SHREVEPORT, La. – Anglers fishing the Red River near Shreveport, La., may be hooking bigger bass in a few years thanks to a $10,000 grant from the Wal-Mart FLW Tour, FishAmerica and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that will allow the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries to stock the river with faster- and larger-growing Florida-strain largemouth bass.
The Fish and Wildlife Service’s Sport Fish Restoration Program will match $5,000 donated by the FLW Tour to FishAmerica. The combined public and private funds will be used to purchase approximately 40,000 fingerlings to be released into the river.
Black bass populations in the Red River have exploded since the 1995 completion of five locks along the river that created several fertile oxbows which provide year-round growth potential. Unlike other Louisiana fisheries, however, the Red River does not have Florida-strain bass, which have been introduced elsewhere by the state’s Inland Fisheries Division. As a result of the state’s decade-old stocking program, 10-pound bass are commonly caught in Louisiana waters. In fact, the top 20 largemouth bass in Louisiana are all above 14 pounds and have been caught since the program began.
“Before we started the stocking program, a 6-or 7-pound bass was big in this state,” said Inland Fisheries administrator Bennie Fontenot. “Now, we don’t even look at them unless they are over 12 pounds. The program has been very successful. We’re anxious to put the Florida gene into the Red River.”
Until the FLW Tour, FishAmerica and Sport Fish Restoration Program donations, the state was unable to stock the Red River due to limitations at its Booker Fowler hatchery in Forrest Hills, La. Fontenot said the current stocking effort will seed the Red River with Florida-strain bass until the state hatchery is at full capacity. Booker Fowler is now in its third year of production.
“The Red River has a tremendous bass population that is just exploding,” Fontenot said. “We want to put the Florida gene into the system to produce larger bass.”
Florida-strain bass are commonly stocked to the exclusion of native bass to enhance the genetic pool and produce larger fish. “A lake or river will only support a certain number of fish,” Fontenot said, “so the idea is not to put more bass into the system, but rather to put genetics into the system that produce larger fish.”
Inland Fisheries plans to release the adolescent Florida bass into the Red River on Sept. 16 during the final round of the Wal-Mart FLW Tour Championship in Shreveport.
Funding for the project is the result of a partnership between the FLW Tour, the world’s foremost professional bass fishing series, and FishAmerica Foundation, the conservation arm of the American Sportfishing Association, that will provide $35,000 to benefit fisheries visited by the FLW Tour.
“As an industry leader, we are proud to take this extra step toward the preservation of our nation’s fisheries,” said Charlie Hoover, chief executive officer of Operation Bass Inc., the organization responsible for running the Wal-Mart FLW Tour. “These irreplaceable natural resources benefit the environment, local communities and millions of outdoor enthusiasts nationwide.”
In a separate effort to support grassroots conservation, FishAmerica has teamed with SCA Promotions of Dallas, Texas, to provide $100,000 for FishAmerica conservation programs if an FLW Tour angler catches a state-record largemouth, smallmouth or spotted bass during the championship.
In the past 17 years, FishAmerica has received donations from fishing tournaments, tackle manufacturers, boat and engine companies, and individuals that enabled it to fund nearly 600 fishery enhancement projects in 50 states and Canada. FishAmerica grant recipients have donated more than 1 million volunteer hours to improve fisheries.