PENNSYLVANIA TROUT

* Furunculosis is present in nearly all of the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission's hatcheries. While it is a serious disease, it can be treated and controlled to minimize the negative effects. It is also found in the wild but is rarely associated with large-scale fish kills.



* In Pennsylvania, fish are treated during an outbreak with antibiotics. Pennsylvania authorities also disinfect fish eggs to prevent transfer of the bacteria from parents to progeny, vaccinate fish and conduct annual health inspections.



Source: Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission

The New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife lost hundreds of thousands of dollars in trout to a bacterial infection that gripped its Pequest Trout Hatchery in Mansfield Township, according to the state.

But efforts to contain the infection have cost the state only about $85,000, according to an official at the division.

By introducing carbon dioxide into the water, the division this month euthanized 114,000 trout after officials discovered furunculosis, a potentially fatal coldwater fish disease, at the hatchery. Another 25,000 trout were euthanized last September for the same reason.

Larry Herrighty, assistant director of operations for the state's Division of Fish and Wildlife, said the hatchery probably lost about $500,000 worth of trout to the infection. Antibiotics to treat the unaffected fish cost about $85,000, he said.

The state normally stocks about 570,000 trout, all raised at Pequest, in the spring. This year, Herrighty said about 450,000 trout will be stocked this spring across New Jersey, where trout-fishing season starts Saturday.

There are 43 waterways around the state that will not be stocked this spring, including the Merrill Creek, Round Valley and Clinton reservoirs; Beaver Brook, Trout Brook, Lopatcong Creek and South Branch Raritan River upstream from Lake Solitude Dam.

The New Jersey Fish and Game Council earlier this month approved the changes to the spring stocking schedule as part of efforts to prevent the spread of furunculosis to wild populations.

Herrighty predicts trout stocking should return to normal next spring as the hatchery is raising thousands of small fish in an indoor nursery.

"We have more than enough fish for the anticipated 570,000 next spring," he said.

Part of the division's plan to address the furunculosis outbreak is to start raising brook and brown trout that are resistant to the bacteria. New Jersey is looking to acquire bacteria-resistant trout from a hatchery in Rome, N.Y., possibly in 2016, Herrighty said.

And it's likely the state won't have to pay for those trout as states routinely share resources, Herrighty said. New Jersey, for instance, has traded New Hampshire some northern pike for salmon, he said.

The Rome hatchery has been fed for about 70 years by a stream, allowing its trout to build a resistance to the naturally occurring bacteria, Herrighty said. By comparison, deep wells feed Pequest, and officials speculate that birds of prey have introduced the disease into the raceways.

Pequest employs air cannons, electric wires and strings crisscrossing the pools to deter blue herons and ospreys, which were particularly abundant last fall locally.

"But some of them have gotten smart and realized they can land and walk over to the pools," Herrighty said.

The state next month will start getting estimates and begin engineering work to install pole barn-like covers over the hatchery's eight raceways, Herrighty said. It's a common solution at hatcheries, where keeping birds at bay is a common problem, he said.

In the interim, the hatchery is draining, steam cleaning and disinfecting raceways as they remove trout. Staff are also treating fish with antibiotics and testing them about a week before their release, Herrighty said.