[Blackmacs]

Originally Posted by JLDII

This is just another lake falling into slot managment because the state quit stocking it while they restocked Red Lake. There is a long list of lakes in this group.

Minnesota is a frick'n mess when it comes to fisheries managment and stocking. The truth is that in the early 90's the sales of fishing and hunting licenses got diverted from direct funding of the DNR to funding the bankrupt states general fund. As a result fisheries stocking state wide dropped from over 220,00 lbs of fry a year to just over 80,000lbs. They let their rearing ponds turn to crap, got rid of all the needed equipment, and insisted they could manage the states resources with slot managment instead of stocking. Thank you Ron Payer. Now that stocking program is funded by a miniscule budget passed down by the legislature and our fisheries people are spending over half of it doing studies on computer stocking formulas and models instead of actual hard stocking actions.

Seperate the DNR from the state legislature, redirect all funds from license sales to the DNR, and get a DNR Commisioner that is not a string puppet to the special interest groups running the Capital in St. Paul. There is absolutely no valid reason elected idiots are directing the work of trained biologist. Stock the lake intensly for about 2 or 3 years till te fry grow, and allow mother nature decide what the lakes population levels will be. Then you can establish a workable slot limit.

Too many people actually believe human knowledge is superior to mother nature's laws. It just ain't so.

According to: http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/lakefind/...ownum=69084500 the MN DNR has stocked fry at least the last 3 years.