{"id":834641,"date":"2026-07-29T22:53:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-29T22:53:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/834641\/"},"modified":"2026-07-29T22:53:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-29T22:53:11","slug":"whats-behind-lake-eries-steep-yellow-perch-decline","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/834641\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s behind Lake Erie\u2019s steep yellow perch decline?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Text<\/p>\n

Listen to this article<\/p>\n

Estimated 4 minutes<\/p>\n

The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology. Mispronunciations can occur. We are working with our partners to continually review and improve the results.<\/p>\n

Yellow perch is a culinary treasure in southwestern Ontario, near the shores of Lake Erie.<\/p>\n

You can find it on many menus at local restaurants. But the fish is becoming scarce.<\/p>\n

The population is down by nearly 20 per cent this year, according to the Ontario Commercial Fisheries Association \u2014 lows not seen since the mid-1990s.<\/p>\n

LISTEN | Yellow perch population declines in Lake Erie:<\/p>\n

Afternoon Drive6:59Yellow perch population declines in Lake Erie<\/p>\n

Vito Figliomeni is the association\u2019s executive director. He\u2019s also one of the people who tracks yellow perch, and says the main culprit for the sharp decline is the rise in another fish, a little higher on the Great Lakes’ food chain.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s hard to ignore what we’re seeing in respect to the abundance of the walleye populations,\u201d he told CBC Radio\u2019s<\/a> Afternoon Drive guest host Chris Ensing.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe’ve had near-record walleye population since 2020. So when you look at the last six to seven years, you’ve had sustained populations numbering in the 50 million to 100 million walleye in Lake Erie.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"InWalleye are the main reason for the yellow perch population decline in Lake Erie, according to Ontario Commercial Fisheries Association. (Daniel Miller\/The Associated Press)<\/p>\n

Figliomeni says walleye\u2019s main food source of smaller fish, such as rainbow smelt and emerald shiners have also been hit hard \u2014 fuelling their appetite for perch.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf those numbers are down, walleye are going to turn to what’s next.\u201d<\/p>\n

He says volatile temperature swings also wreak havoc with yellow perch.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe’re experiencing warming and erratic climate conditions. I think all of us have seen that we’re seeing a gradual warming \u2026 in the lake,\u201d Figliomeni said, adding the central basin of Lake Erie is experiencing oxygen-depleted zones because of the rising temperatures.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt really drives yellow perch populations out of the central basin, so out of their habitats and forces them into other areas in the search for food and survivability.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"TheThe yellow perch population has seen a sharp decline in 2026 in Lake Erie. (Ohio Department of Natural Resources)<\/p>\n

Elevated populations of double-crested cormorants, a predatory bird species, could also be playing a role in the perch decline, he says.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to Figliomeni, yellow perch have historically been a robust species with a track record of highs and lows.<\/p>\n

He says one way to try bringing back the perch population is better understanding the predator-prey relationship within the Lake Erie ecosystem.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now, quotas, for example, for yellow perch, walleye, lake whitefish are managed and in silos \u2026 what we’re seeing with all these pressures on the perch, it’s difficult to model a situation that’s going to yield accurate results.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

As a result of the population purge, Ontario\u2019s Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) says the Great Lakes Fishery Commission lowered its Lake Erie-wide allowable catch quota to 1.984 million kilograms. That\u2019s down from 2.666 million kilograms in 2025, and from 2.979 million kilograms in 2024. The MNR manages Lake Erie\u2019s commercial and recreational fisheries alongside U.S. and Indigenous partners.<\/p>\n

LISTEN | Scientists study temperatures of the Great Lakes with underwater gliders:<\/p>\n

Windsor Morning8:38The Great Lakes are getting warmer \u2014 and scientists are using underwater gliders to monitor temperatures<\/p>\n

Climate change has been front and centre as of late with the impact of the Ontario wildfires. Data shows the earth is getting hotter.\tAnd that also includes our warming Great Lakes and other lake ecosystems. Lydia Paulic and Aaron Fisk are with the Real Time Aquatic Ecosystem Observation Network out of the University of Windsor. They spoke to the CBC’s Chris Ensing about how they’re using underwater gliders to capture and quantify temperature changes in the Great Lakes.<\/p>\n

Environmental scientist Aaron Fisk studies the warming of the Great Lakes with autonomous underwater gliders.<\/p>\n

The University of Windsor researcher oversees the Real-Time Aquatic Ecosystem Observation Network.<\/p>\n

One of their additional goals this year has been to look for yellow perch in Lake Erie.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe equipment really allows you to collect data and scales, continuous and over time, that you can’t do with people,\u201d he recently told CBC Radio\u2019s<\/a> Windsor Morning.<\/p>\n

\"AnAn autonomous underwater glider is put into one of the Great Lakes to gauge temperatures and collect other environmental science data. (Real-Time Aquatic Ecosystem Observation Network)<\/p>\n

\u201cWe put little acoustic tags inside the fish and they ping and we can follow them around. But we don’t have receivers everywhere, and so the glider can be outfitted with a receiver to go look into those areas to find those tagged fish.\u201d<\/p>\n

This year, Fisk says, there\u2019s concern around the lack of yellow perch being flagged.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was a study being conducted by the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, which does such important work for understanding our fish populations. They had released these tagged yellow perch, but we’re not seeing a lot of them.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 4 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":834642,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[49,48,295,66],"class_list":["post-834641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/834641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=834641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/834641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/834642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=834641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=834641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=834641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}