By Mike Bleech

Trout fishing is big business in Pennsylvania. Sport-fishing generates $50 million per year in sales and income taxes, and 75 percent of all fishing license buyers also buy trout stamps. Trout stamp sales account for 17 percent of Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission income.

However, there is a problem.

"Expenditures for fishing in the state have been on the decline, so we're concerned," said Dick Snyder, chief of the Division of Fisheries Management, during a trout management work group last July.

Trout stamp sales began in 1991. Sales of the stamps peaked at about 960,000 in 1995, the year before the last increase in fishing license costs. The Trout Management Workgroup, which included representatives from various anglers' groups, is just one of several ways the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission is addressing this decline. They are looking at special regulations and programs carefully to determine what anglers want.

Trout management in Pennsylvania should be viewed as an ongoing process, a continual effort by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission to adapt to the resource and to anglers' needs. Both the resource and anglers change, and this year there will be some management changes, but not as many as last year. However, there are other changes in progress, things that are being studied that likely will result in changes for the near future.

This year, the production goal for state hatcheries is the same as last year, about 4,025,000 trout. In addition, 100,000 brook trout will be raised through a cooperative agreement with the Allegheny National Fish Hatchery; 150,000 rainbow trout will be purchased from a commercial hatchery in North Carolina, and about one million trout will be raised by cooperative nurseries for a total of about 5.275 million trout.

Trout may be purchased from North Carolina for lower cost than they can be raised in state hatcheries. However, through a union agreement, any trout purchased must be an addition of state trout production, not a substitution.

"The challenge for the Fish and Boat Commission is that our hatchery system is limited by the pounds of fish we can produce to protect the effluent quality," explained Rick Hoopes, director of fisheries. "Our hatcheries can raise about two million pounds of trout per year. We can have either more but smaller trout, or larger but fewer trout. The Fish and Boat Commission attempts to strike a balance that will please the most anglers. Our goal is to produce an average 10-inch fish," Hoopes said. "This is close to the maximum average that could be attained under normal growing conditions. It would take two years to grow rainbow trout to an average of 13 inches. Bigger and more trout are no longer in the cards for the Fish and Boat Commission," Hoopes added flatly. "The public has told us they want bigger fish, but to do that we're not going to be able to get 4.1 million," Hoopes said.

According to Hoopes, an increase of just one inch in average size, from 10 inches to 11 inches, would reduce stocking numbers to 3.3 million trout.

"We do get a few large surplus breeder trout in the stockings," he continued. "About 1 percent of trout stocked are what are termed as 'premium trout,' fish that are more than 16 inches in length."

For anglers who are really serious about catching larger trout, there are various special programs including Catch-and-Release and Trophy Trout special regulations areas.

Photo by Terry Jacobs

According to Hoopes, rainbow trout are the best-producing trout in our hatcheries.

An issue that seemed hot last year, but which might have been blown out of proportion, involves the use of bait in certain Special Regulations areas. Traditional Anglers of Pennsylvania, a fishermen's advocacy group, told the Fish and Boat Commission that they wanted the rule prohibiting the use of live bait changed on Delayed Harvest waters during the period when the creeling of fish was legal, claiming it was unfair to anglers who prefer to use live bait. Upon soliciting public response, the commission received 1,167 written comments with just 31 supporting the removal of the live bait restriction. Support for the live bait restriction from 97 percent of those who responded seems a clear mandate.

"The fact that so many people took the time to weigh in on this proposal tells us two things. First, the rule-making process works and works well. Both those seeking a regulation change and those with reservations about it had the opportunity to participate in the deliberations," said Douglas Austen, Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission executive director. "The overwhelming response for our existing program re-affirmed public support for the Delayed Harvest concept."

With that support in hand, two additional stream sections have been added to the Delayed Harvest program for this year. A 1.75-mile section of Honey Creek in Mifflin County extending from the upper Bald Eagle State Forest boundary, and a 2.5-mile section of Powell Creek in Dauphin County, extending from the upper bridge crossing on T-551 downstream to the confluence of the unnamed tributary along T-358, will be managed under Delayed Harvest Artificial Lures Only special regulations.

Several other management and regulations changes are in the wind. Some might be in place for the opening of the 2005 trout season, while others are planned for the future.

About 250 miles of our 4,700 miles of stocked trout streams are under Special Regulations rules. The nine various Special Regulations programs have been popular with anglers, regardless of protests from groups that want all bait restrictions removed. This minuscule amount of our stream mileage (only 5 percent) provides a disproportionately large amount of quality fishing recreation.

Fish and Boat Commission policy is to make Special Regulations angling as simple as possible. Some of the changes we will see soon are of this nature.

Four of the Special Regulations programs (Selective Harvest, Selective Harvest All Tackle, Selective Harvest Artificial Lures Only and Heritage Angling) are being considered for elimination, along with some other miscellaneous Special Regulations areas. Rules for these programs are very similar to other Special Regulations programs. In most cases, stream sections from these programs will be converted to other similar programs.

Another possible change is elimination of the prohibition against fishing with molded facsimiles in some Special Regulations areas. The issue of multiple opening days is being mentioned again. Anglers previously rejected this idea, but their logic for that is sketchy.

"Many of the waters in the southeast warm up earlier. Perhaps we could be stocking them earlier. We want to revisit that," Snyder said.

Angler use and trout harvest is being studied on streams that have been designated "Wild Trout Streams." About 2,700 miles of streams have this designation. All streams are accessible to anglers. Sections of these streams are being electroshocked to determine trout density. The Fish and Boat Commission also plans to learn angler effects, catch rates, the number of trout harvested and the length of trout that are caught. This information can be used to set size and creel limits.

A Wild Trout Stream designation means that no stocking is done. Further evaluation of these streams will likely indicate that designation should be removed from some so they can be stocked.

Some of our best trout streams have been designated as Class A Wild Trout Streams. These are managed without stocking as self-sustaining wild trout fisheries.

"This is a good policy, but it has some confusion of terms and limits management," Hoopes said. "Trout populations and trout fisheries are not the same things. If you don't have people fishing, you don't have a fishery."

The management challenge with the current Class A policy is to define desired levels of angler use, to manage for production potential and to determine which streams no longer meet the criteria, which is based on biomass. Streams can be removed from the list if they do not pass criteria for two consecutive surveys. Some streams meet the criteria, but are not listed.

"We wanted to continue to stock those streams," Hoopes said.

Some streams on the Class A list are underutilized primarily, it appears, because they are not stocked.

"That is an issue we need to deal with. For example, are we going to de-list Class A waters to pursue other management options?" Hoopes said.

An example of this situation is Young Womans Creek in Clinton County. A portion of the creek was placed on the Class A list after just one survey. Though 90 percent of the stream is publicly owned and access is good, fishing pressure dropped considerably after it was removed from the stocking list in 1983. It is being considered for Delayed Harvest Artificial Lures Only special regulations. There appears to be good public support for such a change.