By Louie Stout
Northern Indiana waters, including the St. Joseph River in South Bend, received a quality walleye stocking in October.
Those fish came from a commercial fish rearing company and were purchased by the Michiana Walleye Club and the Indiana DNR.
Indiana also used commercial hatchery fish to stock Clear Lake in Steuben County, Sylvan Lake and Winona Lake at 10 fish per acre.
More walleyes will be stocked in northern Indiana lakes in the coming days. Those fish were raised by the DNR at their Fawn River Fish Hatchery.
Indiana biologist Matt Horsley said that 11,760 fall finglering walleyes purchased from Gollon Bait and Fish Farm in Wisconsin went into the St. Joe. The purchased walleyes were in good shape and ran 7 to 11 inches.
Indiana and the walleye club stock the river every other year. On years when Indiana doesn’t stock, Michigan stocks it’s portion of the river up and downstream from the Hoosier state.
The DNR pays for its portion of the river stocking with funds it receives from I&M Electric for potential fish loses.
Previous river stockings have been made at Maggie’s Landing, but this year they were planted upstream near County Line Road.
“Survival of previous stockings at Maggie’s has been dropping so we decided to try stocking farther upstream where there is more vegetation to offer the young fish more protection from predation,” said Horsley. “I will go survey the river next fall to evaluate overall survival of this year’s stocking.”
Those walleyes that Indiana raised at Fawn River will help supplement other northern Indiana lakes. Those lakes scheduled to get those fish –dependent upon the supply – include Pretty, Wall, Loon, Big Turkey, Stone and Pine, Maxinkuckee, Dewart, Fish, Crooked and George lakes.
Horsely and the DNR are dependent upon angler feedback regarding walleye successes throughout the season.
“I love getting info from anglers about whether they are catching walleyes – or not,” he said. “That’s just one of the ways we evaluate the fisheries to determine if we need to look at different options.”
You can contact him by email at mhorsley@dnr.in.gov or by phone, 269 829 6241.