Wildlife
With the probable exception of the Delaware River, Lake Hopatcong is home to the greatest variety of gamefish species of any waterway in New Jersey.
Several species of trout are stocked each year, although they have not typically held over and survived the summers, due to an absence of cold, deep, oxygenated pockets of water in the lake. Largemouth bass, smallmouth bass, sunfish, yellow and white perch, rock bass, bluegill, crappie, chain pickerel, channel catfish, bullhead, and carp all inhabit the lake. Eels also have been caught. Hybrid striped bass, walleye, and most recently, muskellunge have all been stocked successfully within the last few decades and now are thriving. Catfish also are stocked from time to time. The main forage is the abundant alewife herring, (Clupea vernalis), the basis of the lake's fish food chain.
Read more about this topic: Lake Hopatcong
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