Visit the Team Iceshanty Proshop
cThese are the black spots I was referring to.
If you filled the fish that have the black dots you will find the tiny grub in the meat. Just take the end of a filled knife and cut them out.
I'd be willing to bet that all of the above reasons contribute to the decline. I would also look at the age of the lake; it's sediment level; recent algae bloom formation; as well as any amount of run off from the surrounding agricultural fields. The lake is filling in with sediment and weed growth explodes within its depth range. It dies and rots which in turn uses oxygen. To compound this, the lake has very little in-flow. 12-15 feet down is the thermocline during the summer and below that there is no oxygen. It is a complete dead zone below that. This leaves little room for the fish to roam and induces stress on them thus inhibiting their growth cycle during the summer. Winter comes and the water flips. The lake's bottom is temporarily oxygenated, that's where the perch eat the blood worms, but this is burned up by the non-decomposed sediment and we are back to square one. A good solution would be VERY VERY large bubblers all over the lake during the spring,summer and fall. Dredging is going to remove the un-decomposed material but not the root cause, but it will help. The lake needs an input of oxygen. Good luck Silver Lake Assn. Open your wallet and say AHH... I don't own a cottage there but if they ever do something about it and need a hand I'd be more than willing to help. I can run a shovel or drive a wheel barrow. It's a really nice lake to ice fish and I'd hate to see it decline further.
What can be done about it?
There is a dam on the outlet on Federal St. in Perry. They can raise and lower the gates to adjust the lake level.Looks pretty much like the dam next to Teds in Lakeville.