North Dakota tourism rebounds despite Canada border closure outdoornews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from outdoornews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
North Dakota has a year-round game-fish season – why?
May 13, 2021
North Dakota fisheries draw game-fish anglers year-round. (Photo by Visit Garrison)
North Dakota has a year-round fishing season, including for game fish. Thus, the harvest of big fish in spring, before walleyes or northern pike have spawned, is a common coffee-shop topic. Some anglers wonder whether we should have a closed season, or, alternately, whether we should have some type of fish-length restriction that would reduce harvest of larger fish.
First, a little background.
In 1993, the North Dakota Game and Fish Department made the decision to have a year-round fishing season statewide. At the time, the Missouri River system already was open to walleye and pike harvest year-round, but the “game fish” season was closed in the rest of the state from mid-March to early May, a regulation that dated back at least to the 1930s.