Make it, take it

Establishing a put, grow and take fishery in an impounded reservoir might sound easy, but there are challenges.

Turcotte Fish Hatchery Supervisor Curt Summerlin claims it’s much more complicated than just dumping fish in the lake.

“One of the main changes that occurred during my time is to discontinue stocking the Atlantic-strain striped bass,” Summerlin said. “We’ve gone back to the Gulf-strain striped bass — fish that are originally native to this area.

“The Gulf striped bass are native to the rivers that empty into the Gulf of Mexico, stretching from Florida to extreme East Texas. They are just a genetically different fish from the Atlantic strain, those striped bass from the Eastern Seaboard that migrate to the Atlantic.”

In order to sustain the fishery, Summerlin and the biologists at Turcotte use electrofishing to collect them when striped bass make their annual spawning runs up the Pearl River — when the fish are literally knocking at the door of the hatchery.

“Our main objective is to keep that population strong, striped bass-wise, since that’s our source of brood fish for producing both stripers and hybrids,” he said. “We collect them right here, from down below Barnett Dam.”

The Turcotte hatchery uses the white bass female/striped bass cross to produce its hybrids. Male striped bass are collected on site, but the biologists must travel upstate to get the white bass.

“White bass are not native in the Pearl River drainage,” Summerlin said. “The Pearl is geographically isolated because it runs through the center of the state straight to the Gulf.

“Most of your rivers connected to the Mississippi have white bass in them. Those rivers connected to the Mississippi do have white bass, but the Pearl system does not. We use North Mississippi impoundments — Enid, Grenada and Sardis, to get our white bass.”