| New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife |
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Hackettstown State Fish Hatchery
2003 Broodstock Collection (Part II)
by Craig Lemon
Hatchery Superintendent
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At the end of "Part I", the Hackettstown Hatchery netting crew had just set trap nets in Monksville Reservoir and Greenwood Lake in an attempt to capture walleye and muskellunge adults for spawning at the hatchery. Three trap nets were set in each water body on April 14. The nets were checked two days later and produced 19 muskies and 56 walleye. The Monksville nets captured 7 muskies and 43 walleye, while the Greenwood nets captured 12 muskies and 13 walleye on the first day. |
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In order to safely transport this many brood fish to the hatchery, the hatchery staff released many of the walleye back to the reservoir after collecting some growth data from them. Releasing the walleye was an easy decision, because over 5.5 million Swartswood Lake walleye eggs were back incubating at the hatchery. The nets were checked and pulled from Monksville Reservoir on April 18, after catching an additional 4 muskies and 12 walleyes. The nets were checked 3 more times and pulled from Greenwood Lake capturing 3 more muskies and 36 more walleyes. As can be seen by looking at the photos and the charts below, many of the fish coming out of these two waters were of good trophy quality. |
 Amy Schweitzer with a nice Monksville walleye. |
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During the month long egg taking process, the hatchery crew crossed northern pike with muskellunge to produce hybrids called tiger muskies. Eggs of both crosses, northern pike female x muskellunge male and muskellunge female x northern pike male were spawned. Tiger muskies are a sterile hybrid and cannot reproduce. The crew spawned 100,000 eggs of each cross and the expected survival rate to the target size of 10 inches is above 80%. Tiger muskie fry readily accept dry pelleted diets and are therefore raised completely indoors. These 10-inch advanced fingerlings will be stocked by September 1 in the following waters: Furnace Lake, Lake Hopatcong, Little Swartswood Lake, Shadow Lake, Shenandoah Lake, Manasquan Reservior, Rancocas Creek, Carnegie Lake, Deal Lake and the D&R Canal. The second and final week of muskellunge brood fish collection was planned for Echo Lake Reservoir and Mountain Lake. Due to the large number of fish collected during the first week of muskie netting operations, hatchery efforts were aimed at Echo Lake Reservoir only for the second week. As stated in Part I, Echo Lake was not trap netted in 2002 because of low water levels. |
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Four trap nets were fished in Echo Lake Reservoir from April 21 to April 25. These four nets captured 20 muskellunge during the five-day period, almost doubling the hatchery’s entire 2002 muskie collection efforts. The largest two of the 13 females captured measured 47 and 49 inches. Echo Lake Reservoir contains a strain of muskellunge known as the Leech Lake strain. This strain, stocked by Muskies, Inc.,originated from Leech Lake in Minnesota and can sometimes be identified by the beautiful spotted pattern on the fish's side. New Jersey's other muskellunge lakes contain several strains, including Leech Lake, Chataqua (NY) and Pymatuning (PA). |
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The NJ Division of Fish and Wildlife received eggs and fry from the Pennsylvania Fish Commission and the New York DEC to begin its stocking programs in Greenwood Lake, Mountain Lake, Mercer Lake and Lake Hopatcong. The program promises to be self-sufficient in the future, using brood stock populations from New Jersey lakes to provide all of the eggs necessary. The muskellunge table below shows the results of a great netting season. Forty-five muskellunge were captured - twenty-four males and twenty-one females. Hatchery staff spawned 19 females producing 839,000 eggs. The females averaged 44,000 eggs per fish. The eggs had a 50% hatch rate and produced 400,000 fry. |
| About 250,000 of these fry
survived and swam up in ten days to accept feed. A portion of these swim
up fry were placed into fertilized hatchery ponds, while the remainder were
kept indoors and started on a mix of brine shrimp and dry feed.
Muskellunge reared at the hatchery in ponds reach 10 inches by September 1 while feeding on fathead minnows. The intensively reared muskellunge fingerlings reach 10 inches by October 15 while feeding on a high protein dry diet. A total of 4,400 of these advanced fingerlings are projected to be stocked this fall into the following waters: Greenwood Lake, Echo Lake Reservoir, Lake Hopatcong, Mountain Lake and Mercer Lake. |
 Ed Conley and Steve Strodel spawning Leech Lake muskellunge from Echo Lake Reservoir. |
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All of the brood fish have been safely returned to waters from which they were captured. The hatchery crew placed tags in many of the female muskellunge to identify individual fish while they were in the hatchery. Some of the tags were not removed at the time of release, and three of the tagged fish have already been caught by anglers. Any angler who catches one of the tagged muskellunge and would like more information about the fish's history can contact the Hackettstown Hatchery at 908-852-4950. Below are tables showing the numbers and sizes of fish captured from the waters where the trap nets were set in 2003. NORTHERN PIKE
MUSKELLUNGE
WALLEYE
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"Part I"
2001 Broodstock Collection
2002 Broodstock Collection
2004 Broodstock Collection
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