Closure Of Fish Hatchery Highlights Others’ Importance

Fish hatcheries provide an important role in boosting fish populations. The Department of Natural Resources recently announced that the French River Hatchery in Duluth will be closed after near four decades of service.

The Park Rapids fishery office is responsible for managing the fish in lakes and streams in parts of Hubbard, Wadena, and Becker counties. This includes surveying the populations over time.

One of the ways they help is by creating stock fish to artificially increase or maintain healthy populations.

Fish eggs come to the fishery, where they are grown at controlled temperatures.

They produce about 23 million walleye fry annually to be taken to area lakes and rearing ponds.  They also produce over 4,500 pure-strain muskie fingerlings each year.

This fishery produces different species than the French River Hatchery, which revived the dismal trout population in Lake Superior – something that Doug Kinsley, in Park Rapids, was excited to hear about.