The Pennsylvainia Fish and Boat Commission has completed their annual Musky survey, which began on Friday, April 17th, and ran through Friday, April 24th. The main purpose of this survey is to assess the health of the muskie population in Lake Nockamixon,
although all the various species of fish in the nets are documented. Twenty nets in total were set in various locations across the lake, at a rate of approximately four per day. We are happy to report to all who have donated to the club in various ways, that these stocked fish continue to show up healthy and in good numbers. The largest fish, from the 2012 fall stocking, are in the low to mid thirties already.Most of the fish were males with milt, while some of the females were ripe with eggs. Pures out-numbered the Tiger muskies by apx 4 to 1. Some were recaptured later in the week, miles away from where they were initially caught. Some were recaptured from last year – verified by the use of a PIT tag embedded in the fish.
Processing these fish is a huge undertaking as each muskie is subject to scale sampling, fin clipping, PIT tagging, and length/weight measurements. All of this data is documented and crunched against previous years results. We would like to thank PFBC biologists, Mike Kaufmann, Greg Murphy, and John Buzzar for their hard work and dedication to providing a better fishery for us all. Stay tuned to mi50.com for a detailed report.
