We talked about this at the meetings in terms of what it means for Indiana stocking decisions. You cannot maximize total return of fish, while also maintaining species diversity, seasonal diversity, and geographical diversity in a fishery. Creating fisheries at localized places in specific seasons by definition will inevitably be inefficient as it relates to total return of fish to anglers, because not all species survive and return at the same rates, and may do better at one location compared to another. There are inherent tradeoffs, and there is no one “right” answer. That’s because it’s a values-based decision. It depends on what the goal is. And goals are inherently driven by what people want. We use science based evidence to figure out how to achieve values-based goals.
I said most of this at the meetings, but: the reality is, chinook survival and return in Indiana is low and not likely to improve very much no matter what management actions are taken in terms of where/when/how the fish are stocked. Net pens might help modestly, but aren’t a silver bullet. Current Wisconsin data shows basically no improvement over direct stocking, although they are still evaluating another yearclass or two. Concentrating stocking on one location likely won’t improve return rate very much, but it would certainly improve the absolute number of fish returning to a single port.
With regard to Brother Nature’s question about timing of alewife spawning and chinook survival, juvenile chinooks don’t start eating fish until late summer, say August or September. From May to August, they are primarily eating invertebrates. Basically the theory for why north-central Wisconsin has much better survival is they have a lot more rocky structure (habitat for benthic invertebrates) and prevailing westerly winds (blows terrestrial invertebrates in lake) plus frequent upwellings that bring up nutrients and concentrate bait more consistently than other areas of the lake.
Anyways, back to Indiana - there’s very little science that informs a best management decision with regard to chinook stocking location and numbers in Indiana. Quite the contrary - the best available information we have suggests that nothing we can do will significantly improve survival rate at this point in time. Therefore, choosing where to stock is very much a values-based decision, one that must be broadly supported by anglers. In other words, political. Although I would call it stakeholder based.
Somewhat ironically with regard to this post, the intent of returning to 3 ports for 2020 was about angler trust. We made explicit promises in 2016/2017 that if chinook stocking increased in the future, we’d go back to 3 ports. At the time, people were questioning if DNR even wanted kings or if stocking would ever increase again. If people can’t trust that we’ll follow through on what we promise, what basis for cooperative management do we have going forward? If anglers don’t trust the managers, what hope of there is working together in good faith? Frankly, I’m pretty disappointed that we’re being excoriated for keeping our word.
I understand frustration with the poor fishery and slow progress. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – if I could snap my fingers and make a change that would significantly improve the fall fishery, I would have done it long ago.
When it comes down to it, making a significant shift from decades of stocking 3 ports requires thoughtful, prolonged discussion by a committed group of people, and/or a dedicated meeting soley to hash out details and plan a path forward - not simply an informal vote at a meeting of a few dozen folks over the course of an hour or two – something that a couple anglers brought up at one of the meetings, in fact. Especially when you factor in considerations such as shore access vs stream access vs boat access, central location vs geographical diversity, net pen feasibility and desirability , metrics for evaluation (discontinuation? Expansion?) and so on and so forth.
Perhaps we were not clear enough that the meetings were intended to be a first step, not a one-off. And that by asking people what their opinions were was not going to immediately dictate stocking policy for this spring. For that, I apologize.
Historically in Indiana there hasn’t been a lot of direct and formal engagement of anglers and how it relates to stocking decisions. The managers made the decisions, often just continuing on with what had been always done. Or, using a bunch of data on return rates and angler usage to make changes in stocking that were based on available evidence, and not taking angler opinion into consideration. The meetings this spring were a first step to explain what we think about, and have a 2-way conversation with people about what THEY think.
In my view, the process of correctly establishing a process for making these decisions involving stakeholder input is a lot more important than a single year of stocking. A new process is not something that is built overnight. And if we can’t be trusted to keep our promises or be transparent, that isn’t a good foundation to build upon. Clearly we’re off to a rocky start in that regard, even though we were trying to remain true to our word.
I look forward to any constructive suggestions for going forward
