State Begins Adding Poison to Lake Davis to Kill Pike

By Dorothy Korber, The Sacramento Bee, Calif.

Sep. 10–California Fish and Game today began poisoning a Plumas County lake in an attempt to eradicate the population of northern pike.

Crews began dripping and spraying 300 gallons of rotenone on the creeks and other tributaries feeding Lake Davis. An additional 16,000 gallons of the organic poison — deadly only to gilled creatures — will be placed in the lake itself beginning Sept. 25.

The poison will kill all the fish in Lake Davis, which will be restocked with native trout, according to Ed Pert, manager of the $16.7 million project.

“If we don’t get them this time, we will have to weigh whether it’s humanly possible to eradicate pike in Lake Davis,” said Pert.

Meanwhile, Lake Davis and its watershed in Plumas National Forest will be closed to the public until the water is free of rotenone.

The northern pike — large, skinny fish with a snout full of sharp teeth — could take over the entire ecosystem of the lake, Pert said.

“We’re concerned not only about the damage pike are doing to Lake Davis, but also about the possibility they will escape the lake and enter the state’s other waters,” he said. “That could put more constraints on how we move water around California — so pike eradication not only has environmental implications, but social and political implications as well.”

The state poisoned Lake Davis in 1997, but within 18 months, the pike were back. Today, Pert reckons there are hundreds of thousands in the lake and its watershed.

Pert said technology and resources have improved with time, and this effort has been done in cooperation with Portola, which until 1997 used the lake for its water supply.

For more information on the eradication of northern pike from Lake Davis, visit www.dfg.ca.gov/lakedavis or call the Portola office of the California Department of Fish and Game at (530) 832-4754.

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