Each year the Freshwater Fisheries Society of B.C. raises and releases millions of fish into hundreds of lakes around the province.
No small number of those fish wind up in lakes in the Thompson, Okanagan and Shuswap regions.
The fisheries society has released a year-in-review report on their fish stocking efforts in 2019.
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In management region 3, which spans the Thompson and Shuswap area, more than 1.2 million fish, ranging in size from a few grams to large enough to be caught by anglers, were released into 171 lakes. The hatchery fish were predominantly rainbow trout numbering 908,020, but 154,800 brook trout and 138,850 kokanee salmon were also stocked in lakes. The single largest release of fish in the region was 100,000 kokanee fry put into Stump Lake near Kamloops in May.
In region 8, which encompasses the Okanagan, 498,120 fish were released into 95 lakes. Like the region to the north, the most common fish raised and released was the rainbow trout with 465,720 set free. The remainder of the stocked fish were 28,400 brook trout and 13,000 kokanees.
The biggest release of fish in the Okanagan in 2019 was the stocking of 35,000 rainbow trout averaging only 10 grams into Beaver Lake near Winfield.
Provincewide, 4.97 million trout, char and kokanee were released into 622 lakes.
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