Fact Or Fiction?

[Dapper Dan Man]

I have a friend that fishes with me regularly and he told me that someone told him that a couple weeks ago MDC had released two walleyes with a reward tag of $10,000 each on them. I haven't found anything on the web to confirm this, but wanted to bounce this off of the experts here and see if there is any truth to this very fake sounding story.

[Martin]

The tags may have happened, but I'll betcha the amounts are not near that huge. But I, have no proof either. Just being around for 60 years makes it very hard to believe they would put a 10 grand tag on ANY fish...again, just my opinion. Everybodies got one of those....lol

[Leonard]

The tags may have happened, but I'll betcha the amounts are not near that huge. But I, have no proof either. Just being around for 60 years makes it very hard to believe they would put a 10 grand tag on ANY fish...again, just my opinion. Everybodies got one of those....lol

$10 Gs (each) for 2 walleyes...

HOLY CRAP!

with the size of Bull Shoals it should be more...

Catch one of those... may not want to eat it

[teacher]

You probably have to catch both to claim the prize..

[Martin]

My guess is that the tags would be $100.00 at most, probably less....You'd have to provide where, when, and how you caught the walleye.

[powerdive]

Releasing two tagged fish would make sense only for a fishing derby, and would be covered/paid by an insurance policy. There's really no possible knowledge gain from such a small sample. I think it's a hoax.

Last time the MDC tagged walleyes and paid rewards, they tagged 1000 fish, which allowed enough to be turned in that they could learn something about growth and movement patterns. They deduced that walleyes in Bull Shoals grow quickly and generally do not range throughout the whole lake--a very small percentage roamed, but for the most part they stayed within their own lake sections.

Those tags were worth $10, $50 and $100 each. I caught a couple 50's and a few 10's--none of the 100's.

[Martin]

I caught 1 $50.00 and one $10.00 walleye.This was back in 2003 or so..I did contact A.J. Pratt (biologist) later and gave him the numbers I had turned in.....One was a male that was only a couple of miles from where I caught it. The other was a female that had wandered from the mouth of Bear Creek all the way to the big flat at Diamond City....Still not near the whole lake, but many miles from Bear Creek....interesting stuff. I'm with PD. 2 fish wouldn't tell them anything, and the question would be, "WHY" would they do something like that...