Wood creek feeds into the Rockcastle, which as we all know is where the strain presently still exists. If you are going to stock walleye into Wood Creek, you would certainly want to stock the Rockcastle strain or take the chance of hybridizing the final hold out of the pure southern strain. In that respect, keep stocking Rockcastle walleye in WCL. Will they grow and reproduce as well as the same fish might in C-land? Of course not, but I think our Fish and Wildlife folks know that.

Now then for Cumberland... a fish and wildlife study showed that the strength of a year class of stocking is quite obvious two years after that stocking. That in fact the average fish captured in the spawning areas is a 17 inch 2 year old fish. So, why not spend a couple of years stocking nothing but the Southern Strain walleye in Cumberland and see what we get? It would be a good estimate of their survivability and growth rate. One problem is that genetic studies are needed to tell the fish apart and I imagine that is quite expensive for the state. So that opens a whole can of worms- how to tell, without tagging, which walleye would be the newly stocked Southern stain and which were naturally spawned from the Erie Strain. Anyway, it would be a good start, and maybe we'll see that soon.

I think Fish and Wildlife are heading in the right direction with this. And I actually admire their patience with this matter. They have isolated a control group of fish for study. They may not be ready to produce half a million fingerlings a year yet. Remember the hatcheries have lost an entire year's worth of fish due to disease in the past. I'm ready for the re-introduction of the southern strain too, but for now, why not spend a little time doing some research before dumping fish in the lake. That's your point, isn't it? That the state started stocking the Erie strain based on assumptions, theory, and availability, without fully understanding the consequences?

Resectfully, Steve