Blue Catfish Stocking In DeSoto Bend

[JIvers]

The IDNR is stocking blue catfish in DeSoto Bend in western Iowa: http://www.iowadnr.gov/fishing/ctl/detail/mid/2780/itemid/2203

This is interesting because the article notes those blue cat fingerlings may eventually be used as brood stock for blue cat stockings elsewhere in Iowa, should they take in DeSoto Bend.

IIRC the IDNR tried stocking blue catfish in Iowa lakes in the past, but none of those efforts were succesful. (This was in the era of the salmon/lake trout stocking efforts in the Iowa Great Lakes. Really. That happened. )

As noted in the article, blue cat are caught in Iowa's stretch of the Missouri River, and very occasionally elsewhere in the state. Here in eastern Iowa, as I've noted before on this site, people report catching blue catfish all of the time out of the Cedar, Iowa, and Mississippi river, but every single "blue catfish" I have ever seen in eastern Iowa has been a male channel cat in spawning colors.