After seven decades of rehabilitation, lakers have fully recovered in most of the lake, the Lake Superior Committee (LSC) of the Great Lakes Fisheries Commission announced.
Between 1920 and 1950, the lake supported an annual commercial harvest of 4 million pounds of lakers. By 1964, overharvest and sea lamprey had depleted the population to the point where only 210,000 pounds were caught. At that time, the newly created Great Lakes Fishery Commission — comprising of fishery managers from Ontario, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan, and from various US First Nations — called for dramatic action.
The success of lamprey control measures initiated in 1958 led to more management efforts such as strict harvest regulations and fish stocking. In the mid-1990s, positive results from these measures allowed the committee to substantially reduce stocking since naturally reproducing lake trout populations were thriving.
Sustaining Superior lake trout populations
The committee estimates the abundance of naturally reproduced lakers is at, or above, the best estimates of the population prior to the sea lamprey invasion in 1938. Hitting the benchmark led the committee to declare the laker population restored. Specifically, it achieved the 2003 objective of having “genetically diverse self-sustaining populations of lake trout that are similar to those found in the lake prior to 1940, with lean lake trout being the dominant form in nearshore waters, siscowet lake trout the dominant form in offshore waters, and humper lake trout a common form in eastern waters and around Isle Royale.”
It was a 70-year process of cross-border, inter-agency management based on what was good for Lake Superior as a whole, committee Director of Policy and Legislative Affairs Greg McClinchey said.
“I look forward to the continued cooperation amongst fisheries managers and agencies to maintain healthy, self-sustaining lake trout populations in Lake Superior through effective sea lamprey control, prudent harvest policies, and protection of the Lake Superior ecosystem, which includes prevention of invasive species and water quality protection,” chair Bill Mattes added.
