Map of M/V Togue stocking trips for 2005

At the request of Assistant Regional Director Gerry Jackson and Jordan River NFH manager Rick Westerhof, fishery biologist Aaron Woldt of the Alpena FRO created a GIS based map of stocking trips made by the M/V Togue in 2005. The M/V Togue, based in Cheboygan, Mich., is the Service's offshore stocking vessel used to plant yearling lake trout in US waters of lakes Huron and Michigan in support of interagency lake trout rehabilitation programs.

Biologist Woldt worked with Boat Captain Mike Perry to obtain coordinates for all waypoints and lake trout stocking locations used by the M/V Togue in both lakes Huron and Michigan. Woldt, working with Jordan River NFH Biologist Tim Smigielski, created a map showing M/V Togue trip paths, waypoints, stocking locations, total miles traveled, and total number of lake trout stocked in lakes Huron and Michigan.

In 2005, the M/V Togue traveled 1,153 miles in Lake Huron stocking 1,194,109 yearling lake trout and 1,435 miles in Lake Michigan while planting 2,072,254 yearling lake trout. Woldt formatted a poster sized electronic version of this map on the Region 3 poster template and forwarded it to the Regional Office for printing.

This map will be used by Region 3 personnel to educate public and Service employees regarding M/V Togue operations and will be displayed at the 2006 GLFC Combined Upper and Lower Lake Committee Meetings. A PowerPoint presentation showing trip by trip stocking operations was also prepared by Woldt and Smigielski and is available for use at outreach events.