| Here is an article on the subject of stocking spotted muskie.
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Yearlings bolster Green Bay muskie restoration effort
By Dan Small
Contributing Editor
Wild Rose, Wis. - The DNR's plan to restore Great Lakes spotted muskies to Green Bay and its tributaries is working well, despite budget cuts that have put a severe dent in many DNR programs.
The success is due in part to the generous support of the Musky Clubs Alliance of Wisconsin, and in part to hatchery technicians' efforts to fine-tune the rearing of muskies for stocking.
"Our ultimate goal is to restore a self-sustaining, naturally reproducing muskie population in Green Bay, the Fox River, and the Winnebago system," said Wild Rose Hatchery supervisor Steve Fajfer.
On July 1, Fajfer and a crew of biologists and technicians seined a pond near Wautoma to remove yearling muskies and take them to their new home in Green Bay.
Spotted muskies are native to Green Bay, but until recently, they were absent since the early 1900s, when overfishing and poor water quality contributed to their demise. In 1989, the DNR began stocking Green Bay with spotted muskies raised at the Wild Rose Hatchery from eggs taken in Michigan. Then from 1989 to 1991, "spotteds" were stocked in Long Lake in Waushara County to produce a reliable source of eggs here in Wisconsin. These fish began producing enough eggs for stocking in 1995. Long Lake is being phased out as a source of muskie eggs, as Green Bay is phased in, Fajfer said.
The muskie fry are reared through the summer, then most are stocked as fall fingerlings, at a length of about 12 inches. DNR research has shown that muskies survive much better when stocked as yearlings instead of fall fingerlings, as they are bigger and less vulnerable to predation, so some fish are now held over the winter and stocked the following year.
"There are a lot of big predators in Green Bay - walleyes, northerns, bass, and other muskies," Fajfer said. "A 17- or 18-inch muskie is almost too big for anything to eat, and they don't face the problem of finding food over the winter."
Young muskies need a lot of elbow room and a lot of food.
"An 18-inch muskie prefers a forage item at least one-third to one-half its size," Fajfer said. "A 6- to 10-inch minnow is expensive, so we can't raise large numbers of yearlings. It takes four pounds of minnows to produce one pound of muskie."
The space issue was solved by moving some muskies to a pond on the Wild Rose Hatchery grounds formerly used to raise northern pike, and some to a pond on DNR land south of Wautoma. Muskies raised in the hatchery pond were stocked in Little Lake Butte des Mort on April 15. Those in the Wautoma pond are normally stocked in Green Bay in fall, but this year they were stocked on July 1.
The food issue was met by donations from muskie clubs throughout the state. Since 1989, the Musky Clubs Alliance of Wisconsin has donated $100,000 to this effort, Fajfer said. That money has all gone to buy minnows to feed the voracious young muskies. In 2004 alone, when DNR funds were cut, the clubs donated $20,000 to the muskie program. Dave's Musky Club of Kaukauna contributed half that total. Six other clubs (Packerland, of Green Bay; Bill's, of Wausau; Winnebago, of Fond du Lac; Esox Hunters, of Brillion; C&R, of Dale; and First Wisconsin Chapter of Muskies, Inc., of Chippewa Falls) contributed the rest.
"The clubs have donated an average of $10,000 a year for us to produce about 5,000 fall fingerlings," Fajfer said. "We've refined our techniques, and this year our goal is to raise 20,000 fall fingerlings with the clubs' $20,000 donation. So we harvested the Wautoma pond early to keep our costs down and use that money to raise more fingerlings at the hatchery."
In most years, muskies in both ponds show a survival rate of at least 50 percent. This year, however, the fingerlings in the hatchery pond fared better than those in the pond near Wautoma. Of 100 placed in the hatchery pond last October, 95 survived over winter.
Four hundred fingerlings were placed in the Wautoma pond. When crews seined the pond on July 1, they found only 161 yearling muskies. Fajfer said the pond was most likely hit hard by otters over the winter. The fish that survived, however, averaged 18 inches and over a pound and a half in weight.
The Wautoma muskies were trucked to Green Bay and stocked at several locations. Sixty-one were stocked in the Fox River at DePere, while the Menominee and Peshtigo rivers and Sturgeon and Little Sturgeon bays received 25 each.
All yearlings were marked with a fin clip so they can be identified as stocked fish. The Wautoma fish also were marked with a numbered floy tag.
Anyone who catches a tagged fish should leave the tag in the fish, Fajfer said. If the fish is to be released, anglers should record the tag number, species, and length of the fish, along with where it was caught, then call the phone number listed on the tag and report the catch. Anglers who report catching tagged fish will receive a letter indicating when and where the fish was stocked, how big it was, and if it had been caught previously.
"It's hard to put into words the feeling I get seeing these healthy young muskies," said Gene Allen, of Dave's Musky Club, who joined the DNR crew that seined the Wautoma pond. "We knew the DNR couldn't do it without our help, and we're glad to be able to contribute."
When asked what he hopes will come of these efforts, Allen didn't hesitate.
"A new world-record muskie," he said. "If any place can do it, Green Bay should have a good chance."
Perhaps in 20 years or so, one of those little muskies that survived the otter raid in that Wautoma pond last winter will break Louis Spray's 1949 record of 69 pounds, 11 ounces. If she's still wearing her little orange tag, there will be no question where she came from.
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