Why not just stock more paddlefish?

The best management approach for long-term sustainability of paddlefish in North Dakota is to maintain quality habitat for sufficient natural reproduction and recruitment.

Stocking efforts in the state have yielded mixed results.

Larger fish (4 per pound) stocked in 1995 in Lake Sakakawea have recruited to the fishery, but smaller fish stocked in 1997 (10 per pound) have not, suggesting that larger fish at stocking are preferred.

Even in the successful stocking of 1995, naturally recruited fish have made up about 95 percent of this year-class, so natural recruitment is the key to a good fishery.

Stocking has its uses, however.

The most recent stockings of tagged young-of-year paddlefish have occurred in 2007, 2011 and 2018 to better understand juvenile paddlefish survival in years of low reservoir water levels and high river and reservoir levels and to have some known age fish in the population to compare with estimated ages from jawbones.