Recent harvest trends (decade or so) – very low quota recommendation
Statistical catch at age model – 21,000 – 40,000lbs
Surplus production model – didn’t work
Habitat Model (MEI) – 68,000 – 76,000lbs (top of my head)
Grubson, There are 8 tribes that are signatories of the 1837 treaty. The Mille Lacs Band has the largest quota. Which specific tribe I work for is for me to know.
CaptainMusky, yeah our nets are designed to catch 16 – 19″ walleye. They do get some perch but not many. I don’t know of any Band members that own a smaller net designed to catch perch. I have some, but I’d have to double check our netting regulations.
From 48 hours before we open netting to 24 hours after I spend every possible minute at the landings. Often all night, I have 6 staff and 7 game wardens that help monitor our tribes harvest. I meet the boats at the dock, help unload the bins, pick the nets, sometimes I go right out in the boat to monitor.
Last year I checked in 4 perch. 4.
Our tribe simply dosnt harvest many perch. So when I see tribal totals from the other bands and landings totaling 1-2000 pounds, yeah it makes total sense.
I was down there 2 weeks ago. A band member wanted to teach himself how to set a net under the ice. He caught zero perch. Zero.
Another one of the reasons we arnt super worried about anglers going over their 36,500 pound quota.
4 fish, probably not. I could see 3 with a loose slot.
Figure out how to get rid of zebra mussels and spiny water flea, rework that biomass back into plankton -> forage -> then fish biomass, hell, then we’ll talk about a 6 fish limit.
At one point during the walleye population dip zebra mussel biomass out weighed all fish in the whole lake. I’ve never seen anything like it. I came from AK we don’t have invasives up there. Not like that anyways, it’s alarming.
I’m pretty sure we can differentiate between harvest and natural mortality.
I’m not sure to be honest.
If our total mortality is over 50% we would reduce our exploration rate to bring it down.
I suppose we could try to reduce perch predation by removing more walleye. In 2018 the walleye population was large, but the fish were skinny there weren’t a lot of perch around and the ones that were there probably got eaten by starving walleye.
In the case of skinny walleye I think it would be good to harvest more walleye, but that’s a little risky too. You have to be confident in your walleye population estimate, and in 2018 they wernt. It was too recent from the 2012-2014 walleye pop decline.
I was barely around in 2022 but I believe the 73,000 pounds is based on a habitat model. It takes lake physical characteristics, size, depth, etc, incorporates temperature and nutrient (productivity) metrics, then other fish biomass estimates.
I’m no modeler, it gave two estimates 73,000 was the higher. This model isn’t perfect as it dosnt adjust year to year, only trends. Some years taking 73,000 pounds would be over harvest. This year it’s probably ok.
The normal catch at age population model suggested 21,000-40,000 pounds. That model was not adopted because we can’t test it with perch mark recapture.
Other analysis havnt been necessary until now. It takes time and often outside modeling help. We prioritize. Now we hope to have a more accurate perch quota recommendation by July
Mille Lacs will never go to the statewide regulation, none of the large lakes are. See Vermillion, Red, LOTW, Leech, Lake Superior, etc. they all have special regulations to account for the fishing pressure. Mille Lacs gets pounded.
The regs were tight af for years but if you really look, they are trending looser. The state botched last summer, none of us were happy with that, but it was adjusted and was two walleye, (tiny slot limit), 20 perch, all winter. The lake still looks healthy so Walleye will likely get looser for this summmer.
Oh and as far as managing on a 2-3 year cycle I’ve changed my mind. This lake is so dynamic I prefer to adjust quotas annually. Can you imagine trying to set netting quotas 2 years ago for what we’ve seen in 2024? Not possible.
We can calculate natural perch mortality. It’s one of the goals of the new perch committee. We have a biologist that is confident he can age perch otoliths and the mathematician that will take the age class data over the last 10 years and do the analysis. After that it becomes a simple formula
Natural mortality + fishing mortality = total mortality. If it’s 40% or even a little higher we are probably fine, if it’s 50% or higher we’ve got a problem.
Tribal harvests are reported to the DNR within 24 hours (often less) they are the most timely reported harvest totals in all of fisheries.
We make them publicly available out of good faith, We are not bound by public notification requirements.
Trust me, the state was NOT trying to reduce the limit sooner. They wanted to keep it at 20 through the ice season.
Keep the positive ice fishing energy level high.
But it became apparent the bite wasn’t slowing down, a reg change was necessary. If the ice woulda stayed good I wouldn’t have been surprised if anglers hit 73,000 pounds before the tribal harvests even started.
Good to hear about the forage. I mean they must be hungry for some reason. I’ve only worked at Mille Lacs for three years. It’s a dynamic lake, tough to figure out. All fisheries aspects of 2024 have been surprising.
Crazy El Niño year
Huge tulibee year class
Huge perch year class
Huge walleye year class
Hottest perch bite in over a decade
What’s next…..
By June 1st, even with the bag limit reduction I believe we will be over the 73,000 mark.
We don’t factor in previous quota underages. It dosn’t really work that way because so many fish die of natural mortality each year.
But this and a few other things have been taken into consideration, its why we are not closing perch angling despite being significantly over the angling quota, and remember it’s not closed, angling harvest will slow considerably, but will continue. Especially if the perch bite is still going opening weekend.
The 5 fish bag limit is not forever, just the remainder of this fishing year. I think the states fishing year resets Dec. 1.
Oh and I’ve got all the previous year info somewhere. I’ll post a graph asap.
Last year harvest was probably very low. Which I think is part of the reason the bite has gone crazy this year. Last year probably would have been a mediocore bite, thousands of pounds of perch would have been harvested. Instead they remained in the lake spawned and over ate their food source. Now this year we have a super bite. This does not necessarily mean there are a million billion perch (though it may). Hungry fish populations are prone to over exploitation.
I’m actually putting together the tribal harvest totals for the last decade now. It’s not much usually between 1000-2000 pounds.
Where the concern lies this year is:
These perch are large and therefore more likely to become bycatch during our walleye harvests.
If the population density is high also higher perch catches.
Low perch forage = more foraging activity, more movement again, higher perch catches.
I expect the tribal harvest will be more than 2,000 pounds this year. What it will be I have no idea.
I chair the perch assessment committee. We are partnering with a mathematician professor from Canada who is also tasked with assessing Lake Eries perch population. Hopefully we can come up with a reasonably accurate perch population estimate. Perch are notoriously difficult to estimate.
One of the reasons perch populations crashed in Lake Michigan. Retrospective analysis using upgraded methods show that population was being over exploited for years.
Mille lacs is looking good, best assessments in 11 years. Hoping to keep it that way.
ok I’ll hit you with some facts on the situation.
From the late 90’s to 2022 the perch quota was 270,000lbs. The perch went through a pretty serious population decline around 2014. Harvest was minimal. The 270,000lb quota no longer represented the population nor the harvest realities.
In 2022 a group of biologists from multiple agencies got together and attempted to get a better population estimate and new quota. This isn’t easy for Perch. They tried 4 different methods and presented them to the full Mille Lacs Fisheries committee. Of the 4 a 73,000 pound quota split 50/50 was the largest, the least conservative method. It is believed, generally speaking harvests above 70,000 pounds are not sustainable.
This year ice fishing pressure was high, and the perch bite was bananas. Probably a healthy perch population, and a forage shortage. Which is a little confusing since there appears to be plenty of walleye forage?
As of feb. 23rd anglers had harvested an estimated 43,000 pounds. There that was 14 days ago and the tournament harvests are not included in that. It is possible that angler harvest is pushing up against 60,000 pounds. Well over the states quota. The tribes have indicated that despite the 73,000 pound agreement being breached, there is room for flexibility. Catch and release only seemed unnecessary, but a management action is warranted. Hence the bag limit reduction.
Last spring the lake hatched a huge walleye year class. This is at least partially because there was a bumper crop of perch hatched as well. It is possible that the healthy adult perch spawning population drove that perch year class. We want to make sure there is ample spawning stock to spawn again this spring.
A new perch committee has been formed to rerun 5 different population estimation methods and reassess the 73,000 pound quota.
I know a lot of anglers do not agree with this action but, this winter was amazing fishing, the lake was busy, resorts were full. The lake provided an ice fishing season to be grateful for.
<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Michael Best wrote:</div>
Last year there were roughly 10,000 deer harvested during muzzleloader.
It’s looking like we will surpass last years umbers with the remaining seasons that are left.Just looking at the harvest data today. MN is currently at 154,000 obviously with seasons still ongoing.
So despite all this “DNR mismanagement” and DNR/insurance company secret collusion to eliminate deer from all of Minnesota, we are now at a harvest rate that is greater than or very close to equal to the harvest rates in 10 of the last 12 years.
The only harvest that is significantly greater in that time period was in 2017 with 167,000 deer harvested.
Yes, there will ALWAYS be areas that for some reason have below-average numbers. But to me, as a state-wide number, I would say this looks to be an pretty average deer season as far as harvest numbers.
Just a quick correction: If we are referencing the same comparable statistic from the harvest report, there were 197,000 deer harvested in 2017.
I hunt up in the 130 zones north of Duluth. We had a pretty good season, most folks are pretty pleased with what we saw this year. The deer were really moving on opening morning. If you batch the four 130 zones together buck harvest should be ~10% up from last year.
It’s been pretty damn cold this week, but we have essentially no snow pack. Another mild to avg. winter and the trend back towards 2017 numbers should continue.
I’m also very involved in moose population monitoring and I’m very curious to see how those big critters will respond to these winters and wildlife interspecies dynamics.
Oh I’m sure they don’t ignore it. I think they raise premiums accordingly. Which is much easier and more effective than influencing deer hunting regulations.
It’s not impossible, politicians are a sneaky bunch. But coming from someone that helps set deer hunting regulations I have never run into it.
License sales are up? I hadn’t heard that, that really is great news. License sales have been on a multi-decade nationwide decline. Even a small increase is reason to celebrate.
Hunter success is looking like it’ll be decent this year as well. Still a little lower than I’d like to see up north, but significant improvement over the last two years.
To the post above this. I’m fairly certain the insurance company story is a myth. While I’m not top brass, I work in natural resource management, pretty much at every agency under the sun by now. I’ve never once ran into insurance company lobbyists. I have run into farmer lobbyists, legislators or groups supporting farmers that push to keep deer populations low.
I asked an insurance executive once, his response was “since deer are managed at the state level we’d have to employ a lobbyist in damn near every state, that’s ridiculously expensive. Instead we just raise premiums a little bit in regions with high vehicle strike incidence rates.” This makes more sense to me.
That reminds me, I’ve got a deer to register and a road kill head to turn in for CWD testing 
I hunt 130/132, our camp is pretty happy with what we’ve seen so far. We hunt a highly pressured piece of county tax forfeit land. Last two years were tough, but this year we’ve got 2 bucks and ran into a guy just out for a walk with a nice 8-point down. Helped him drag it out, unusually heavy animal Three bucks out of ~1-2 sq. miles is good for the Brimson area.
Hugo’s Bar has weighed in a good number of bucks for the 2024 Big Buck contest. It’s a slow trend back, but overall we’re happy hunters!
Well I said I was a meat hunter, but if the first deer that walks out is a nice buck I’ll take it. Two for my family this morning, after two tough years we are calling that a huge win.
I registered mine at Hugos Bar and there was more nice bucks registered for the big buck contest than I’d expected.
A lot of people out, heard some shooting and a lot more positive energy coming out of 130 and 132 this morning.
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I’m looking forward to this weekend, seems to be a few more deer up north than last year, and they have been on the move this week. I live in 132, work in 199/181 and hunt mostly in 182 for the bonus tags. I’m a meat hunter through and through. Moved to a new spot, seeing plenty of sign, feeling motivated!
Yeah, the bite was hot AF this spring. Thanks for the info.
I’m curious, can anyone confirm harvesting a slot fish during Oct? I know the bite has been pretty tough. I’m looking for a rough count to compare to creel results.
Anyone got water temps from this afternoon/evening. (saturday 9/21) I was out Tuesday and Wednesday night and had 68 – 72 degrees still. Hoping for a cool down!
How’s harvest opener going? Launches busy? Bite going ok?
Now that people are cleaning fish are we indeed seeing juvenile tulibee in the stomachs? Juvenile perch? Got any stomach contents pics?
Anyone that’s been fishing the lake for a awhile, are the fish looking healthier than last year? How about compared to 2018 (I think that was the year they got razerback skinny) Any other note worthy observations?
Lots of questions I guess.
[Can you explain why in 2022 the state quota was set to its lowest number in 5 years even though the biomass at the time was its second highest recorded since 2014?
Bad negotiations?]
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The reduced quota in 2022 was due to a very low juvenile index. A measure of year class strength for the last 4 years. I think 2019 and 2020 were very low juvenile survival years I don’t remember. 2021 and 2022 are looking pretty good though. 2023 was a bust, I’ll bet damn near ZERO juvenile walleye survived in 2023. I’m optimistic about 2024, I guess we will see soon.
In my opinion there were probably some negotiation issues in 2022 at a level higher than mine. Cause 135,000 pound quota is pretty damn low, and the state angling regulations were ridiculous. The state only harvest 15,000 pounds in 2022.
I’m hoping so hard that the biomass model comes back higher than 1,219,000 this year. Even just a little bit would be so nice for everyone.
I’ll give it a try, I’m not a modeler, but I think the main difference was the model did not differentiate between sexes. I’m not sure why that wouldn’t have been included, but sometimes a model wont work when you add too many variable. Perhaps sex had to be removed.
Anyways that was part of what lead to the population decline, amongst a million other things. Males were being over targeted. Back then we were all about protecting the large female spawners. Turns out it’s more complex than that. Tribal catch is ~80% male by design, but when angler regs were designed to protect the large females, targeted smaller males were hit double. The sex ratio became skewed, before the population declined. This could have been picked up with a split-sex model.
That was during the 24% exploitation rate era, 24% is a fine exploitation rate if a walleye factory is firing on all cylinders, but one thing goes wrong and that becomes a high exploitation rate quickly.
The other invasive that has a profound impact is spiny water flea. Not only do Spiny water flea eat other zoo plankton, but also are not suitable food for forage fish. They get stuck in shiners gullet and they die. I did hear that Tulibee can digest spiny water flea, perhaps if ML is cooking up a Tulibee year class right now Spiny water flea densities would decline?
Last impactful thing I’ve heard of and someone here can probably confirm. During the 70’s and 80’s many cabin and resorts had failing septic systems, and probably pumped grey water right into the lake. These sources of nitrogen fertilized the historically clear and less productive lake. This in turn led to increased productivity lower in the food web that ultimately led to a shitload of food for walleye of all years classes. The clean water act cleaned this up, the lake became less productive, and now despite having miles and miles of premium spawning habitat there isn’t enough food for all these fish. The juveniles regularly starve over winter.
Oh and now the water gets to a million degrees in the summer and frys the juveniles brains. I heard there has been some adult Tulibee die off this past week. Looking forward to cooler weather.
It’s all an estimate from the DNR creel survey.
Creel surveys are inherently inaccurate.
I’d prefer a creel survey for the avg joe.
Then have mandatory catch reporting from the guides and launches. Assuming the catch reporting would be 100% accurate it would help make up for the inaccuracies of the creel survey.
But for now this is what we’ve got to go on.
The penalty gets taken out of the following year’s quota if I remember correctly. So say you go over by 10,000 pounds, that amount is dedcucted from the future quota amount the following season.
Maybe Ripjiggen or BigWerm can confirm this but I seem to remember it occuring at least once, maybe twice, when Mark Dayton was the governor.
Correct, and some would say the state anglers are still paying the penance on that to the tribe.
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The state has gone over the quota 9 times. See the graph I’ve attached. Though there used to be a “conservation cap” system that allowed last min negotiations to allow for continued catch and release fishing, often the state would pay it back the following year. Something like that anyways, the overages were before my time.
I’ve also attached a spreadsheet I use when I have data questions from the past 10 years. I don’t really worry about what happened before 2014. 2014 is when the current population model was developed, and I consider the period before that the pre-invasive species era.
There is not currently a conservation cap system or an overage policy in place. After the last time, 2019, the policy agreement was dissolved. The tribes are not currently interested in an overage policy agreement.
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I think a three year plan would be wonderful.
It wouldn’t be a set quota, but rather a formula based on the Spawning Stock Biomass. If the SSB increases the exploitation rate increases, if the SSB decreases the exploitation rate decreases.
For example if the SSB is 1,219,000 lbs, the exploitation rate is 12.9% (the actual 2024 numbers), quota = 157,500 lbs. If the SSB increases to 1,300,000 then 13.5% exploitation rate, quota = 175,500 lbs.
There would be a stop gate installed in the formula, “if the SSB drops below 1,000,000 lbs, exploitation rate may not be more than 10%”
Keep the numbers in the formula for three years, then adjust if needed.
This is mostly off the top of my head, but this is what I’d like to see.
Now good luck getting it adopted into policy…
Sometimes I wish I was emperor of Natural Resources.
oh yeah, now I see what you did. It’s correct, my bad.
This year I at least understand what happened.
last year (62,000/100,000) wasnt so bad either
2022 (15,000/80,300) that’s unbelievably flawed reg setting.
The tribes have a vested interest in this being done right. We get a lot more harassment and blame when state regs get more strict than necessary.
And dude, your reported numbers wern’t just columns flipped around. At least I don’t think so. You were about 22,000 pounds off in 2023.
and yeah I’m a stickler for numbers. Fisheries management is almost all numbers. I barely even touch a fish anymore. Emails, budgets, and spreadsheets.
Good to hear you can confirm the cisco hatch. Fingers crossed they survive the winter. I’m also optimistic for the 2024 walleye year class.
Not all of the biologists share that optimism, we’ll see I guess.
