Private stocking

[Captain Wader Farts]

I was listening to something on Spotify while I was in the treadmill that challenged me to reach out to a club stocking over wild or native trout and ask them if they would consider stocking someplace less harmful. I live in Dauphin County and know where the state puts fish but does anyone know of any clubs stocking over wild trout in the area? Esp. Native brook trout?

 

[Roofin' Trouter]

There is a list of waters stocked by clubs that have cooperative nurseries on PAFBC's website. If I remember right Dauphin County Anglers Club stocks a few cricks. Co-op hat heroes receive fingerlings from PFBC , so maybe you might not consider them private stockings. I don't know. For a list of people and clubs that file for permits to stock trout maybe call PAFBC. They will steer you in the right direction.

 

[troutbert]

The PFBC has listings of stockings by coop hatcheries on their website. You could then compare that to wild trout info also from the PFBC website.

Someone with GIS skills and software should be able to bring in shapefiles for the wild trout stream sections and the coop stocked sections, then note the overlap.

Coop hatcheries do not include all club hatcheries, but I think it includes a large majority of them.

 

[CRB]

Not all private stocking come from co op hatcheries

 

[Bamboozle]

It may not be every non-PFBC stocking or even 100% accurate in regards to coop stockings, but below is the most current cooperative nursery stocking list from the PFBC website:

 

[troutbert]

In many cases where coop hatcheries are stocking over wild trout, the PFBC is also stocking the same section. That isn't always the case. There are some wild trout sections stocked by a coop only, and not the PFBC. But there is a lot of overlap.

 

[sarce]

The PFBC has listings of stockings by coop hatcheries on their website. You could then compare that to wild trout info also from the PFBC website.

Someone with GIS skills and software should be able to bring in shapefiles for the wild trout stream sections and the coop stocked sections, then note the overlap.

Coop hatcheries do not include all club hatcheries, but I think it includes a large majority of them.

Are those shapefiles available to download? Or even a Google Earth kml/kmz? It would be a quick exercise if I can get my hands on those layers. Edit: might even be able to set up a web map that you all could access.

 

[rustbeltwilds]

In many cases where coop hatcheries are stocking over wild trout, the PFBC is also stocking the same section. That isn't always the case. There are some wild trout sections stocked by a coop only, and not the PFBC. But there is a lot of overlap.

I can absolutley concur

 

[troutbert]

Are those shapefiles available to download? Or even a Google Earth kml/kmz? It would be a quick exercise if I can get my hands on those layers. Edit: might even be able to set up a web map that you all could access.

Here's what turned up on PASDA in a search:

Search Results - Pennsylvania Spatial Data Access

www.pasda.psu.edu

I'm not seeing shapefiles of where the coop hatcheries stock.

But it looks like there are shapefiles of the wild trout (natural reproduction) sections, and shapefiles of the sections stocked by the PFBC.

Combining those shapefiles in a map, showing where the PFBC is stocking over wild trout populations, would be interesting.

 

[Mike]

In many cases where coop hatcheries are stocking over wild trout, the PFBC is also stocking the same section. That isn't always the case. There are some wild trout sections stocked by a coop only, and not the PFBC. But there is a lot of overlap.

The primary purpose of that program is or was to stock trout where PFBC hatcheries can’t by policy, primarily because of limited access, such as too many posted riparian stretches to qualify for PFBC stocking, but also because of physical dimensions as in stream widths not meeting or else exceeding standards and stockable section lengths not meeting requirements. From a practical standpoint, however, some co-ops do not have or else have few unstocked waters near-by that could be stocked and transport for longer distances might not be possible with their equipment. Additionally, there may be some co-ops that had stocked waters which eventually were classified as Class A and were then required to stop stocking those waters, resulting in the need to stock stream sections that the PFBC already stocked. Finally, Operation Future resulted in considerable cuts to the stocking numbers on certain waters and some co-ops may have desired to supplement PFBC stockings with additional fish in order to increase the stocking rates and/or frequencies to former or near-former levels.

One under-appreciated value of co-op nurseries stocking some Class A’s is that they keep private Class A waters open to public fishing through their positive interactions with riparian landowners. Often the co-ops and their sponsoring clubs have strong landowner contacts and are viewed by the landowners’ as being their neighbors. That is not necessarily how the landowners view PFBC employees who might request landowners to keep their lands open to public fishing even without co-op stocking. If a relatively minor stocking or two, and I do mean minor, could be used to keep riparian lands open to public fishing, especially in regions or portions of regions where trout fishing opportunities are limited, I’d be all for it with AFM review on a case by case basis and with AFM’s providing stocking rate guidance.

 

[troutbert]

Are those shapefiles available to download? Or even a Google Earth kml/kmz? It would be a quick exercise if I can get my hands on those layers. Edit: might even be able to set up a web map that you all could access.

I have never seen shapefiles of stream sections with native brook trout populations available for download. But those shapefiles must exist because I've seen mapping of brook trout populations. If you ask the PFBC for this, they should be able to supply it to you.

Then you could bring the brookie shapefiles and the PFBC stocking shapefiles into GIS and show the overlap on a map, and hopefully also produce a table of stream sections where the PFBC is stocking over native brook trout.