Winnebago Sturgeon Spearing Report - Saturday February 16, 2013
The second Saturday of the 2013 sturgeon spear fishery was much like opening day. Water clarity conditions did improve over the last week and we saw a resurgence of sturgeon spearers take to the ice today, but the total harvest was still relatively low (37 sturgeon taken today). The largest fish today (73.7” and 112.5 pounds) was harvested by Stephen Goebel of Malone and registered at Jim and Linda’s in Pipe. The large fish trend increased today with 4 of the 37 fish weighing in at >100 pounds. A more detailed breakdown by station can be viewed in the attached document, but overall, the South end of the Lake is starting to see higher harvests with 18 of the 37 fish being registered at Wendt’s today. I would like to take credit for the increased harvest there because I worked out of Wendt’s today, but I know that isn’t the case. More fishermen are starting to set up on the Southern areas of the lake. In fact, our shanty counts today indicated that almost 400 out of the 1838 total shanties were placed in this area of the lake.
On opening day (February 9, 2013) shanties were fairly evenly spaced on Lake Winnebago:
Area 1 = 398 (14%)
Area 2 = 523 (19%)
Area 3 = 439 (16%)
Area 4 = 526 (19%)
Area 5 = 412 (15%)
Area 6 = 426 (16%)
Total = 2724
Fish/shack = 0.014 or 1.4% of shacks speared fish
However, shanty counts were much different today (February 16, 2013) with much less effort in areas 4 and 6:
Area 1 = 264 (14%)
Area 2 = 414 (22.5%)
Area 3 = 303 (16.5%)
Area 4 = 241 (13%)
Area 5 = 393 (21%)
Area 6 = 223 (12%)
Total = 1838
Fish/shack = 0.020 or 2% of shacks speared fish