mille lacs tagged walleye results

I was lucky enough to enjoy a few hours of fishing last Saturday with my dad on the big pond after not fishing together for about 3 years, it was crazy to see how little boat traffic was on the lake. We caught a bunch of eyes out on the flats pulling spinners with crawlers, I was fortunate enough to catch one that had been tagged and received my certificate from the dnr in the mail, it is pretty interesting to find out the info.

The growth rate of the fish seems odd to me. Keep in mind this is a Male aswell
Date tagged was 4/29/2008 it measured 16.9″ tagged over in the garrison reef area
first recapture 6/2/2012 mesures 17″ caught south of garrison in the Sha-Bosh-Kung area, this length is what has me puzzled, in 4yrs it grew a 1/10″ of an inch??? granted angler error can play a factor!!
my recapture 7/9/2016 measures 20.5″ caught out on Schultz’s flat

My guess this fish was born in 2005 give or take a year, So from the time it was tagged to when I caught it 8 years later it has grown less than 4 inches?? This just seems crazy, granted being a male but I certainly would have thought a fish that age would be closer to 22-26inches?
None the less it is still pretty cool to find information out about the fish and their migration throughout a lake. I have a number of certifates from northerns that I had caught when I was a young kid up there fishing in the harbor, always fun to see their migration as well.
On a side note all the fish we caught were fat and healthy, I had a 25″ that was all of 7lbs, just a tank. Biggest fish for the weekend was by my B.I.L his went 27 and a pig.

How did you get your tag reported? I caught one this summer, too, but I tried 4 times to report it online with errors on the site every time.

I did it online aswell. Your measurement needs to be in 1/10’s, I was having errors too.

Justin, Very interesting report. Most are great successful walleye catches (which I enjoy) but yours is quite curious! Yes, almost unbelievable the almost stunted growth rate? I truly wonder about that? I will admit (confess) I am a “citizen advisor” participating with the DNR committee and all of the reports, studies and speculations…this revelation if in fact accurate is either an anomaly or an eye opener on the Mille Lacs recruitment. As you question, I and many others wonder about your evidence as concluded by the DNR’s tagging study. This raises even more question on the DNR data?
Anyway, thanks for the “enlightenment” !

Very interesting. Thanks for sharing. Curious if that was a fluke or is common?

I just received one back in the mail as well. Tagged in 14, was 19.4″ fish now was 22.5″ and a female..
I have never had one work typing it in online. I just always call it into the Aitkin DNR office.
Wallster ><((((>

So as a human male after we reach sexual maturity we dont grow much taller in our life time . When I was 15 years old I was probably only 71 inches tall, at age 58 I am only 73 inches tall. Why would a fish be expected to grow longer after it matures?

Male fish reach sexual maturity and grow very slowly. Almost every walleye over 21 inches or pike over 25 inches, muskies in the mid 30 is a female. You can google it and many studies show this data give or take a couple inches for different habitat.

Mwal

cheers wrote:

So as a human male after we reach sexual maturity we dont grow much taller in our life time . When I was 15 years old I was probably only 71 inches tall, at age 58 I am only 73 inches tall. Why would a fish be expected to grow longer after it matures?

Interesting to compare humans to fish so I asked these guys. Their consensus was that you might be correct regarding males. They were at a loss when asked why if female walleyes become “sexually mature” at age 3-4 years (maybe 17-20″s) and keep growing up to 30″+

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cheers wrote:

So as a human male after we reach sexual maturity we dont grow much taller in our life time . When I was 15 years old I was probably only 71 inches tall, at age 58 I am only 73 inches tall. Why would a fish be expected to grow longer after it matures?

Growth in humans and fish is totally different. Humans display “determinant growth” meaning they reach a size (height) and quit growing; where fish have “indeterminant growth” meaning they will/can grow longer throughout their life.

Further, mwal hit the nail on the head. Male fish generally hit a size and then grow very slowly after that. The growth of the tagged male walleye in question is probably very typical for the body of water it came from. Nothing mysterious.

ClearCreek