The following 2 quotes from the article sheds alot of light on why the survival rate of the newly hatched walleyes may be suffering.

QUOTE~
"Instead, the drought reduced lakewide productivity (algae and zooplankton production) and turbidity (muddiness), which are factors that offer the best feeding conditions for fry while minimizing predation from white perch, alewife, and (rainbow) smelt.

These invasive species have been shown to have higher survival rates during mild, ice-free winters, such as we had last year. When they are abundant, they take a higher toll on eggs and fry."



"Hartman pointed out that after the zebra mussel infestation in 1988, Lake Erie can no longer consistently support the higher numbers of fish possible prior to the invasion of this exotic species. Lake Erie frequently produced Ohio harvests in excess of 4 million walleyes per year from a population that may have been over 70-80 million strong." ~UNQUOTE


Slot limits would only benefit the Canadian Gill netting industry as they much prefer those fish in the 18" to 24" range as they bring premium prices vs. the larger 25+" fish and they take up much less space in the gill tugs storage lockers than those larger fish do. The lake Erie fisheries Management unit which determines the total allowable catch would never be able to convince the Canadians to only target those fish outside the slot bracket if that would even be a possiblity to target just the larger fish in the first place.