Paddlefish Return Home
The Iowa Great Lakes are home to over 40 different fish species and offer over 11,000 acres of aquatic diversity, making the beautiful clear water lakes a haven for fishing and recreational fun. Some of these fish are familiar to fishermen, such as walleye, largemouth and smallmouth bass—species that help support our Spirit Lake Fisheries Hatchery, are large enough to bend a fishing rod, and aggressive enough to bite a hook.
But there’s a new fish beneath the water’s surface in the Iowa Great Lakes! A new, old fish!
This past fall, the Iowa Department of Natural Resources implemented a plan where American Paddlefish were reintroduced into West Lake Okoboji.
“This project has been discussed for four years as American Paddlefish were once native to our lakes,” said Mike Hawkins, District Fisheries Biologist. “We don’t have this opportunity to reintroduce a species very often, especially one that’s native to the lake. We are so thankful and proud of the Hatchery staff at Lake Rathburn and all the work they did to raise the paddlefish until they reached their new home in Okoboji.”
American Paddlefish regularly spawn in the Missouri River and Hawkins said they initially came into the Iowa Great Lakes from the Little Sioux River, making the long migration into the lakes. “Our thought is they disappeared because of fragmentation of the river systems with the dams that were put in place, stopping the upstream migration. Paddlefish don’t reproduce in lake systems and are a river fish,” he shared.
While some river fish can jump the dams, paddlefish aren’t able to get over a dam and why they were no longer found in the Iowa Great Lakes. Hawkins said when talk took place of reintroducing the American Paddlefish into our lakes, which is the only species of paddlefish left in the world, there was a lot of excitement.
“Because the Iowa Great Lakes was once native to paddlefish, we became a natural choice to do some stocking here,” Hawkins added.
With extensive research, Hawkins said there are countless stories about big fish being caught from the early 1900s to 1919, even one at 210 pounds, being caught on West Lake Okoboji.
It has been over 100 years since a Paddlefish was caught on the Iowa Great Lakes, as referenced in a 1919 Okoboji Protective Association Bulletin. “This fish story is not only the story of the season; it is claimed to be the biggest catch on record for any body of water in the northwest. The fish is a spoon-bill sturgeon measuring six feet nine inches from tail to end of bill, Measures forty-three and a half inches around the biggest part, seventeen inches across the tail, seventeen-inch bill and weighs—now get this—185 pounds. This fish was caught Tuesday by R. Vanderbeek who has for years piloted fishing parties about Okoboji. Mr. Vanderbeek was spearing fish through a hole in the ice from his shanty, which is located at the north end of West Okoboji. He said he first noticed the smaller fish race through the water as though they could not get away fast enough, and then this immense shadow came cutting through the water. He threw two spears, both reaching their mark, and after letting out about twenty feet of line, with another man’s assistance succeeded in dragging the fighting monster out of the water. He said that he alone would have been unable to land this freshwater whale. There have been a number of healthy specimens of this variety of the finny tribe caught in Okoboji heretofore, but this one is said to break all records. Mr. Vanderbeek is on his way to Omaha where he will have the big fellow mounted, so that he may forever display it as a proof that he can tell the biggest fish story of any fisherman or would-be fisherman in these parts.”
Restoration Process
Conservation work began in earnest in 1991, with the formation of the Mississippi Interstate Cooperative Resource Association (MICRA), composed of 28 state DNRs and an organization created to improve management of interjurisdictional fish and other aquatic resources in the Mississippi River Basin. Over the past few years, the DNR's Rathbun State Fish Hatchery has been receiving newly hatched paddlefish fry from the Missouri Department of Conservation (DOC). The Missouri DOC collects eggs from a wild population of paddlefish from the Osage River. The culture of paddlefish eggs and fry is done similarly to walleye. The paddlefish fry are raised at the Rathbun Hatchery until they reach about 15 inches in the fall.
Paddlefish have been documented to live for as long as 50 years and can become extremely large. However, they pose no threat to other fish and humans, eating by simply swimming around with their mouths open. Their gills have structures called rakers that trap tiny plankton that are then swallowed.
“The paddlefish has changed very little from its prehistoric attributes,” Hawkins explained. “It has a paddle-shaped snout, called a rostrum, that extends over one-third of its body length. They were once referred to as freshwater shark because of the shape of its tail and cartilaginous skeleton. It also has an electrical sensory system—like a shark—that detects very weak electrical fields in the water, helping it find plankton.”
Stocking the Lakes
Transporting live fish can be a tall task, and organizers had to wait for conditions to be just right, especially with last year’s warmer fall. “Things that can reduce stress is reducing density of the fish on the truck, making sure that the oxygen levels are good, and cooler water temperature is another crucial factor,” Hawkins said.
A little over 2,000 paddlefish were delivered to the Spirit Lake Hatchery over a period of several days. A public stocking took place on Oct. 11, where a crowd watched the final 400 paddlefish be released at Emerson Bay into West Lake Okoboji. In addition, 25 of the paddlefish were implanted with acoustic tags so that their movements can be studied over the next year and a half. With 20 acoustic receivers on the bottom of the lake, the receivers log seasonal migration around the lake and identify if the fish are leaving the lake system. Once a fish is “heard” by the receiver, it records the exact date and time that the fish swam by. Biologists can then download this data periodically and determine patterns of movement.
“We don’t know a lot about how well they will survive, and if they will actually stay in the lake, or what they will do and where they will go. The tags will give us a lot of data and help us plan when restocking will take place again,” Hawkins explained. He added that paddlefish are great eating and don’t contain a lot of heavy metals since they eat low on the food chain. “My goal is to see one when I go diving. The paddlefish are amazing creatures and it’s like finding a living fossil,” he said. “Our lakes are doing really well, which is exciting, and it’s exciting to reintroduce a native fish to them.”
Projects like the Paddlefish Restoration come from monies collected from hunting and fishing license sales that go into the Iowa Fish and Game Trust Fund, as well as money from the Federal Sport Fish Restoration Program that collects money from the sale of fishing equipment.
“Most people don’t realize that hunters, anglers, and hunting and fishing equipment manufacturers fund most of the conservation efforts around the country. Whether you fish or hunt, those license dollars go into a constitutionally protected trust fund that must be used for conservation work. Those sales then leverage the Federal Sport Fish Restoration Program fueling conservation efforts like the reintroduction of paddlefish into our lakes,” Hawkins explained. "Even if you don't hunt or fish, but want to support conservation work in Iowa, you can simply buy a license."
For more information on how to purchase a hunting or fishing license, go to www.iowa.gov/how-do-i-hunting-and-fishing-licenses. To learn more about paddlefish or you’d like to learn about other restoration and conservation efforts in the Iowa Great Lakes, visit the Spirit Lake Hatchery at 122 252nd Ave. in Orleans or by calling 712-336-1840.
1919 Okoboji Protective Association Bulletin
“Fishing is growing better as time goes on in West Okoboji. Only two weeks ago, R. Vanderbeek speared a Spoonbill Sturgeon near the head of West Okoboji Lake weighing 185 pounds, which was by far the largest ever taken from those waters, but not to be outdone in fishing or with fish stories for the coming generations Ren Wiese on Monday of this week speared a sturgeon, which tipped the scales at 210 pounds. Mr. Wiese’s fish is a female wherein the other was a male, and while only measuring six feet, seven inches long, two inches shorter than the Vanderbeek fish, measures forty-seven inches or four inches larger around with an eighteen-inch bill. Mr. Wiese was spearing fish in the bay off Pillsbury Point where the water is about fifty feet deep. The fish was about fifteen feet underwater, but Mr. Wiese got her strong with the first spear. Realizing he would have a difficult task landing the fish alone, he tied it with about twenty feet of rope and went for assistance. The fish was not difficult to manage at first but when he returned from a twenty-minute trip up to where Charley Wilson was working, it had gained considerable life, and it was only with the third attempt with Charley’s assistance that the fish was thrown out upon the ice, where it made things hum for a time. A deal is on with the Commercial Club of Spirit Lake and Mr. Wiese wherein the club will purchase the monster and have it mounted for exhibition. The Vanderbeek fish was sent to Omaha where it is being mounted for exhibition purposes at the Park.”
