Syracuse.com - Oneida Lake's burbot get little respect

HuntingNY-News · February 15, 2013

"Tell your readers when they catch them not to leave out on the ice. They're not hurting anything," one Cornell researcher said.

The meat on a burbot fillet is white, flaky and tasty.

Cornell University

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The burbot is the Rodney Dangerfield of the Oneida Lake fishery.

Most anglers catching them through the ice during the winter just toss them aside, giving the gulls and other birds a free meal.

“They look like a cross between a bullhead and an eel,” said Randy Jackson, associate director at the Cornell Biological Field Station in Bridgeport. “They’re yellowish, with rusty blotches – actually quite colorful.”

“But their scales are tiny so they’ve very smooth and slimy. And they squirm a lot when you grab them. Aesthetically, they don’t have a whole lot going for them.”

The fish are unique in several ways. They’re the only freshwater fish in the state ito spawn during the middle of winter, often in shallow water below the ice. They sport a single barbel (whisker) in the middle of the lower jaw. They prefer cold water and that’s when they’re the most active.

During the warm summer months, when Oneida Lake’s temperature rises above 55 degrees, they find the coldest part of the lake “and hunker down,” living off energy stored in their liver, Jackson said.

Burbot live in northern waterways around the globe and Oneida lake is in their southernmost range. The fish, which is a cousin to the saltwater cod, is also called an eelpout, dogfish or lawyer. Apart from Oneida, they are also found in this state in Canadaugua and Otsego lakes, along with Lake Champlain, and upper parts of the Alleghany and Susquehanna rivers, and tributaries of the St. Lawrence River, Jackson said.

They were once plentiful in Oneida and anglers and wildlife biologist used to think of this aggressive feeder (once the water cools) as a threat to the lake’s perch, panfish and walleye populations. Their numbers took a hit, though, with the arrival of sea lamprey in the lake. Despite successful efforts in putting down the lamprey population in the 1980s, the burbot population never rebounded to its former levels and continue to decline, Jackson said.

Presently, the steadily warming lake is their largest enemy.

“They’re not endangered yet, but if this lake continues to warm for another 50 to 60 years they will be gone,” he said.

Jackson said most local anglers consider burbot an untasty, trashy fish. Not true.

When caught during the winter, their meat, (once the dark meat is cut away) is white and flaky, with a delicate flavor. They are excellent tasting, where they’re fried, baked or boiled, he said.

Jackson told about how he caught one through the ice on Oneida and immediately filleted it and put it in a frying pan on a Coleman stove. It was quickly devoured.

“Nobody was complaining about it,” he said.

The state record for burbot, caught on the Black River Bay, is 16 pounds, two ounces. The larger ones in Oneida are much smaller, averaging a couple of pounds and usually measuring no more than 24 inches, Jackson said.

Jackson said the best time to catch burbot is usually around now when they move from the deeper to the shallower water to spawn. They often get in “big congregations” underneath the ice. They can be caught easily with the techniques used for walleye – namely with a jig tipped with a fathead or shiner, or using with tip-up using the same bait.

Is there anything to the long-held idea that burbot pose a threat to other fish in the lake? No, they're an important part of Oneida Lake’s healthy, native fish community.

“Tell your readers when they catch them not to leave out on the ice,” he said. “They’re not hurting anything.”

David Figura can be reached at <a href="mailto:[email protected]">[email protected]</a>, by calling 470-6066, through Facebook at PS Outdoors and on Twitter at PSOutdoors.

View the full article on The Syracuse Outdoors Blog