Louisiana drops 10,000 fingerling redfish at Fort Pike into the Rigolets

About 10,000 fingerling red drum went into the Rigolets at Fort Pike on Friday morning, Sept. 18. The fish, flushed from a hatchery tank into the shallows beside the fort, are a separate drop from the West Cove release on Calcasieu Lake already on this desk.

The pilot has now put more than 150,000 red drum, about 2.5 to 4 inches long, into West Cove, Grand Isle, and the Rigolets. Randy Pausina’s Recreational Fisheries Research Institute and CCA Louisiana are running it under a Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries permit. The state is not paying for the fish. Pausina put the cost at about $6 each. Broodstock came from wild Louisiana redfish; Southeastern Louisiana University is keeping the genetic record so later sampling can tell stocked fish from wild ones.

LDWF deputy assistant secretary Chris Schieble called the work a pilot test of whether red drum stocking works off Louisiana, not a fix for every problem in the stock. The recreational bag was already cut in 2024, from five fish to four, with the slot moved to 18–27 inches. Survival and contribution still have to show up in the sampling before anyone treats hatchery fish as the management plan.

Photo: Sophia Germer / NOLA.com.

This is a The Gillnet news desk summary, not a reprint.

Source: NOLA.com — Louisiana begins stocking redfish in its coastal waters (Mike Smith, The Advocate, Sept. 21, 2026).