The Michigan Natural Resources Commission recently adopted a new year-round regulation when it comes to fishing in many of Michigan’s waterways. Fishers will now have to limit their catch of rainbow trout to one per day if the fish is 20 inches or greater when fishing on select rivers. In West Michigan, those rivers include parts of the Muskegon, Rogue and Pere Marquette Rivers.
Jay Wesley, Lake Michigan Basin Coordinator for the DNR explains the reason behind the new regulation.
“There’s an interest by steelhead anglers and angling groups to protect those fish, so those folks have pressured our natural resource commission to make more conservative regulations.”
Wesley says that while steelhead numbers have remained fairly steady in recent years, there was a time when that wasn’t the case.
“We saw quite a decline happen in the early 2000’s which was a direct result of the quagga and zebra mussels in the lake, but since about 2004, the Lake Michigan population at least has been pretty stable.”
The amended regulation takes effect on April 1 of this year. You can learn more about it at Michigan.gov/DNR or on the Michigan DNR hunting and fishing app.