NEWS RELEASE

Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission

October 29, 1999

CONTACT: David Yeager (850) 957-6175

BEAR LAKE TO RECEIVE BLUEGILL AND CHANNEL CATFISH

If everything goes as planned next week, Bear Lake (Bear Lake Map in Adobe PDF, Bear Lake Brochure in Adobe PDF) in north Santa Rosa County will have at least 10,000 more bluegill and channel catfish in its waters. Now it*s up to anglers to do their part.

Fisheries biologists with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission's (FWC) Division of Fisheries spawned the bluegill and catfish last spring in holding ponds at the Blackwater Fisheries Research and Development Center near Holt. They'll move the 3-4-inch bluegill to Bear Lake on Tuesday and the 7-12-inch catfish on Wednesday or Thursday.

"These fish have been raised on commercial pellets and there*ll be 10 fish feeders in the lake," said Dave Yeager, FWC fisheries biologist. "We know the lakes in the Blackwater River State Forest are heavily used and we're hoping the public can catch some of these fish without a whole lot of trouble."

Yeager, who has extensive research experience with striped bass and hybrids on panhandle rivers said, "The goal is to increase the carrying capacity of the lake in terms of numbers and pounds of game fish." The installation of the feeding stations and stocking of bluegill and catfish is part of a broader plan to change the way some lakes in Blackwater are managed. A public meeting is scheduled for Monday night, Nov. 8 in Milton where biologists can discuss proposals to change to an 18-inch minimum largemouth bass size limit on Hurricane Lake and a catch-and-release only bass regulation on Karick Lake.

The public meeting will be held from 6 - 8 p.m. at the Santa Rosa County Administration Center on Highway 90 West.