Prairie, one of the new lakes built on the old
Commonwealth Edison ground known as Site M, remains a very good largemouth bass
lake. It was excellent a few years after the initial stocking but it is
hard to maintain that very high level. The initial bass year class moved
through the fishery providing excellent fishing in 2003-2006 but those old fish
are gone now. The Spring 2009 survey revealed a very good bass
population. Eighty-eight bass were collected per hour with 82% over 15”
and 12% over 18”, so large bass are still prevalent in the lake. I’m a
little concerned about the apparent lack of small fish but we have seen population
structure indices that look like this for years so the smaller fish must be
there just not susceptible to our electrofishing. In the Fall of 2009 the
on-site nursery pond was drained and 720 smallmouth bass were stocked into the
lake from it. Those numbers are not what I had hoped for but the fish
averaged 9.2” so their survival should be excellent. In 2010 I will
continued to raise the “smallies” in the nursery pond and will also supplement
their numbers by stocking fingerlings from our hatchery. I hope to build
up their numbers within three years to provide and additional species for the
bass anglers. They probably won’t reproduce naturally so they will always
need to be stocked.
The muskies are doing well. The 2009 survey was the best to date so far
as number of fish collected per hour of electrofishing. The largest was
only 41.5” long however. I have reports of fish over 50” being caught but
I haven’t seen anything approaching that yet. We will continue the
current stocking regime of 200- 10” fingerlings every other year to maintain
that fishery.
The channel catfish are excellent, in numbers, population size structure and
body conditions. The bluegill and redear sunfish are not good at all and
probably never will be for reasons to long to go into in this forum. For
large bluegill and redear sunfish go to Drake and Gridley lakes. The lake
is open to boats with motors over 10hp but there is a lake-wide no wake zone.
For those boats with 10hp motors or less, they can operate full throttle if
desired. There is a concrete ramp, parking lot, restroom, handicapped
fishing pier, playground, pavilion, camping area including rental cabins, docks
near the campgrounds and a 17 mile hiking trail around its perimeter.
(report by fisheries
biologist Dan Stephenson - Feb 1, 2010)