It's a busy time of year at the St. Paul fish hatchery as officials are putting in the work to help ensure the state has enough fish for its 10,000 lakes, and this year, the hatchery is breaking records.
"We have a record number of eggs at this facility," Genevieve Furtner said. "Almost 42 million eggs."
The walleye eggs are contained in tubes hung from the walls in what's called a battery.
"They are just the tiniest walleye," Furtner said. "They are like the size of a pinhead."
While they have a record number of eggs, when it comes to how many of the fish will survive and one day swim in a Minnesota lake, Furtner shared with News Talk 830 WCCO's Susie Jones that it was "Surprisingly less than 1%."
Furtner pointed out that some of the baby walleye had already hatched and would be making their way through an intricate system of hoses before moving into holding ponds. From there, they will be released into the wild.
Workers at the hatchery raise the fish for angling, so Minnesotans can continue to enjoy the sport. It's a $4.4 billion industry in the state, so the operation must be successful.
Furtner said they work carefully to harvest the eggs from existing fish in lakes. They do this by collecting male and female fish and then waiting for mother nature to take over.
"The males are always ripe, but the female, you have to determine if they are ripe or green," Furtner said.
Workers will fertilize the eggs themselves, squeezing the female fish to get their eggs out before taking the sperm out of the male they've captured and then combining the ingredients.
The St. Paul Hatchery was the first state-run facility, established in 1877, and was first called the Willow Brook hatchery, then the Mounds Park hatchery, and finally the St. Paul hatchery.
According to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, it was established as a holding, rearing, and shipping station due to its close proximity to the railroad and abundance of spring water. A wide variety of fish species were raised, held, and stocked statewide.
Milk cans were used as shipping containers and transported in railroad box cars.
The original water sources were several cold water springs diverted into raceways, and seven ponds. The St. Paul Hatchery has been remodeled several times. Only two of the original spring-fed ponds are still in use. In the 1940s, two new wells were drilled, with a third added in 1988-89.
Has the technology been modified since its establishment? The general technology used for the hatchery was last upgraded in 1988-89 to include: all pumped well water, packed columns, a steam boiler, an oxygen injection system, and iron filters. This was all done to better aerate the well water supply to the facility. The cold water portion of the hatchery was closed in 1994.
Furtner said they are always concerned about the equipment, pointing out a nearby holding tank.
"You notice the feet on them have almost rusted away," she said. "And if the feet completely rusts away, it's likely to tip over, and it's likely to tip over when it's laden with fish."
Minnesota Governor Tim Walz is seeking $118 million to repair and replace aging boat accesses, fish hatcheries, and other outdoor recreation infrastructure.
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