The Michigan Department of Natural Resources said it stocked nearly 650,000 fish at dozens of locations throughout Michigan during the fall.
According to the DNR, the 648,557 fish were stocked at 76 locations in the state, which will provide angling opportunities in seasons to come.
“This was another exceptional fall fish stocking season, enhancing fishing opportunities throughout Michigan,” DNR Fish Production Manager Aaron Switzer said in a statement. “Combined with successful spring and summer stocking efforts, the 2025 total reached nearly 19.5 million fish stocked in Michigan’s waters.”
The number and type of fish stocked vary by hatchery. In Michigan, there are six state and three cooperative fish hatcheries that work together to produce different species, strains and sizes of fish.
Fish at state hatcheries range anywhere from one month to 1.5 years before they are stocked. Most are stocked in the spring, but some fish ar estocked in the fall because they require less time and fewer resources.
In all, there were seven species stocked this fall: Atlantic salmon, brook trout, brown trout, lake trout, rainbow trout (Eagle Lake and steelhead strains), walleye and muskellunge.
The breakdown by hatchery is below:
- Marquette State Fish Hatchery (near Marquette) stocked 27,915 fall fingerling and 250 adult brook trout that weighed a combined 3,022 pounds. These fish were stocked at a total of 27 locations in the Upper Peninsula.
- Oden State Fish Hatchery (near Petoskey) stocked 140,366 fall fingerling rainbow trout that combined weighed 7,508 pounds and were stocked at four locations in the Upper and Lower peninsulas.
- Thompson State Fish Hatchery (near Manistique) stocked 3,008 Great Lakes strain muskellunge that weighed 304 pounds in Lake Hudson and Thornapple Lake. Thompson also stocked 329,085 fall fingerling steelhead weighing 2,413 total pounds in six locations.
- Wolf Lake State Fish Hatchery (west of Kalamazoo) stocked 64,532 fall fingerling steelhead weighing a combined 917 pounds in Crystal Lake.
- Harrietta State Fish Hatchery (near Cadillac) stocked 17,548 fall fingerling brown trout and 24,520 fall fingerling rainbow trout. These fish were stocked in four locations with a combined weight of 1,573 pounds.
- DNR fisheries management units also stocked fall fingerling walleye this year.
- Southern Lake Michigan Management Unit stocked 33,580 Muskegon strain fall fingerlings weighing 1,373 total pounds in 20 locations.
- Central Lake Michigan Management Unit stocked 2,507 Muskegon strain fall fingerlings weighing 160 pounds total in three locations.
- Northern Lake Michigan Management Unit stocked Little Bay de Noc with 5,211 fall fingerlings (Little Bay de Noc strain) weighing a combined 88 pounds in five locations; 2,815 of these walleye fingerlings were raised in a co-op partner pond tended by the Bay De Noc Great Lakes Sportfishermen.
You can visit the DNR website to see if any fish were stocked at your favorite fishing spot.
