# Trophy fish for our children



## katfish (Apr 7, 2004)

ODNR held the catfish Summit Feb 14 and are quite excited about creating an inland trophy fishery for blue cats.










It will be years before we know which lakes provide the best growth and survival but stocking begins Fall of 2016 for 4 new lakes and hoover whiach has already begun stocking.

I am predicting that C J Brown and Hoover will be the more successful lakes.


----------



## CPK (Jan 31, 2015)

Can't wait for all of this to take hold.


----------



## Salmonid (Apr 14, 2004)

Robby, I believe Rocky Fork has a better chance to support a robust fishery for the blues, it has by far some of the biggest channels in the SW region where as CJB is already loaded with stunted channel and waaay too many of them, I believe that the food available to them at CJB will be harder for them to grow quickly but that is just my opinion and RFL has a healthy population of LMB, Channels and Crappies so it appears there is a lot more food available for them there but only time will tell, what are your thoughts on Clendenning and Senacaville since your more familiar with those fisheries catfish wise then we are over here, LOL PS Good seeing you yesterday!

Also agree its great news!!

Salmonid


----------



## ducky152000 (Jul 20, 2005)

Seneca could create a great bluecat lake due to all the shad. Unfortunately they draw down the lake 8 feet most years. More than likely the majority of the blues will end up in willscreek.


----------



## M.Magis (Apr 5, 2004)

Interesting. I would have thought that Salt Fork would have been a better candidate than Seneca due to the increased depth and shad population. Seneca is very similar to Dillon in many respects, and that didn&#8217;t work out too well. My assumption is they didn&#8217;t want to risk the musky fishery suffering. It&#8217;ll be interesting either way.


----------



## seang22 (Mar 3, 2014)

Hoovers already had the blues dropped in. Anyone have any success?


----------



## Salmonid (Apr 14, 2004)

Magis, you are correct, several of the criteria used to find a lake was that it must be in the native range which means it had to be an Ohio River drainage, second was it had to have at least 20 FOW and needed to be a large body of water so they couldn't be fished out, another criteria was that they were not going to put them where there was an existing musky population since both would be competing for the top notch on the predator prey chain. That eliminated several great lakes such as East Fork and Ceasers Creek. Of course down the road I imagine all the Ohio River lakes may be available but at this first stocking they wanted large bodies of water that did not have a high flush rate and all the above fit that category quite nicely. 


Salmonid


----------



## ducky152000 (Jul 20, 2005)

high flush rate meaning, the amount of water or fish? If its fish Seneca would be a terrible choice. It amazes me how many saugeye go down the spillway. Blues will be no different or worse. regardless im sure some will stay. How many is the question.


----------



## katfish (Apr 7, 2004)

I reckon the lakes will be monitored closely for several years to determine which lakes are the best candidates.

Stocking rates or exclusion of lakes and addition of others is quite possible.

Only time will tell. If I am right they will ramp up stocking rates in Hoover and C J Brown. Rocky Fork may prove to be a surprise also.


----------



## winguy7 (Mar 12, 2014)

That's awesome. I know they were out last year on the lakes asking people what they thought about it.


----------



## H2O Mellon (Apr 5, 2004)

This is great news. Initially I though about East Fork and Ceasers Creek but understand the deal about Musky. Boy though, I think CC would make for a great Blue Cat fishery! As far as East Fork, I think you cold bring the entire Blue Cat population on the James River and they wouldn't make a dent on the shad population in that lake. I've never seen a lake with as many shad. IF the Musky population ever takes off in East Fork it's going to produce some fatties. 

They seem to be going after CJ aggressively which I really like but like Mark pointed out there's a bazillion of those 1-3 # channels in there.


----------



## Earthworms (Dec 15, 2014)

You gonna fish any musky outings with ch 41 this year? If not I will come down for a day on the lake with you.


----------



## hatfield75 (Jun 6, 2009)

seang22 said:


> Hoovers already had the blues dropped in. Anyone have any success?


Yes, I caught quite a few last spring. They should be hitting the 5-8 lb mark this year. They are very aggressive and eat about everything. At first we were catching them on cut bait then they switched over to hitting our live 5-7 inch gills. They also like to harass the crappie guys and their big fat bass minnies.


----------



## catfishcc (Oct 28, 2013)

Odnr said they didn't want to put blues in salt fork cause of the Muskie. Until catfish become a sport fish , odnr will always give bass, saugeye and Muskie more attention.


----------

