FRANKLINVILLE, N.Y. — It's a day that many Western New Yorkers have been waiting all winter for 'catch-and-take' trout season kicks off Saturday. 2 On Your Side tagged along as Ischua Creek in Cattaraugus County was stocked this week.
"We are stocking rainbows and brown trout," said Jonathan Draves a fish culturist at the Randolph Fish Hatchery.
While spring weather has been playing hide and seek, it has not slowed down New York's hardworking fish hatcheries. They put months of work into getting our many creeks, streams, rivers, and lakes ready for anglers.
"In the fall we begin with our fall egg take so we take somewhere between 4 and 5 million eggs of three different species and once we get the eggs we hatch those and then in a year and a half they become the fish that we're stocking today," Draves said.
Every spring, the team at the Chautauqua County hatchery transport and stock well over 100,000 trout in Western New York waterways. However, they raise millions for distribution across the state. Ischua Creek gets about 7,500.
"The spring yearling rainbows are about 9 inches and the 2-year-old browns are 12 to 15 inches," said Draves.
Stocking starts with a little road trip. The fish travel in special tanks on the back of a truck, which Draves said, jokingly, might as well be ice cream trucks for anglers.
"We have a lot of people who follow the trucks around. They're all looking forward to the fish being put out," he said.
Sometimes a net and bucket are needed to reach more remote creeks and streams but the majority of transportees become flying fish. Sliding down a pipe that attaches to the side of each tank, and into the water below bridges along the creek.
While 'catch-and-release' is permitted year-round according to the New York Department of Environmental Conservation, Saturday is the traditional first day of the season because as Draves explained: "It is the beginning of creeling where you can keep some of the fish."
As anglers know there are size limits set by the state DEC but regardless of experience, Draves suggested using the state's new interactive online map called the 'DECinfo Locator.'
"You can go to each of the streams it actually pops up where all the public fishing access sites are as well as the fish we're stocking in those sections of stream," Draves said.
The map is relatively new and does have a lot of other useful outdoor information for hiking and camping around New York, although fishing will be the focus this weekend.
Draves called it the: "Official kickoff of spring and fishing season in New York."