28-01-2025
Michigan DNR working to bring back fish ‘lost' since 1930s
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — With a little help from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, a native fish that was once considered 'extinct' from state waters is working to make a comeback.
The DNR is continuing its work to reintroduce the back to Michigan waters. The agency is working alongside several local tribes, including the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians, the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians and the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians.
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Eggs are being hatched at the Oden State Fish Hatchery near Petoskey. Approximately 400,000 eggs will be released along three different rivers in northern Michigan .
The Michigan Arctic grayling was considered extirpated in the 1930s. Once plentiful in the state's rivers and streams, the Arctic grayling descended from a fish that lived in Michigan waters since the glaciers of the Ice Age receded.
According to Dan Kimmel with , several factors played a role in the grayling's doom, including the state's timber industry.
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'The logjams scoured the streams and all but destroyed grayling spawning areas,' . 'Cutting the trees down also caused serious silting problems that literally choked the streams in which the grayling lived.
'Those streams, lacking the canopy shade the bankside trees provided, soon became unsuitably warm for the grayling. The delicate balance of nature tipped and the little grayling, unable to adapt to the large-scale changes facing it, began to disappear.'
Overfishing and the introduction of non-native trout, including rainbow trout and the European brown trout, nearly forced the Michigan population of Arctic grayling to disappear.
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'The last specimens were taken in the 1930s as part of a last-ditch effort to rescue the fish and keep it swimming our state's waters,' Kimmel wrote.
Attempts have been made in the past to bring grayling back to Michigan waters, pulling populations from other areas, including Alaska and western Canada. The DNR started its latest initiative with the local tribes in 2016.
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