ARCHIVED NEWS RELEASE
This document is provided for archival purposes only. Archived documents
do not reflect current WDFW regulations or policy and may contain factual
inaccuracies.
News release May 19, 2003
OLYMPIA - Young anglers looking for a good place to fish over the Memorial Day weekend should consider three juvenile fishing ponds scheduled to receive "bonus plants" of hatchery rainbow trout by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW).
Chosen for their easy access by juvenile anglers, the three ponds set to receive additional fish are Wapato Lake in Pierce County, Long's Pond in Thurston County and Sarge Hubbard Park Pond in Yakima County.
All three ponds will receive fresh plants of 10- to 12-inch trout by Friday, May 23, and should provide good fishing through the long holiday weekend and well into the summer, said Terry Rudnick, WDFW's youth sportfishing coordinator.
"The fishing is already good in these three lakes, and this week's plants should make them outstanding bets for kids wanting to catch trout," Rudnick said. "They're just what the doctor ordered for parents looking to give their kids a positive fishing experience."
Long's Pond and Sarge Hubbard Park Pond will each receive an additional 3,000 fish, while Wapato Lake will get 1,500 fish.
"We're calling these `bonus plants' because all of these ponds were stocked with large numbers of trout earlier this spring," Rudnick said. Sarge Hubbard was stocked with nearly 6,000 trout prior to last weekend's WDFW-sponsored Fishing Kids event, and Wapato received 1,500 rainbows last week for a Tacoma Sportsmen's Club fishing derby. Long's Pond was stocked with 4,000 rainbows in early April.
Rudnick noted that trophy-size trout are a possibility, too, especially at Sarge Hubbard, where WDFW has released rainbows from the Naches Hatchery weighing up to 11 pounds apiece.
The additional trout scheduled for release this week come from Troutlodge Inc. of Sumner and were originally intended to be used for Fishing Kids events in Vancouver, Longview and Chelan. However, WDFW hatcheries were able to provide the trout for those events, freeing up the Troutlodge fish for other purposes, Rudnick said.
Long's Pond and Wapato Lake are open only to juvenile anglers under the age of 15 years. Sarge Hubbard Park Pond is open to juveniles under 15 and disabled anglers with a reduced-fee license. All three waters are open to year-round fishing with a five-fish daily trout limit.