Saint John River Chapter Research

We face unique odds in New Brunswick when it comes to protecting the Muskie fishery in the Saint John River.

Muskies are so new to this province that they are not yet recognized as a sport fish, and unfortunately not fully understood. Our Chapter is proud to be actively participating in Muskie research in New Brunswick through tagging and gathering data about these wonderful fish that are providing us with a world class fishery in our backyard. Our Research Study consists of an online system that our members have access to, and contains several sub programs. We are also currently applying for funding, permits and other additional help to have more research done on this new and exciting fishery in our Province. For questions or inquiries you can email ResearchDirector@muskiesnb.ca (Matt Williamson, the current acting Research Director).

  Tagging Study

      Starting in the Fall of 2006, The Saint John River Chapter began our Tagging Study on the Saint John River Muskies with the permission of our DNRE. All the tagging information is logged in our database, which can beviewed and searched by all members of the SJRC. The tagging data is not accessible to the general public and is available to our members only. Tagging guns have been issued and are carried by most of our members, and data is added by these members as they catch fish. At the closing of the 2009 fishing season, 188 Muskies have been tagged and released in the Saint John River, of which 21 have been recaptured.

      Tags have a unique number on them, as well as the printed text "PLEASE RELEASE ME" in hopes that non-members who catch fish will release their catch as they are very beneficial to our study. Also, tags have the printed text "WWW.MUSKIESNB.CA", and we would greatly appreciate being contacted by anyone who catches a tagged fish with reports of length, girth, location caught, lure type, trolling or casting, depth, angler and date. If you are a non-member and want to report a tagged Muskie, we hope you will email our Research Director at ResearchDirector@muskiesnb.ca with as much information as you can provide. For your information, you will receive a Live Release Certificate and the history of the fish that you caught.

      In 2008, the Tagging Study evolved and became a fully automated online system. It continues to gather, manage, and compute statistics in real time on data to this day. Interesting statistics are mined from our tagging study database automatically such as growth rates and migration patterns. Throughout the fishing season, data is added to the system generally on a weekly basis.

  Angler Log

      Also starting in 2006, the Angler Log program involves gathering data from our membership on the hours spent angling Muskies. Commonly referred to as the "fish of 10,000 casts", Muskies can take hours and even days of angling to find and catch. We keep track of those hours to determine the catch per unit effort in each of our predefined zones.

  Other Information

      We consider the Saint John River and its tributaries as three zones in New Brunswick. The below map illustrates what we call Zones 1, 2 and 3. Note that Zone 1 (appearing in red) is a shared border with the US, and that all tributaries of a zone (besides the previous zone, of course) are considered part of that Zone. For example, the Nashwaak River is part of Zone 3. So is Grand Lake.