No ruffe were found in Lake Huron during the 2005 sampling season.

The U.S. Fish $ Wildlife Service's Fishery Resource Offices (FRO) of Ashland, Alpena and the Lower Great Lakes; along with the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources (OMNR) collaborated in drafting the report, "Surveillance For Ruffe in the Great Lakes, 2005." 

The invasive, perch-like ruffe received the stigma of "nuisance species" in 1992, following suspected implication with declines of native forage fish in the Twin Ports harbor of Duluth, Minn., and Superior, Wis. The report summarizes fish sampling activity in each of the Great Lakes that targets invasive ruffe, as well as some major sampling that does not target ruffe, but is capable of capturing ruffe incidentally.  From this sampling data, new locations containing ruffe are identified, and the range of ruffe is updated annually.  Sampling that targets ruffe (dedicated ruffe surveillance) also collects baseline data on native fish communities. 

Since 1991, the USFWS and OMNR have been tracking the ruffe in the Great Lakes to document its range, and evaluate opportunities to delay ruffe range expansion.  Assisting with this task are several cooperators including the U.S. Geological Survey, the state departments of natural resources bordering the Great Lakes, tribal Indian communities, the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters, Sea Grant, universities, and recreational anglers.  The ruffe was confined to western Lake Superior until 1995, when it was detected in Lake Huron, near Alpena, Mich.  Catch per unit effort in Lake Huron surveillance trawls reached a climax of 660 per hour in 1999, but declined to zero in 2001.  Capitalizing on a distressed, self-confined ruffe population, the Alpena FRO enhanced the ruffe decline by initiating an intense gill netting effort in 2002 to remove adult spawning ruffe.  Paralleling the ruffe decline in Lake Huron was increasing round goby abundance there, suggesting that the goby may have also been a contributing factor in that ruffe decline.  No ruffe have been captured from Lake Huron since 2003. 

In Lake Superior during 2005, the ruffe made a minor range advance of 5 km eastward along the north shore, from Thunder Bay Harbour, Ontario.  Along the Lake Superior south shore, the ruffe range remained unchanged, from Duluth, Minn., to Marquette, Mich.  The Bays de Noc have comprised the ruffe range in Lake Michigan, since 2002 and 2004.  In the Lower Great Lakes, ruffe remain undetected, as well as in all inland lakes and streams within the Great Lakes Basin.  The complete ruffe surveillance report is distributed to the Great Lakes Panel on Aquatic Nuisance Species (ANS) and the National ANS Task Force; and it is available on the Ashland FRO websiteat: http://www.fws.gov/midwest/ashland