Review and
pictures by Mark Daul

An Outdoors Niagara Exclusive!

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WILSON STOCKING

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Wilson NY Spring
Steelhead Stocking April

“T J” Jacob

See photos below to see
how big this steelie was when he/she was a baby!

Click
the pics!

There were a total of
27,000 steelhead trout stocked in Twelve Mile Creek. 12,000 were stocked
in the west branch and 10,000 stocked in the east branch. In addition,
5,000 were stocked in the Town of Wilson rearing pens. Backed by the
Town and supervised by many volunteer residents, this program has proved
very successful and as well as any other program like it on Lake
Ontario/Niagara River.

The volunteers met the
DEC Truck that arrived at 12:45 PM from the Altmar NY Hatchery.
It was quite cold and windy with a breeze from the east. Harbor water
temp was around 42-44 degrees which was ideal. The fish didn’t
mind though.

Charter Captain Mike Lis
has taken the volunteer lead to organize and oversee the feeding
schedules by even more volunteers. Lis is also the lead communications
man with the DEC. NYS DEC Chief Biologist Mike Wilkinson is the contact
person and he oversees all stocking efforts in the DEC Region 9.

One of two pens waiting for stocking	DEC Truck backing up to release the baby fish which measured at 5 to 6 inches	DEC’s Mike Wilkinson and assistant hooking up the discharge pipe
Volunteers managing the other end	There they go! 5,000 babys!	Brad Clark [L] Town of Wilson liaison, and Captain Mike Lis talking “fish”

Interesting note: As the fish
were coming down the pipe to the pen, they wanted to stay in the pipe and were
trying to swim upstream against the flow. As always, the water lying in the low
spots of the pipe had to be flushed out by raising the high end of the pipe even
higher so they would all come out. The volunteers treat these fish as
though they were family.

Lake Release on beach

When being released directly to
the lake, many of these little guys, after being pushed out the pipe into the
lake, would actually swim back up the pipe despite the flow of water
coming down. [see middle picture] The volunteers will stand the pipe upright so
they are all forced out. It’s like a bunch of little kids looking back for their
mother on the beach to make sure it is OK to go in. They will swarm in groups at
the lake edge until finally disappear from sight. Some even try to swim on the
sand like the photo on the right. Actually they get disoriented and eventually
find their way back to the water where they know they will be safe.

Setting up the pipe
The guy in the background is Terry Swan, retired tackle dealer and
he always volunteers his services to the betterment of the fishery.

Notice how after being released, these
little guys want to hang around the pipe where they came from. When the
pipe is removed, in time they will meander off and out of sight