Outdoors Weekly News Archive

February 1, 2008

Winnebago sturgeon spearers look forward to good season
The DNR sold 8,759 spearing licenses for the Lake Winnebago 2008 sturgeon fishery including 130 non-resident licenses. This is up 10 percent from the 2007 season when 7,902 licenses were sold for Lake Winnebago.

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DNR News
OSHKOSH, Wis. – Sturgeon spearers are hoping the ice cover created on the Winnebago pool lakes by December’s cold weather will hold and provide good travel conditions for the Feb. 9 opening day for the two spearing seasons, the Lake Winnebago and the Upriver Lakes seasons.
Travel conditions on the ice and water clarity are the two primary factors that affect spearer success rate, according to Ron Bruch, Department of Natural Resources fisheries team supervisor stationed in Oshkosh.
As of Jan. 12, Lake Winnebago had an average of 11 inches of ice and the Upriver Lakes had 13 to 15 inches. Some areas have less than 2 inches of ice exist due to under-ice currents, shoals and the January thaw. People venturing on the ice are advised to be extremely careful and make sure they know exactly how much ice exists in the area they plan to travel.
Early reports indicate that water clarity ranges from excellent to fair, although spearers will be more interested in water clarity reports the week before the seasons begin at 6:30 a.m. Feb. 9. Spearers are allowed to cut their holes and set their shacks beginning Feb. 7. Season regulations are available on the fishing regulations pages of the DNR Web site.

Up River lakes season
The 2008 spearing season will also include the second annual lottery spear fishery on the Upriver Lakes -- Lakes Butte des Morts, Winneconne, and Poygan -- upstream of Lake Winnebago. Participation in this fishery is limited to 500 spearers selected through a random drawing from applicants. During the inaugural season in 2007, the 485 people who purchased an Upriver Lakes sturgeon spearing license enjoyed a 65 percent success rate in a very high quality fishery.
“Spearers were very happy in 2007 with the new Upriver Lakes sturgeon lottery fishery, and with the full 16-day season on Lake Winnebago,” Bruch said. “The ice and water clarity conditions were just right to give the spearers a nice long season without resulting in an overharvest.”
The great experience of those who participated in the 2007 Upriver Lakes lottery fishery encouraged significantly more people to put their name in the hat for the 2008 season. There were a total of 3,902 applicants for the 500 spots, up from the 2,795 who applied for the 2007 season.
The Upriver Lakes system runs through Feb. 24 unless the pre-set harvest cap for the Upriver Lakes is reached or the pre-set Winnebago System-wide harvest cap is reached, whichever comes first.

Winnebago season
License sales for the fishery on Lake Winnebago are not limited because the overall harvest can be effectively managed by the harvest cap system. The DNR sold 8,759 spearing licenses for the Lake Winnebago 2008 sturgeon fishery including 130 non-resident licenses. This is up 10 percent from the 2007 season when 7,902 licenses were sold for Lake Winnebago. System-wide, Lake Winnebago and the Upriver Lakes harvest caps for the 2008 season are 556 juvenile females, 556 adult females, and 1,000 males.
The Lake Winnebago season runs through Feb. 24 unless the pre-set harvest cap for the system is reached or for Lake Winnebago alone is reached, whichever comes first.
The lake sturgeon population in the Winnebago System has been improving over the last 15 years as the result of a series of regulation changes designed to maintain the annual harvest at a safe level and to allow the number of large adult female fish to expand after a period of serious overharvest in the early 1990s.
The DNR has maintained a proactive sturgeon population and harvest assessment program on the Winnebago System since the 1940s. The long-term data base is invaluable for monitoring sturgeon population trends over time related to harvest and population management decisions.

VHS not found
Sturgeon spearing participants will be glad to know that a new fish disease, viral hemorrhagic septicemia or VHS for short, hasn’t been found in sturgeon from the Lake Winnebago system. VHS, which is not a human health threat but can cause fish to bleed to death, was discovered last May in drum from the Lake Winnebago system. To date, lake sturgeon have not been found to be vulnerable to VHS, although more than two dozen North American fish species are vulnerable to the disease.
DNR staff tested 40 lake sturgeon in February 2007 for VHS and all tests were negative, as was the result for an additional sturgeon tested in August. “We will be testing another 40 or so fish again during the 2008 spearing season for VHS,” Bruch says.
Spearers are reminded it is illegal to possess a fishing pole, hook and line, angling equipment or other similar devices in an ice fishing tent, shanty or other ice fishing enclosure with ice holes larger than 12 inches in diameter or square