Anyone have any experience with river otters? The wildlife dept. in OK introduced them to a number lakes, and now some of the locals are claiming they are decimating the fish population.

I have only seen a few over the past five years. Lake Bastrop, Colorado River near Columbus TX, and Inks Lake.

They are in lake Fairfield. They actually helped that lake by culling some of the small bass.

It's been quite a few years since I fished Conroe, but the dam used to be alive with them. You could pull up in front of it, kill the outboard, and sit still. After a few minutes you'd see them popping out everywhere. They were a hoot to watch. Neither I, or anyone I knew, ever got the impression that they were decimating the fish population.

I wonder if they are still there. We used to see them there just about every trip.

The only thing decimating the fish population in Lake Conroe is the "Friends of Lake Conroe."

They may be ok in lakes but they will wipe out a pond in no time!

Most every lake here in East Texas have them.

What keeps them from getting caught on jugs and trot lines?

They're awesome. See their tracks on the banks and bars of the lower Colorado River a lot. They eat lots of small fish as others have mentioned and also invasives like tilapia and carp. Not enough to dent the population though. They're all over the Rockies and trout populations never have any problems. They're a scapegoat for poor management practices unfortunately.

They are in Lewisville, one night we were crappie fishing in the boat slip. We were throwing our crappie into a laundry basket with pool noodles all around it and rope to pull it out to make it easy to clean em.

We heard splashing, turned on the light to see what was going on and there was an otter sitting on the happily eating a crappie on the boat lift. He plopped in the water and was gone, fish in his mouth. He came back again 15 minutes later. We made a top for our fish basket.

Environments are based on predator prey relationships. Typically there is plenty of fish production to support an otter population. And they are really fun to watch.

I have a video of one on my phone at lake Bridgeport a couple years ago. I don’t know how to post it on here or I would to show. Pretty cool

Seen them several times at Squaw creek.

Have seen them on Martin Lake, back under one of the bridges. They sure were fun to watch.