes and hit our baits. ???? A little while after the northern was caught the walleyes seemed to move back in and start biting again.

[understudy]

I really don't know if the Behavior carries over to Northerns, TV4, Seems to me I've experienced similar. Northerns seem a good deal more aggressive to me. Almost as aggressive as small mouth.

Bill, I figure it something like this. The walleye and Musky in this river cannot have very much of a predator / prey relationship at all. The rabbit never lays next to the fox. The songbirds always try to drive away the hawk. The deer never hangs out with coyote. Natural instinct prevents this.

I think it's more like this, A household has some pets, dogs and cats. Now, we all watched cartoons, and dogs and cats don't get along. Although the dog could probably kill the cat (sustaining some injuries ) it doesn't happen. In fact, it's not uncommon for the two animals to lay together, eat together, and become very friendly. You would say this was very unusual if your only source of information was cartoons. There are very few natural observations of game fish in the wild that I know of. So, all we have is what we've been told, mostly other peoples opinions. People who never spent time underwater.

Do some dogs and cats hate each other?-Sure. Will the dog ever turn on the cat? Probably not, but maybe. Even more than Muskie and Walleye, both Cats and Dogs have a decent degree of intelligence, but they have some serious hunting instincts as well. All you have to do to see it is pull out a laser pointer. So, if the walleye was dying, The muskie might take him out.

Yes, everything has to be somewhere. But this is a big river, a river that is unstocked, it has a abundance of SMB, but a much lower walleye and muskie population. If you don't know where to look, you could dive the river 20 times, and never see either. I don't feel it's incidental. They could easily avoid each other. There are plenty of good rock reefs that are only used by the bass.

This video is not surprising as there is a more significant predator-prey relationship among walleyes and walleyes than muskie and walleyes.

[AllenW]

I read where a musky and probably most fresh water fish won't eat (normally) a fish that they can't swallow whole, if so, it would explain why the musky's aren't attacking the walleyes in the video.

Good stuff, thanks for posting.

Al

[rrrrrrRon]

Thanks for the interesting video. The walleyes were consistently nearer the bottom while the muskies were higher in the water column, but I wouldn't think that difference would deter a hungry musky. I've had great walleye fishing stopped countless times when a big northern or musky came into the area. Maybe the Niagra fish have signed a non-aggression pact.

Ya those walleyes are rather timid and the muskies are just cruising. One of the walleyes in the vid looked like it had teeth marks on it. The walleye must be there for the same reason as the muskies are. Water conditions and food. Oh what big teeth you have Mr. Musky