Genoa National Fish Hatchery personnel spawning walleye during spring netting and spawning operations.

The National Fish Hatchery System (NFHS) produces a wide range of fish, amphibian, and freshwater mussel species in support of multiple fishery management goals. Whether producing animals for endangered species recovery, restoration of imperiled populations, supporting cooperative management initiatives with tribal, federal and state cooperators, or providing and enhancing recreational fishing opportunities on National Wildlife Refuges or other federal lands the NFHS faces many challenges. One of the challenges that the system faces is its ability to produce adequate numbers of disease free, genetically sound numbers of fish and eggs to meet production goals. This challenge is exacerbated when hatcheries use wild or free-ranging populations.  Genoa National Fish Hatchery faces this challenge annually in order to meet its goals for egg, fry, fingerling and yearling production for cool water fish. The hatchery produces walleye, sauger, and northern pike to meet management objectives in endangered mussel recovery, cooperative management programs, and tribal trust responsibilities across much of the U.S.  The egg source for these programs are wild stocks of fish located in pool 9 of the Upper Mississippi River within the confines of the Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge.  The need to collect wild fish in a system as large and dynamic as the Mississippi River offers special challenges to hatchery crews. The migratory nature of riverine fishes, highly fluctuating river levels, and natural population variability all affect the annual success of this operation. Despite these and other challenges the hatchery crew was able to collect in excess of 3.8 million northern pike and 54 million walleye eggs to support fishery management programs.  The resulting eggs and fish from these operations will be transferred to other cooperators in five states over the coming year to meet a wide range of fishery needs.  Additionally, this years egg take was conducted using strict and robust biosecurity and disinfection measures to limit any potential disease transmission from the wild stocks into the hatchery.  This years harvest represents a record in production for the hatchery and bodes well for America's fisheries both at the regional and national levels.