Illinois
Follow The Shad
With a dense human population around the “Windy City” along with being the second highest producer of corn in the country, Illinois does not sound like a traditional musky epicenter. In 1975, after Project Illini started, over 1,500 muskies from hatcheries in Wisconsin and Minnesota were stocked in several Illinois lakes.
In 1977, Project Illini was working in conjunction with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources and looking for a sustainable fish hatchery that could successfully raise musky fry. In 1979 the Jake Wolf Fish Hatchery was born. To this date, the Jake Wolf Fish Hatchery continues stocking muskies to many of the greater and lesser lakes of Illinois.
From 1988-2009, nearly 500,000 muskies were stocked in Illinois and today several lakes hold fish in excess of 30 pounds. With no closed musky season and strict creel limits, Illinois has become a musky angler’s Heaven, especially for Wisconsin and Minnesota anglers whose season is closed in the spring. It’s now a big draw for Wisconsin anglers to jump start their musky season on waters like the Fox Chain O’ Lakes just a few miles south of the border.
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