Goose Banding @ Genoa NFH 2026

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The Mississippi River and surrounding areas house the Mississippi Flyway, an internationally important migration route for waterfowl and migratory birds. This feathery highway extends from central Canada to the Gulf, but some birds use this route to travel as far North or South as the Arctic Circle and the Patagonia region. The Audubon Society estimates that around 60% of migratory bird species in North America use this flyway!
Photo: Genoa staff holding geese and volunteers standing next to a flock of geese in a pen. Photo credit: USFWS
Genoa National Fish Hatchery, located in the heart of this flyway, is no stranger to birds. Visitors and staff often see swans, eagles, cormorants, herons, and of course, Canadian Geese.
A couple weeks ago, Genoa National Fish Hatchery partnered with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) to band the flock of Canadian Geese that have called the hatchery home for the past few months. Volunteers coordinated on land and water to herd the geese into a pen and worked for a few hours giving them all shiny anklets. These leg bands allow organizations like Wisconsin DNR to monitor population and collect data on migrations and similar data.

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Art Brings Life and Learning to Genoa National Fish Hatchery, Celebrating Kevin Baird’s Artistic Contributions at the Great River Road Interpretive Center

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Celebrating Kevin Baird’s Artistic Contributions at the Great River Road Interpretive Center
The Great River Road Interpretive Center at Genoa National Fish Hatchery has always been a place where visitors can experience the wonders of nature firsthand—bird mounts, live fish, and informative displays greet guests as they explore. Recently, however, the Center added something truly special for the community: two stunning paintings by my friend & local artist Kevin Baird.
It all began with a blank wall near the stairs. I wanted to enhance the space, but it was too narrow for mounted animals or artifacts, so I turned to Kevin Baird for a unique solution. Kevin is an artist from Holmen who has painted murals at local schools and churches. Kevin enthusiastically joined the project, collaborating with staff to create an educational mural illustrating the Life Cycle of Freshwater Mussels. This vibrant scene not only brightens the Center but helps explain the relationship between fish and mussels and how their life cycles unfold. Kevin also painted a word bank to help visitors understand key terms. The mural has quickly become a conversation starter, sparking curiosity and deepening appreciation for the Center’s conservation efforts.
Kevin’s contributions didn’t stop there. Downstairs in the aquarium room, he painted a magnificent 7-foot Lake Sturgeon. This artwork gives guests a chance to “measure up” against the sturgeon, comparing their height to the massive fish. It’s a fun and interactive way to highlight the 40,000 to 60,000 Lake Sturgeon raised at Genoa NFH each year, while sharing interesting facts about their role in local aquatic ecosystems.
The Genoa National Fish Hatchery team expresses its heartfelt appreciation to Kevin Baird for his outstanding and remarkable work. His art has transformed the Center into a more engaging and educational space, helping to inspire and teach visitors about the important work being done. We invite everyone to visit and experience these beautiful paintings for themselves at the Great River Road Interpretive Center! By: Erica Rasmussen

Kevin standing next to his artwork – The Life Cycle of a Freshwater Mussel and 7-foot Lake Sturgeon. Photo: USFWS

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Kids Fishing Day 2026

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Hundreds of visitors from around the area visited Genoa National Fish Hatchery on Saturday, May 16th for Genoa’s Annual Kids Fishing Day Event. The beautiful weather brought good vibes and sunshine and great fishing for all who attended.
During the event, participants and their families traveled around different stations at the hatchery, filling their fishing passport booklet. Stations included Bird Bingo, Fish Painting, Lake Sturgeon Touch Tank, and more! Kids had to visit 4 stations before being given a pole and bait to try their hand at fishing in our Rainbow Trout pond. Each child could take home up to 3 cleaned Rainbow Trout.
This event wouldn’t be possible without our wonderful staff, lovely volunteers from Friends of the Upper Mississippi, Friends of Pool 9, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services Fisheries office, the Roch Kendrick Foundations, and of course, our fantastic community, all of which come together to make this event a success. It’s always great getting to see the joy on the kids’ faces as they partake in a day of hands on learning in the outdoors! By: Eliza Swartwood
Photo: Participants and staff at stations and volunteers helping handout bait. Photo credit: USFWS
Genoa National Fish Hatchery’s mission is to recover, restore, maintain and enhance fish and aquatic resources on a basin-wide and national level by producing over 35 aquatic species of varying life stages, participating in active conservation efforts with our partners, and becoming a positive force in the community by educating future generations on the benefits of conservation stewardship.
Great getting to see the joy on the kids’ faces as they partake in a day of hands on learning in the outdoors! By: Eliza Swartwood

Photo: Participants and staff at stations and volunteers helping handout bait. Photo credit: USFWS

 

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New Staff Member at Genoa NFH

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We are pleased to welcome Yassier Porro as the new Administrative Officer at Genoa National Fish Hatchery. Yassier began his career with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service at the Midwest Fisheries Center before moving to the Alpena Fish and Wildlife Conservation Office. We look forward to having him on our team!

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Rainbow Trout Eggs Arrive from Ennis National Fish Hatchery

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Genoa National Fish Hatchery’s trout production is now underway for the upcoming year. Rainbow Trout eggs arrived from Ennis National Fish Hatchery (Montana). Genoa NFH received approximately 120,000 Shasta strain rainbow trout eggs from Ennis NFH. Ennis NFH is the largest facility in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s National Broodstock Program and specializes in rearing fish to adult size, then taking the eggs from those fish, incubating them, and shipping them to production hatcheries.

These Rainbow Trout are being raised to provide a cost recoverable recreational fishery at the Fort McCoy Army Base in Sparta, Wisconsin, as well as to increase recreational fishing opportunities through various federal, tribal, and state partnerships. In addition, they are stocked for recreational fishing opportunities for fishing events for people with disabilities, elderly adult and kids fishing days on hatchery grounds, the Veterans Administration hospital in Tomah, WI for their annual fishing event for veterans with disabilities, Chad Erickson Memorial Park for Hillview Nursing home residents and the public, Camp Decorah for Boy Scouts of America recreational fishing pond, multiple Red Lake Band of Chippewa Tribe lakes and other locations in Wisconsin and Iowa waters.   Fort McCoy is a United States Army installation and is used primarily as a military training center and a support site for military personnel and their families. The site has multiple ponds for fishing opportunities for soldiers and their families. Genoa National Fish Hatchery raises rainbow trout for spring stocking to six Fort McCoy locations: Suukjak Lake, Sandy Lake, Big Sandy Lake, Stillwell Lake, Swamp Pond, and Sparta Pond.  In 2025, Genoa NFH stocked 15,233 catchable size (11 inches) Rainbow Trout in Fort McCoy waters. The stocking of rainbow trout provides a great recreational fishing opportunity for military staff and their families as well as for Fort McCoy visitors. Currently, Rainbow Trout from the 2025-year class are in a pond and our Coldwater South building awaiting stocking in the upcoming months. Past studies have shown that when 15,000 fish are annually stocked on the base it results in 66,580 angler hours of fishing.

By: Orey Eckes

Photo: 1 year old Rainbow Trout feeding in a hatchery pond. Photo credit: Jadon Motquin/USFWS. Photo: Below: 1 year old Rainbow Trout in a hatchery pond. Photo credit: Jadon Motquin/USFWS.

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New Cohort of Hine’s Emerald Dragonfly have arrived at

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Genoa NFH

Photo: Hines Emerald eggs hanging out, waiting for spring to start. Photo credit: Beth Glidewell/USFWS

Hine’s Emerald Dragonfly eggs collected last August were transferred to Genoa NFH earlier this spring after overwintering with partners from the University of South Dakota. The eggs, from 3 maternal lines, are currently in ‘winter’ conditions in a holding chamber at the hatchery and will be slowly warmed at the end of March. The warmer conditions will initiate hatching, and we hope most larvae will have hatched by mid-April. Immediately after hatching, larvae are placed in individual culture cups and fed zooplankton filtered out of the hatchery’s ponds.

Spring pond conditions are managed for zooplankton production, which serves as food for young-of-the-year-old fish that have been produced and stocked into hatchery ponds. This large-scale production also means there are ample rotifers, daphnids, and copepod nauplii present to filter out and feed to dragonfly larvae. Dragonfly larvae are voracious predators right from the start, so the tiny hatchlings are fed zooplankton prey 3 times per week, starting the day or the day after they hatch.  After 4-6 weeks in individual culture cups, larvae are large enough for the next culture stage – mesh screened cages. Larvae were moved into these cages in late May and early June and are currently in low-flow pond water conditions in the Dragonfly Culture Trailer.

This year’s cohort is the 4th round Genoa NFH has cultured from an Illinois population, previous year’s cohorts have come from populations in Door County, Wisconsin. This Illinois population, from locations along the Des Plaines River near Chicago, is a more highly threatened population that has retained higher genetic diversity, so we hope focusing head-starting and hatchery culture efforts of these individuals will help to bolster this critical population.

By: Beth Glidewell

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Spring spawn is upon us!

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As the last of the ice thaws, Genoa National Fish Hatchery staff gear up for one of the busiest and most exciting times of year—spring spawning season. This is when we harvest our overwintered ponds, which hold a variety of fish including feeder minnows, mussel host fish, and adult spawning species such as Fathead Minnows, Largemouth Bass, Smallmouth Bass, Black Crappie, and Yellow Perch.
Adult minnows are collected and sorted, then moved to our 33-acre production pond where they will reproduce and serve as an essential food source for other fish on station. Throughout the summer, staff deploy approximately 20 cloverleaf minnow traps to capture minnows to feed hatchery fish as they grow.
Mussel host fish are transferred to hatchery buildings to support our mussel propagation program. Some are inoculated with native mussels and released into designated waterways, while others remain on station for monitoring and mussel production.
Adult spawning fish are also harvested and relocated to specific hatchery ponds where they will reproduce, producing the young-of-year fish that will grow throughout spring and be stocked in early summer and fall. Before any fish leave the facility, all fish are screened by our fish health team to ensure that we are not spreading pathogens.
Once our overwintered ponds are harvested and adult spawning fish are moved to their respective ponds, production season is officially underway!
By: Nicholas Bloomfield

Staff collecting different species of fish and sorting them into buckets. Then they will be transferred to a hatchery pond at the station. Photo credit: USFWS.

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