Wild Spawning Crew

Fish spawning is the first and most vital strategy in fish culture. Located in beautiful Pinedale, Wyoming, the wild spawning crew’s main objective is to collect eggs from various wild fish populations throughout Wyoming. The eggs collected from wild fish may be used for fish production, wild broodstock recruitment in Wyoming waters, trade with outside states/agencies, or brood recruitment for captive broodstocks at one of 11 state hatcheries in Wyoming. When spawning fish in the wild, they are captured with trap nets, dip nets, seines, v-traps, and gill nets. Eggs gathered for production come from grayling, Kokanee salmon, brown, brook and rainbow trout. Eggs used for broodstock recruitment or broodstock establishment come from Snake River, Bear River (Bonneville), Yellowstone, Colorado River cutthroat, and lake trout. In addition, milt from brook trout is pre-collected and used to fertilize lake trout eggs producing a hybrid known as splake. In a typical year, the Spawning Crew gathers approximately 4 million eggs from wild broodstocks.