Michigan Department of Conservation
Research and Development Report No. 75
Institute for Fisheries Research Report No. 1727, 1966
The Michigan General Creel Census for 1964
Grace G. Hubbell
(Preface by Gerald P. Cooper: This is presumably the last of a long series of annual reports on the General Creel Census of angling in Michigan. The census was started in 1927 largely under the urging of one of our early and most illustrious Commissioners of Conservation, William H. Loutit of Grand Haven. From the beginning the census records have been gathered in the field by Conservation Officers as part of their regular duties. The officers are to be commended for their conscientious efforts in this work.)
The 1964 General Creel Census was the thirty-eighth such census made by conservation officers and it is the last, as explained above. The purpose of the census was to secure a sample of sport fishing from all types of water throughout the state. It does not include creel records from special research projects of the Research and Development Division.
During 1964 the officers procured records of 59,584 fishing trips. The waters fished were divided into three main categories—trout, nontrout and Great Lakes waters; each group being subdivided into lakes and streams. It is believed that this tabulation of the data gives the best available indication of the fishing quality and, to some degree, fishing intensity in the six types of waters administered by the state.
The number of anglers interviewed were as follows: (1) trout waters, 8,179 (14% of all anglers interviewed), of whom 2,462 fished in designated trout lakes and special trout ponds and 5,717 fished in streams; (2) nontrout waters, 46,769 (78%), of whom 40,968 fished in lakes and 5,801 fished in streams; (3) Great Lakes waters, 4,636 (8%), of whom 2,951 fished in the Great Lakes and 1,685 fished in the connecting waters.
Of the 59,584 anglers interviewed, 7,922 (13%) were nonresidents; 9,113 (15%) were women.
Anglers interviewed either while fishing or at the end of a fishing trip. Hence, this census is a partial rather than a complete record of the 59,584 angler trips. Also, it represents fewer than 59,584 individual anglers as some may have been interviewed on more than one fishing trip. Only legal-size fish caught by sport fishermen are included in this summary.