"Jim tenHaaf" said:
[quote="hemichemi"]From a blurb in this year's Muskies Inc. calendar:

If you stock a lake with 1000 muskies, only 6-8 will typically survive to make it to 50"; that's less than 1%.

I'd like to know some more stats if anyone knows them:
What percentage of fish are female?
What percentage of males grow over 42"?
What percentage of fish (stocked) will hit 42"?
In a lake like TorchElkSkeg. etc, how many fish are naturally born and what % will reach 42"?

I can't answer most of these without sorting some data first. Most of the information will have to come from Thornapple since there's a large enough sample size of age, sex, length.

The speculative question at the end though is pretty easy. Duke has it right that they are 100% naturally born (no stocking) but I'm not sure that is what you meant. If you wanted a number of how many fry hatch in the spring and survival through year one, well… that would be a complete guess on the part of anyone who tried to answer that question.

The second part of that question is that 100% of the muskellunge in the Elk Chain, that survive to at least 10 years, will reach 42".

"Will Schultz" said:
[quote="Jim tenHaaf"]In a lake like TorchElkSkeg. etc, how many fish are naturally born and what % will reach 42"?

I can't answer most of these without sorting some data first. Most of the information will have to come from Thornapple since there's a large enough sample size of age, sex, length.

The speculative question at the end though is pretty easy. Duke has it right that they are 100% naturally born (no stocking) but I'm not sure that is what you meant. If you wanted a number of how many fry hatch in the spring and survival through year one, well… that would be a complete guess on the part of anyone who tried to answer that question.

I guess I didn't have to put the "naturally" part in there, since yes I'm aware that it is a self-sustaining population. But yes, I was looking for an answer on how many fry hatch in the spring and survival through year one. But thanks for your input, Duke & Will!

"Will Schultz" said:
Answer is…

[size=150]17[/size]

Well… I screwed up and this fish was not 17, I had it confused w/ another 55" fish that was aged as part of the overall study going on and not the tracking study.

This fish was actually aged at [size=150]15[/size], not 17.

I'm starting to think those giant Rapalas might not be just for hanging on the wall… 😯

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"Jim tenHaaf" said:
😯 Wow that's even more surprising! A 15 year old fish as the state record. Now just think if she grew up to be 25…. [smilie=longtongue.gif]

I wish there was more data so this wasn't just speculation but my gut says that due to the growth rate we aren't going to see fish over 18-20 and a 55" 50# fish is likely the near the max for that body of water.

"Duke" said:
[quote="Will Schultz"]Answer is…

[size=150]17[/size]

Verrry impressive… Not that it matters, and I've said it before but our own DNR held the ultimate GLS broodstock foundation in their hands when they trapped that fish this spring.

Jim's resurrection opened up some good reading for me. I liked Duke's thinking here. That would be cool if they could/would take eggs from select giant females from different lakes to try and get "Super fish" genes for fish stocking. Kind of like the Texas Share lunker program they do for Bass….