Walleye regulations on lakes in the Namakan Reservoir will be discussed at 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Kabetogama Community Hall on St. Louis County Road 122.
Minnesota Department of Natural Resources fisheries staff will provide background information, answer questions and take public input on the future of experimental regulations on Kabetogama, Namakan, Sand Point, Crane and Little Vermilion lakes in northern St. Louis County.
“We expect to present at least one option to modify the current protected slot, and possibly two or more,” said Kevin Peterson, International Falls area fisheries supervisor. “These five lakes are popular fishing destinations and we want to be sure the public has the opportunity to ask questions and participate in the discussion.”
The current experimental regulation for walleye, in place since 2007, requires the immediate release of all walleye from 17 to 28 inches. One walleye more than 28 inches is allowed in a possession limit of four walleye. The possession limit for walleye and sauger combined, is six.
The current regulations expire on March 1. Input at the meeting will help determine if they are modified or extended to achieve fish management objectives.
Peterson said the review is a part of the regular process when experimental regulations are put in place for a specific time period and is intended to help the DNR and the public to determine whether it’s achieved the objectives and to consider options for the future.
The DNR first implemented a slot limit on Kabetogama Lake in 1998, about four years after the initial slot limit efforts began on Rainy Lake.
“At that time we were seeing some things that concerned us and anglers on Kabetogama,” said Peterson. Those concerns, he said, surrounded a boom-and-bust cycle, with Kabetogama’s history of high walleye harvest experienced in the 1990s followed by periods of extremely low harvest.
Peterson said a regulation that would “smooth” that cycle out was sought. The initial regulation in 1998 created a 13-17 inch harvest slot with only one walleye over 23 inches allowed. When that was reviewed, he said it was adjusted in 2007 to the same regulation now on Rainy Lake and in place on Kabetogama. Following annual assessments to track the status of the walleye population, Peterson said the DNR observed a steady increase in abundance of walleye over 17 inches on Kabetogama, more pounds of walleye over 17 inches and a declining trend of walleye less than 17 inches.
“So what we’ve done on Kabetogama with our protected slot limit is shifted the population to more larger, older fish and fewer smaller, young walleye,” he said.
The DNR also saw less production of walleye in the last 10 or so years, with just two strong year classes of walleye produced on Kabetogama. It also saw increased catch rates of walleye over 17 inches by anglers.
“I don’t want to paint a bleak picture about the fishing on Kabetogama, but I do have the feeling the current regulation is not doing what we hoped it would, therefore we are looking for some options to modify that regulation,” said Peterson. The goal, he said, would be to shift the size and age of the population back toward more smaller, keeper-sized walleye, he said.
“And most important of all is to get the production up to what we saw in the 1980s and ‘90s,” he said.
However, Peterson said, Kabetogama is just one of five lakes in the Namakan system. Assessments and monitoring of the other lakes have not revealed any “red flags” or concerns, he said.
“My conclusion from that is that the current regulations are performing pretty well on those other lakes and everything is going in the positive direction on Namakan and Sand Point, where we’re seeing abundance and catch rates and harvest increased so much that we’re approaching to what we believe is a sustainable level of harvest on those lakes.”
The challenge, according to Peterson, is to find a regulation that will shave some of the biomass off those larger sized fish on Kabetogama without sacrificing the benefits seen on Namakan and Sand Point. “And that’s a tall order,” said Peterson.
Peterson said the DNR does not favor differing regulations on the lakes because the boundary line between Kabetogama and Namakan lakes is “blurry. Anglers often fish both lakes on the same day or certainly the same week. It would complicate things needlessly for everyone, including enforcement staff, anglers, and business owners to have different regulations on lakes that are connected.”
Peterson said his objective is to find a regulation that works on all five lakes.
DNR staff in International Falls and St. Paul are researching options using computer models that can allow them to look at “what if” scenarios and simulate how a particular regulation would perform on each of the lakes. Those models will be evaluated to see if they meet objectives for recruitment, abundance of different class sizes of fish, harvest levels and all the indicators researchers consider when evaluating the health of fish populations.
