Pennsylvania's Got the Blues

 Catfish, that is. Gettysburg Times, In PA, the blues (catfish) are good or bad, depending on the river

River anglers in Pennsylvania, including on the Susquehanna, can look forward to catching monstrously tasty blue catfish Ictalurus furcatus.

Blue catfish are a favorite among anglers for fighting ability, year-round fishery, and potential to be the Commonwealth’s largest game fish.

In western Pennsylvania, blues are considered to be native and are being released into the Ohio River near Pittsburgh by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission (PFBC).

When blues get into the Susquehanna as invasives, it will come with a cost to the habitat.

It is inevitable that blue catfish will get to the Susquehanna by human transfer (unlawful), or migration from the south (think snakesheads). As invasives, blue catfish are eating the Chesapeake Bay alive.

 

Blue catfish have been knocking at Pennsylvania’s door since the state of West Virginia stocked fingerlings in the Ohio River just west of the border with the Keystone State in 2013-15.

Some of those blue cats have already shown up in western PA waters.

The first blue catfish captured in the Pennsylvania portion of the Ohio River basin in over 100 years happened in 2019, and 11 more were taken the next year. The six caught in the Monongahela in 2021 and 2022 were likely stocked in West Virginia.

For the fourth year in a row, a new record-breaking blue catfish was caught in West Virginia last December. The 50.5-inch fish from the Ohio River weighed almost 70 pounds. They are the largest members of the catfish family in North America. Some can grow to 100 pounds.

In the Bay, blue catfish were introduced in Virginia in the 1970s for recreational fishing. They expanded out of freshwater and into the higher salinity waters of the Bay and exploded into other rivers and tributaries in Maryland and Virginia.

It's just a bit ironic that western Pennsylvania is trying to re-establish a Blue Catfish population while Eastern Pennsylvania is hoping to stop an invasion of them.

The Wombat has Rule 5 Sunday: Outstanding In Her Field garnering clicks at The Other McCain.