Major cuts to Lake Michigan king salmon, lake trout stocking proposed

LANSING, MI -- Michigan is planning a pair of public meetings next month to discuss multi-state plans to cut chinook salmon stocking in Lake Michigan by almost half and lake trout stocking by more than 20 percent.

The meetings will be held in Ludington on Wednesday, Sept. 7 and in South Haven on Tuesday, Sept. 13.

Under a proposal drafted by the Lake Michigan Committee, an interstate group of agencies that manage the lake, Michigan's chinook stocking would drop 46 percent next year, from 560,000 to 300,000 fish next year.

Total chinook stocking between Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan would total 905,000, according to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.

Michigan DNR fishery managers have been mulling another drop in chinook stocking for a while. Earlier this year, fisheries division chief Jim Dexter said Michigan could quit stocking chinooks altogether if continual reductions were necessary. In 1999, the DNR stocked seven million chinooks.

Chinook, also known as "king" salmon, have been a cornerstone of Lake Michigan sport fishing since the 1960s but their numbers have dropped over the last few years due to a corresponding decline in their primary prey fish, alewives.

Scientists believe alewives are on the decline due to the filtration of plankton and other prey fish food from the water by invasive zebra and quagga mussels.

East side Michigan towns that relied on fishing and spin-off spending suffered when the Lake Huron chinook population crashed in 2003 and 2004.

The Lake Michigan Committee planned to propose a 62 percent overall cut in chinook stock among the lake's four states, but backed off that number when anglers objected, said Jay Wesley, DNR Lake Michigan basin coordinator.

Lake trout, a native fish, are not as prized as king salmon among anglers and charter captains, who say the slower-growing trout are competing for alewives and eating baby chinooks, which take about four years to reach full size.

Anglers pushed for cuts in lake trout stocking earlier than the DNR had planned, Wesley said. The DNR monitors natural lake trout reproduction on southern Lake Michigan spawning reefs and "we figured at some point in the near future, in the next year or two, we'd start reducing stocking there."

Wesley said Lake Michigan's lake trout population is comparable to the 1970s and 80s, thanks in part to rehabilitation, natural reproduction growth and the lowest rate of sea lamprey predation since those blood suckers invaded the lake.

The Lake Michigan Committee wants to cut most of the federal lake trout stocking in Lake Michigan, which would drop the fish population from about 3.1 million to 2.1 million, a roughly 21 percent lake-wide reduction in lake trout.

Most of the lake trout currently in Lake Michigan are raised in federal hatcheries in Wisconsin and Michigan under a species rehabilitation program, Wesley said.

The committee proposal calls for dropping lake trout stocking at the mid-lake reef complex by half (about 300,000 fish) and entirely ending stocking of U.S. Fish & Wildlife-raised lake trout in Grand Haven, Holland, New Buffalo, Michigan City, Ind., Sturgeon Bay, Wis., Kewaunee, Wis., and Wind Point, Wis.

The DNR wants to reduce lake trout stocking at multiple "second priority" Lake Michigan sites between Grand Haven and Grand Traverse Bay where non-stocked native populations have historically been more robust and redistribute some fingerlings to other nearshore areas around the state.

Michigan, which raises lake trout in Marquette, wants to continue stocking about 50,000 state-reared fish between Grand Haven, Holland and New Buffalo.

The stocking reductions would not apply to tribal waters for now.

Wisconsin, Indiana and Illinois would also increase lake trout bag limits to three fish per day, and Michigan's possession season would become year-round under the proposal.

Wesley said some have the wrong impression of what the DNR is trying to accomplish with its fisheries management. Without alewives, there's no salmon fishery, so the DNR is trying to "manage them cautiously." While other sport fish have switched to invasive gobies as their primary prey, chinooks have not.

"We really do want to maintain a diverse fishery in Lake Michigan that does include chinook salmon," he said. "Some people think we want to get rid of salmon and that's not the case at all."

This year's Lake Michigan salmon numbers won't be known until the annual weir runs in late October. Wesley said anecdotal evidence and preliminary creel clerk data indicates alewives born last year survived the mild winter well and are showing up in the bellies of caught salmon at the dock.

"We should see an increase in alewife biomass when all the data comes in," he said. "I'd estimate the biomass of chinook out there is up this year."

The public meetings will be held on Wednesday, Sept. 7 at 6:30 p.m. at the Ludington City Hall community room; and on Tuesday, Sept. 13 at 6:30 p.m. at the South Haven Moose Lodge.

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.