Lake Springfield’s catfish continue to attract anglers, aided by the fact there are three species – channel catfish, flathead catfish, and blue catfish – doing quite well in a body of water that sits just a few miles south of the state capitol.
It’s been a gradual evolution for the 3,800-acre “bass lake.”
Still a bass lake, Lake Springfield in Sangamon County, Ill., shows catfish ‘evolution’ Read More »
We’ve been scooped by Illinois DNR’s new version of the Illinois Digest of Hunting and Trapping Regulations, which doesn’t bother me all that much, given that DNR’s top source for news is, well, DNR.
Like every other hunter in the state, I spend hours flipping through pages of the Digest – or clicking through pages of the Digest, as is more common in the world we now live in. Even simple things in the Digest entertain me, such as the section that shares definitions of common terms.
Illinois’ first cast at a virtual fishing tournament resulted in anglers catching 434 qualifying fish.
Hooking fishermen was a little bit tougher. Held March 30 through June 30, the Illinois Walleye Challenge attracted 31 anglers who logged a combined 864 hours of fishing across 43 bodies of water. Half the 297 trips taken in Illinois during the tournament resulted in “zero fish caught.”
Sam Militello had the largest catch, a 28.5-inch walleye.
Dove hunters in Illinois are shooting half as many birds as they did a decade ago. Does that mean there were more doves flying in 2014? Or were hunters better shooters 10 years ago?
It could be both. It could be neither. Regardless, a majority of the state’s hunters – no matter what they prefer to hunt – view the dove opener as a sign hunting is back.
Dove hunting season a symbolic opener in Illinois Read More »
No Illinois wildlife refuge was selected for a pilot program that will basically pay hunters who choose not to use lead ammunition on federal sites. And, in an unrelated move, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced it is planning to decrease the acreage open for hunting at a refuge in the state that is quite popular with hunters.
As expected, the USFWS in late July confirmed it is implementing a program at seven National Wildlife Refuges this fall “to test voluntary, incentive-based efforts to increase the use of lead-free ammunition by hunters on USFWS lands.”
When whispers of the program began to swirl last year, there was thought that the Crab Orchard National Wildlife Refuge might be part of the test.
Ralph Loos: Feds try encouraging non-lead hunting with economic incentives Read More »
It was only a matter of time before an 8-pound bass showed up at a tournament weigh-in at Newton Lake.
Three years ago, DNR’s annual report on the Jasper County water included a note that the top five bass brought to the scale in 2021 were “all over 7 1 ⁄4 pounds.” That was also true for tournaments held in 2023 – with one exception. The biggest bass came in at 8.3 pounds.
Expected 8-pound bass hit scales at Newton Lake in Jasper County, Ill. Read More »
The statewide effort in Illinois to get more young people fishing is a task Herb Dreier initially tackled many years ago.
So it’s no surprise the former program manager for DNR’s Urban Fishing Program is quick with a reply when asked about the key to recruiting new anglers.
“It’s important they catch a fish – any fish, it can be a tiny fish, but catching a fish is vital,” said Dreier, who retired from DNR in 2012 but eventually found himself doing what he did in his working days.
Decatur ‘Early Birds’ hook youngsters on fishing’s joy in Illinois Read More »
DNR’s efforts to improve the size of largemouth bass in Lake Sara have apparently paid off – biologists sampling the lake last year found bigger bass in good condition.
More telling, tournament weigh-ins on the lake in 2023 featured several bass that topped the magical 6-pound mark. One lunker brought to the scale by an angler was more than 7 pounds.
There are plenty of good reasons I became a journalist instead of a biologist, engineer or chemist – and I am reminded of those reasons each time I stumble across a phrase like, “spatiotemporal variation in wild turkey exposure to neonicotinoid insecticides.
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