Thriving largemouth bass show revival of Lake Trafford

The surface of Lake Trafford is hardly ever still now.

A dragonfly rests on a bulrush along Lake Trafford in Immokalee on Thursday, July 27, 2017. The state has been planting native bulrush weeds to provide better habitat for bass and smaller fish after an effort to rid the lake of an invasive plant killed most of them a few years ago.

Ripples from jumping bluegill and crappie circle almost constantly, while the tips of cattails on the shoreline shake as alligators slide hidden beneath them.

There are monsters in those cattails — largemouth bass measured at 26 inches long and weighing more than 11 pounds, waiting to strike on Collier County's biggest lake.

All of the motion and the increasingly positive fishing reports are a sign of the life and health of a once-dead lake that Ski Olesky never thought he would see recover.

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Olesky has lived on Lake Trafford and owned its sole bait store and marina for more than 40 years. He watched as the life was choked out of it first by an invasive weed and then by the rotting muck left behind when that weed died.

Homer Brown and Tom Moorman make their way to the dock after fishing for crappie on Lake Trafford in Immokalee on Thursday, July 27, 2017.

His late wife, Ann, led the charge to clean up the lake, but she never got to see it finished.

"We lost her right before they started," Olesky said. "It's all a result of her. Her effort was well worth it. It wasn’t worth losing her."

If the postcard shorelines of Lake Trafford look like they were custom-made for largemouth bass, with 10-foot-tall cattails and bulrush swaying in the wind and golden lotus blooms almost glowing over lily pads, it's because they were.

The story of Lake Trafford is a story of weeds.

The lake once had a sandy bottom. But decades of runoff from the farms and groves surrounding the lake pumped it so full of nutrients that the ecosystem shifted around the invasive hydrilla weeds. 

Hydrilla weeds spread out in thick branches that look like pine tree limbs and block the sunlight from reaching native vegetation. When the weeds grew out of control, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission sprayed them with a poison. When they died, they sank to the lake bottom and released more nutrients into the water, said Baron Moody, FWC regional fresh water fisheries administrator.

The nutrients sparked algae blooms that sucked the oxygen out of the lake, causing massive fish kills.

Bulrush weeds break the water's surface on Lake Trafford in Immokalee on Thursday, July 27, 2017. The state has been planting native bulrush weeds to provide better habitat for bass and smaller fish after an effort to rid the lake of an invasive plant killed most of them a few years ago.

From 2006-10, the FWC and several partnering agencies dredged the muck out of the lake bottom, which had grown to be 6 feet deep across the 1,600-acre lake. That's enough muck to fill more than 300,000 dump trucks.

Oxygen returned to the lake.

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Bass were reintroduced in 2010 and again in 2011. By 2012, it was clear they were reproducing on their own, and stocking them was no longer necessary, Moody said.

"The dredging project was key," he said. "That was the biggest piece. The work isn't done. We have to keep managing the plants to encourage a diverse native population."

The FWC began planting bulrush, a sturdy and native weed that shoots straight out of the water and is about as thick as a thumb. The weed acts almost like a miniature coastal reef, protecting more delicate cattails and Kissimmee grass that grows closer to the shore and can be washed away by strong waves, Moody said.

"And fish really like the bulrush," he said. "It's breeding habitat."

Tony Rosario, of Fort Myers, fishes off the pier at Lake Trafford in Immokalee on Thursday, July 27, 2017. The state has been planting native bulrush weeds to provide better habitat for bass and smaller fish after an effort to rid the lake of an invasive plant killed most of them a few years ago.

You can either endlessly stock bass in a once-great fishing lake, artificially propping up their numbers, or you can rebuild their habitat.

"Once you re-establish that habitat, you have bass and the bluegill and their food base right there," Moody said. 

In late June an angler caught and released a 10-pound, 7-ounce large mouth. Earlier this year biologists with the FWC tagged a bass that weighed over 11 pounds and released it.

"There's going to be good fishing in Lake Trafford for years to come," Moody said.

Homer Brown, of Bonita Springs, tries to make it to the lake once a week.

He aims for crappie and remembers when the lake was almost barren.

"They've just done a nice job here," Brown said.

Olesky said he's happy that the two largest fish to come out of the lake in years were both released.

"They should keep a few to eat, but I like to see the bigger ones released. I want my grandkids to be able to catch them."