TOPIC:

All,  it took awhile to get the stars align, but there's now a DNR freezer at the Marina Shores fish cleaning station. We're looking for tagged steelhead returns. If you catch a steelhead missing the adipose fin, it has a coded wire tag in the snout. There are instructions and datasheets on the freezer itself, so anglers can deposit the heads. We'll extract the tags and input everything into a big database for analysis.

It's really important that 1) the steelhead is verified to actually be missing the adipose fin, which indicates it is tagged

2) anglers fill out the datasheet completely. Without all the information fields filled in, it will be very difficult to use the information to assess the stocking program as thoroughly as we'd like


If there's any questions let me know. Thanks!

 
 
 

Awesome Ben thank you.

Awesome!

Great News!

thanks Ben, will this be a temporary or permanent?

TBD - we're just in a see-how-it-goes phase.   If people are using it and we're getting good data, keeping it clean and orderly, etc and there are no problems with marina management it will probably stick around for as long as coded wire tag steelhead are out there being caught. 

On the other hand if there's issues with cleanliness, and very few heads turned in , we may figure out a different path

Good morning Ben,

every year we have new fishing folks that get involved with the great fishing for Steelhead. Small boat guys and gals get a chance to stay in close to fish for these crazy fish.
Could you go into a little more detail why it is so important to support this effort not only here, but why it is ongoing lake wide?

Good idea, Ed, thanks. 


Steelhead fisheries, especially in Wisconsin, Illinois, and Indiana, are very reliant on stocking. In Indiana we have almost no wild reproduction, because we do not have the habitat. There is a lakewide program, spearheaded by the US Fish and Wildlife Service, to mark every single stocked steelhead by removing the adipose fin, and also tag them with a tiny coded wire tag. These tags have a 6-digit code that is specific to a specific stocking - so once extracted, fisheries biologists can tell the stocking date and location, the strain, size at stocking, etc.  

By recovering lots of these tags from angler-caught fish, and also through agency-led collections at weirs or spawning broodstock, many things can be learned about the movement of fish, the survival rate of stocked fish, and the timing of steelhead runs up tributaries. All this information will improve understanding of the fishery, and help to improve stocking programs

If we get enough tag returns, we can start describing with high confidence the answers to questions such as 

1) for open lake steelhead caught in Indiana, where are those originating from?
2) are steelhead returning to their place of stocking and being caught, or are they straying into other systems
3) what is the relative survival of our stocking locations
4) what is the relative survival difference by size and strain of our stockings
5) what is the timing of strain returns to the stream fishery - such as what proportion of skamania are caught by month vs winter runs by month
6) what is the age composition of steelhead contributing to various fisheries

Are there plans to add an additional freezer in Michigan City at the cleaning station in Washington Park or Trail Creek?   

Potentially, we're waiting to see how this one is used, waiting to hear back from Port Authority. Like I mentioned above we get a lot of steelhead already in MC via creel clerks on both the lakefront and the creek, drop-offs to office, and federal biotechnicians - so the need is not nearly as pressing as Portage

Thanks to all that have been using the DNR freezers at Marina Shores to leave steelhead snouts for us. 

And although I didn't make a post, we did end up getting one at Washington Park as well.

We really appreciate the data, and over 100 angler returns have been made!

Unfortunately people have been leaving trash in the freezer, and wasting bags and data tags. Please respect these freezers and use the equipment for their intended purpose
If you want to leave eggs in there for other anglers to come get, rather than putting them down the grinder, fine. But please don't use the DNR provided bags, and definitely don't leave an empty used bag in there if you're retrieving other people's eggs. Thank you!

Also, if you use the freezer and happen to notice that it's not working for some reason, please do not hesitate to call my office at 219-874-8219, or email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. 

It can be a couple days in between checking the freezers and if one goes out it can get ripe pretty quick. 

Thanks everyone!