Stocking Beaver Lake with Walleye, 2011

Stocking Beaver Lake with Fish, 2011

Smallmouth Bass 75 Smallmouth Bass (7” to 10”) were placed into the lake on 25 Oct 2011

The Smallmouth bass is generally brown (seldom yellow) with red eyes, and dark brown vertical bands, rather than a horizontal band along the side. There are 13–15 soft rays in the dorsal fin. The upper jaw of Smallmouth bass extends to the middle of the eye.

Males are generally smaller than females. The males tend to range around two pounds while females can range from three to six pounds. Their average sizes can differ, depending on where they are found; those found in American waters tend to be larger due to the longer summers, which allow them to eat and grow for a longer period of time.

Their habitat plays a significant role in their color, weight, and shape. River water smallmouth that live among dark water tend to be rather torpedo shaped and very dark brown in order to be more efficient for feeding. Lakeside Smallmouth bass however, that live for example in sandy areas, tend to be a light yellow brown to adapt to the environment in a defensive state and are more oval shaped. Smallmouth bass have trouble competing with an established Largemouth bass populations, so for Beaver Lake the NE Game & Parks biologists have recommended we stock the largest fish we can get. Walleye 4,500 Walleye mostly 4” to 5” with some as large as 8” on 1 Nov 2011

Walleye (Sander vitreus, formerly Stizostedion vitreum): The Walleye is a freshwater fish native to most of Canada and to the northern United States. The walleye is sometimes also called the yellow walleye to distinguish it from the Blue Walleye, which became an extinct subspecies formerly found in the southern Great Lakes.

In some parts of its range, the walleye is known as the colored pike, yellow pike or pickerel (esp. in English- speaking Canada), Genetically, walleyes show a fair amount of variation across watersheds. In general, fish within a watershed are quite similar and are genetically distinct from those of nearby watersheds. The species has been artificially propagated for over a century and has been planted on top of existing populations or introduced into waters naturally devoid of the species, sometimes reducing the overall genetic distinctiveness of populations. Wiper Stocking 881 Wipers (281 were 5”to 7” & 600 were 3” to 4”) 20 Sep & early Oct 2011

This man-made mutant is the wiper, a fish that doesn't exist in nature but is now created in the fish hatcheries of many states. Wipers may be the toughest freshwater fish you'll ever battle, and they offer you some unique fly-fishing opportunities. Best of all, wipers can be caught on a fly just about any time the water is not frozen, if you know where to look for them. Wipers spend much of the year in open water feeding on abundant Gizzard Shad. Since they are a hybrid, they do not reproduce which means their numbers won’t get out of control.

Wipers are also known as hybrid striped bass, white rock bass (which is what the International Game Fish Association calls them) and Palmetto bass (the common name in South Carolina, where they were first produced). They exhibit what biologists call hybrid vigor – enhanced characteristics of one or both parent species. That means they possess many of the traits that make their paternal parent, white bass, a favorite of Midwest anglers; they school, they hit baits with great gusto, and they fight hard for their size. From the maternal side, striped bass, they get size and power. Catfish Stocking 3,000 Channel Catfish (3” to 6”) on 17 Sep 2011

Most catfish are bottom feeders. In general, they are negatively buoyant, which means that they will usually sink rather than float due to a reduced gas bladder and a heavy, bony head. Catfish have a variety of body shapes, though most have a cylindrical body with a flattened belly to allow for benthic (bottom) feeding.

Nebraska designated the channel catfish as the official state fish in 1997. The most numerous catfish species in North America, the channel catfish (Ictalurus punctatus) can grow to 50 pounds or more (the world record was a channel catfish caught in South Carolina weighing 58 pounds). The average size is between 2 and 4 pounds. Channel catfish can be found in rivers, reservoirs, natural lakes, and ponds throughout the United States. Omnivores with a very keen sense of smell and taste, a channel catfish actually has taste buds distributed over the entire surface of its body, especially concentrated on the 4 pairs of barbels (whiskers) surrounding the mouth. These sharp senses allow the channel catfish to find food in dark or muddy water.