When a lone female carp was captured in an aggregation with a number of “Judas” transmitter fish in December 2007 the Carp Management team knew that they may have been on a winner. Despite extensive effort over the past six years no carp have been captured and no recruitment observed in the lake confirming that it is carp free.

Staff recently spent one and a half days removing many hundreds of metres of old chicken wire barriers, star pickets and an assortment of carp traps from Lake Crescent that were used to block and trap the final fish. With high lake levels and steadily improving water quality the removal of the equipment returns the lake to a condition seen prior to the discovery of European carp in 1995.  The native golden galaxias is now once again abundant and despite proving difficult to catch large trout have also been seen in recent surveys.

Terry Byard