Fished for Trout last week after dumping.Buddy and I didn't catch any but witnessed the 'Loons' going under water,back up with a Trout everytime.Within 10 min.they had eaten 25 or so.At the rate it was going HUMANS had no chance of catching any.TPWD should be alerted.Has anyone else seen this happen and what specie of water fowl are they?

water turkey. cormorant

Sounds like the birds have timed it just right after the release

This happens at just about every pond they stock the trout in. As soon as the trout are put in at Bethany Lakes in Allen, they show up stealing the fish. There's been dozens of other reports all around the state reporting the same thing. Those pesky birds just know when to show up and ruin a good thing.

Yup!

Same in Irving, half the reason I stopped going...

ttt

Yup. I know it.

I caught one of the birds once. Got pissed off at them diving down a spooking bass, so I cast my jig at them to "scare" them. It didn't work. One dove down, then I felt a pop on my line. Set the hook and caught a f-in bird. Pain in the [censored] too. It didn't like a Gama hook in it's beak. Hah. It didn't chase fish for the rest of the day.

The cormorant is a perfect example of an invasive species. It catches a significant percentage of the stocked fish.

Unfortunately the TPWD hands are tied, since the bird is protected by federal law. More proactive wildlife departments in other states have obtained a waiver allowing the birds to be killed, but not Texas.

The bird is sometimes called the water turkey by the uninformed.

We can thank our esteemed government officials for deeming them endangered when DDT almost wiped them out some years ago. DDT was banned and they came back with a vengeance. They are still a protected species. Each bird eats 2-3 lbs. of fish per day. The difference of fishing ponds with no cormorants as opposed to cormorants is like night and day. It's not just the fish they eat. They swim great distances if necessary underwater chasing fish. The fish really aren't in the feeding mode when they are running for their lives.

This is problem all over the country in Urban Ponds stocked with trout.

I am from Las Vegas and we had 4 City ponds stocked with trout in winter from 3 to 8 acres.

Every one of them would be clean of trout in 2/3 days after a stocking. 90% of those fish not being taken by anglers but by the comrants.

They would literally get one every time they dove if they so pleased.

Hate those birds.