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<br />19 <br /> <br />Weight gain relative to length for pike captured in 1990 was intermediate to <br />the previous two years. From all fish it is apparent pike begin to gain <br />weight relatively slowly with increase in length until 650-700 mm total <br />length, when weight gain occurs thereafter quite rapidly. Condition factors <br />for pike demonstrated consistent declines from the Hayden-Craig reach to the <br />Juniper Springs reach in all years (Figure 6). Condition factors showed <br />improvement with downstream distribution in Maybel1 and Lily Park in all years <br />but 1989, when pike condition increased in the Maybe11 reach, and declined <br />again in the Lily Park reach. The mean condition factor estimated for pike in <br />1987-88 (0.711) was considered below average relative to ranges reported in <br />Car1ander (1969). Average condition factors for pike in 1989 and 1990 <br />declined to 0.666 and 0.664, respectively. Maximum condition factors for pike <br />declined in 1990 to 1.16 compared to 1.54 in 1989. <br /> <br />Reproductively mature and ripe northern pike have been collected throughout <br />the study area during the spring from 1988 to 1990. Similar to evidence in <br />1988 and 1989, reproductive success in the form of the smallest pike collected <br />(<300 mm) was confined to the uppermost Hayden-Craig reach in 1990 (Figure 1). <br />In 1988, ripe northern pike were first collected on April 22. Ripe fish were <br />continually observed throughout May. No ripe adult pike were collected in <br />mid-June. Based on these observations, pike spawning in 1988 was associated <br />with a sharp increase in flow in mid-April from 2,000 cfs to almost 6,000 cfs <br />by the end of April (Figure 7). The apparent end of the pike spawning season <br />in mid-June (as evidenced by the lack of ripe males) was associated with <br />sharp, continuous declining flows. Cessation of spawning activity may have <br />occurred earlier in the downstream reaches of Juniper, Maybel1, and Lily Park, <br />since only spent females were collected at the end of May. Ripe pike were <br />still collected in the Hayden-Craig reach at the end of May. <br /> <br />In 1989, sharp increases in flow were noted from mid-April when flow was <br />1,000 to 2,000 cfs, to the end of April, when flow reached over 5,000 cfs <br />(Figure 8). In the first sampling trip of the spring, ripe male pike were <br />collected in the Lily Park reach on May 10, in the middle of a highly <br />fluctuating river flow between 2,000 and 5,000 cfs. Mean weekly flows in 1989 <br />peaked three times at 4,500 to 5,400 compared to three spring peaks of 6,000; <br />12,000; and 10,000 cfs in 1988. Ripe pike of both sexes were collected <br />through the first week in June in the Hayden-Craig and Juniper reaches. At <br />the Maybel1 and Lily Park reaches, flows were rapidly decreasing to 3,000 cfs <br />in the first week of June, and flooded tributary backwaters were too shallow, <br />either at the mouth or overall, to support adult fish of any species. No ripe <br />pike were noted during sampling at the end of June. In 1990, only a minor <br />increase in flows were noted in April, reaching about 3,500 cfs at Deer10dge <br />by the end of the month (Figure 9). Evidence of spawning by pike was evident <br />by mid-May when sampling began and green females with abundant eggs and ripe <br />males were still noted in mid-June. By the fourth week of June, during <br />sharply declining flows, no ripe males were noted among the few adult pike <br />captured. Two adult female pike captured in a mainchanne1 pool in Lily Park <br />still carried numerous eggs. A lone female captured in a flooded tributary <br />backwater near Craig was spent. <br />