Walleye and sauger

What are the differences in spawning habits between walleye and sauger?

Rigger

Sauger (From Kentucky State U.)

Sauger spawn in the spring when water temperatures are between 39 to 43 degrees F. Spawning occurs at night on gravel shoals. Often, sauger spawn immediately after the walleye and in the same locations. In some instances, walleye and sauger hybridize. Sauger eggs are semi-buoyant and fall into substrate crevices following spawning. A female will lay 15,000 to 40,000 eggs for each pound of her body weight. The eggs will hatch in 25 to 29 days when water temperatures range between 40 and 55 degrees F. Fry feed on zooplankton and aquatic insect larvae. Sauger fry will begin consuming other fish when they reach 0.5 inches long. Juvenile sauger may reach 3 to 6 inches long after the first growing season. Female sauger may reach 19 inches long and weigh 3 lbs. Male fish mature at 2 to 3 years, while females mature at 4 to 6 years of age.

Walleye (from U. of MN)

Walleye spawn in April and early-May soon after ice-out and water temperatures in the shallows reach 4-7° C (40-45° F). Walleye migrate from large lakes and rivers into small streams where they look for shallow gravel beds or areas of flooded vegetation. In lakes without good inlet streams, they move into shallow, rocky areas near shore. Walleye normally spawn during the night hours in about 0.3-1.5 m (1-5 ft) of water. Walleye are broadcast spawners, which means they swim above the spawning substrate (bottom material) and release their eggs and sperm into the water. Females release 200-300 eggs at a time, while one or more males fertilize them. This spawning act is repeated at roughly 5-minute intervals. A female may release all her eggs in a single night or may spawn over a period of several nights. Most males spawn for several nights. The fertilized eggs fall to the bottom, where they stick to the gravel or other bottom material. The parents give no care to the developing eggs (embryos actually) or the larvae that hatch from them. The embryos hatch in about 1-3 weeks, depending on the water temperature. In lakes, the larval walleye soon move into the deep, open water, where they develop into juveniles at about 25-30 mm. At this size they often return to the near shore areas of the lake, a movement pattern similar to the yellow perch.

“Cool Fact”: A female walleye produces anywhere from 40,000-250,000 eggs a season, depending on her size and condition.

Or the short answer would be…. not much!

Great reply James!!!!

Len

Damn! and I thought you were just a model for the superdoo,s
package thanks for the info james

James
Thanks for the info. Now we all know you have a Doctorate in Walleye. Need to open up a school call it Walleye U. You would be Professor James. Great Reply.

Thanks

Rigger

boy… thats kind of weird about the kentucky saugers…. they often spawn AFTER the walleyes?… Im pretty sure that HERE where walleye are walleye, and saugers are saugers its the sauger that are up to bat first… seems like their spawning range temps are the lowest so they trigger first…… maybe its the Kentucky DNR thats confused instead of their saugers?

I was thinking the same thing Rivereyes. Anyone else have any opinions on which spawn first? I feel walleyes are a little more versatile in their choice of spawning grounds. In high water years they can use flooded territory to spawn like marsh grass, bullrushes, flooded timber, cobblestone, etc. In other year water may not be high enough to spawn where they did the previous year. Saugers on the other hand favor deeper water and their spawning grounds will be nearer the channel edges and deep water.

Here is another read I just found

Sauger Stizostedion canadense

Sauger is a smaller relative of walleye. These species are very similar and most anglers are unaware of any differences; both being considered ‘~pickerel~’. Two easily observed features can help to distinguish them – sauger, unlike walleye, has distinct rows of spots on its spiny dorsal fin and its tail fin does not exhibit a white lower lobe. Sauger also have three or four dark brown markings across their back, but these are not always apparent. Their average weight is just over 1/2 kg (1 lb), with few fish exceeding 1 kg (2 lb).

The spawning of sauger takes place in early May, often immediately after walleye have spawned. Both of these species may utilize the same gravel shoals in lakes and rivers, and some interbreeding can occur. Interbreeding may account for the large sauger, up to 2.7 kg (6 lb), which have been taken from Tobin Lake.

After the adults spawn, young sauger hatch in about three weeks. Their growth is rapid within the first year, but usually slower than that of walleye. Sauger in Tobin Lake reach their average weight in four or five years.

In Saskatchewan, sauger are only found in the Saskatchewan and Churchill River systems, and in Cumberland Lake. This species prefers large shallow lakes and slow-flowing rivers which are turbid or cloudy. Sauger usually succeed over walleye in very turbid waters, but their north-ward range is restricted by cold water temperatures. Consequently, sauger are less adaptable to different habitats than walleye.

Sauger prey on small fish and other aquatic animals such as crayfish and insects, often gathering on the same feeding grounds as do walleye. Both sauger and walleye are sight feeders; they are adapted to feed in their turbid habitat by their special light-gathering eyes.

Like walleye, sauger are angled by still fishing with preserved minnows, or by casting or trolling with brightly coloured lures. Their flesh, which most people cannot differentiate from that of walleye, is firm, white and of good flavour.

Rigger

Actually, I’m confused too. The temps listed between the comparison paragraphs show the saugers starting their spawn at a temp range starting at 39′ and the walleyes a little higher but the kentucky guys seem to think their fish behave differently. Maybe they do. That’s not the way it usually happens here. Saugers spawn slightly earlier than the walleyes.

In my opinion, the temps and ranges given are just a big generalization. Some fish spawn MUCH earlier than others. We were catching PRE-spawn females in late May last year. So the generalization is “saugers go just a little earlier than walleyes.” No “set in stone” trigger temp. for either species and we know by the presence of saugeye that there is considerable over-lap.

that sounds exactly right to me James…. years of being out there pulling in the fish have shown me the saugs to start first and finish first… but as you can see the temp ranges for spawning overlap… and Im sure the spawing territories do as well… thus we have saugeyes……

Great discussion H2O and Rivereyes.. Remember let’s put the big females back in the water.

There may be some slight differences between sauger and walleye spawning in different systems. In a study on the Missouri River, sauger spawned shortley after walleye. In our studies on the Mississippi River, the only time we were able to catch just hatched sauger fry (4.8 to 5.8 mm in length) was early in the spawning period compared to walleye. For reference, just hatched walleye fry are 5.8-8.7 mm long). After larval fish are over 8-9 mm long, it is nearly impossible to determine if they are walleye or sauger without chemical anylysis. Thus on the UMR, sauger spawn slightly earlier or before walleye. There are also some subltle differences in spawning aggregations. In our part of the river (Pools 9-16), all the walleye spawn in 2 or 3 well defined areas in a pool, generally main channel border areas (gravel, rock rubble, hard-packed clay, or musseld bed). Sauger on the other hand, appear to spawn in more scattered and smaller aggregations, in somewhat deeper water, over smaller patches of gravel, rock, mussel beds, etc. Sauger have never been documented to spawn over flooded terrestrial vegetation like walleye. Walleye in the upper pools of the UMR regularly spawn over flooded reed canary grass as pointed out by an earlier poster. We have never document that type of walleye spawning in the Pool 9-16 area. Also – because some times walleye spawn over flooded vegetation, the hatch of eggs can be highly affected by declines in river stages which gnerally do not affect sauger spawn because of the deeper water spawning areas. Both walleye and sauger eggs are very adhesive when first deposited, but once they water harden (about 2-5 minutes) they lose the adhesive nature and settle into cracks or crevices in the substrate or simply drift along the bottom. We have collected thousands of walleye/sauger eggs with small nets set on the bottom of the river below suspected or know walleye/sauger spawning areas. We have even collected eggs that are in an “eyed-out” stage, which simply means the eyeballs of the larval fish are visible in the egg. This indicates to us that either the eggs can incubate while drifting or the egg was recently washed out of a protective crack or crevice in the substrate. At any rate – I do not believe drifting eggs is a good thing due to ongoing barge traffic at the same time that eggs are drifting in the main channel/main channel border. I believe there is substantial mortality on these eggs during the drift stage. Brian Brecka, WI DNR, has a good article on the early life history of walleye in the Article Section of this site.

fishsgzr—–Great Post!!!—-Thanks!—-V

yeah John great post!… I was hoping you would jump in here!
thanks……

Very nformative thread here guys. Helped me answer some of the questions I had when first running across this post.

Thanks for your imput fishsqzr!

Great post John!

This is a little off topic but I was wondering if you had even so much as a rumors worth of spawning knowledge of the mysterious Paddlefish. It’s being talked about on another thread………..kinda………and I was wondering if you had any knowledge that would lend toward explaining why the sightings of these rare creatures become more common at this time of year?

Here are a couple of links which give information on this fish:

http://www.umesc.usgs.gov/aquatic/fish/paddlefish/main.html

http://ifw2irm2.irm1.r2.fws.gov/fishery/species/paddlefish.htm

It appears that there is a spring spawning migration.

This is a “funny you should ask” response since I was thinking of posting something along that line. WE have been tagging paddlefish at Bellevue and Clinton for about 6 years under a joint project with 28 other states in the Mississippi River drainage. Our quota is 300 wild paddlefish a year (we are up to 250 so far this year). Fish are captured by snagging. Paddlefish make predictble movements into the tailwaters below locks an dams in December and generally stay until either the gates go out and they move upstream or the water temperature reaches the middle 50’s and then disperse to spawning areas. Right now there are lots of paddlefish below the locks and dams – we can snag and work up over 50 in a day pretty easily. They are easy to find with good electronics and we don’t even begin snagging unitl we find them. That is probably why walleye and sauger anglers occassionaly hook one now and then. In Lake of the Ozarks, paddlefish make 50+ mile runs of the Osage River to spawn over flooded gravel bars – but these fish do not make the run until the river is at high-water stage and over 50 degress F. Although we have radio tagged paddlefish for several years in Pool 13, we have never collected a paddlefish egg. We have some good ideas where they spawn – over gravel, cobble, or hard clay substrate or mussel bed – we have tracked females to these areas. Eggs are about the size of #6 shot and black and are very adhesive. In fact – on those gravel bars on the Osage River, when the river dropped very rapidly – paddlefish eggs that were attached to gravel on these bars were exposed to the air and it was impossible to remove the egg from the gravel without destoying the egg. We have collected just hatched paddlefish (1 day old – they do not have the paddle then yet – they look very much like a young sturgeon)in Pool 13 during the tailend of larval drift studies were were doing for walleye/sauger. They also readily move through the dam when the gates open up during spring floods. We have also sampled gravid females and males in the Cedar River (a tributary of the Iowa River which is a tributary of the Miss. River) – 100+ miles inland from the Miss. River. Several of these fish were radio tagged and were followed back to the Miss. River. Paddlefish can be really long distance movers, with some fish tagged in the lower Miss. River being recaptured in the Missour River in South Dakota.
Spawning occurs at 55-60 degrees F, and eggs hatch in about 9 days at 57 degrees. Iowa does not allow commercial fishing for paddlefish, but there is a sport fishing season from Jan 1- April 15 and restricted to 500 yds below locks and dams with 2 fish/day as the limit. Its interesting to note that paddlefish are plankton feeders – that is – they swim with their mouth open – straining the water column to remove plankton. If you ever catch one – take a look at the back side of the gill arches – you will note there are long gill rackers – this is where the plankton is collected. Hard to believe that with only eating plankton -they can easily get to 100+ lbs – but then think about whales – they feed in the same way. Enough of my rambling.

Thanks rmartin!

Fishsqzr, thanks for sharing what you know! That was a fun read! Over 100lbs! Wow! The word “spooled” comes to mind! Thanks again!

Ken

fishsqzr, you could ramble all day and I would read every word of it!

Thanks for that excellent info.

Jon J.