Sucker is more than just a trash fish.
I grow tired of hearing the typical thing year after year after year: Suckers are a fish only fit for using as fertilizer or worse yet, as a species to catch and do nothing with at all besides throw it aside on the bank. Catostomus comersonii or White Sucker in normal people speech is a bottom feeding fish that should have a new P.R. agent on its side to smash these crazy beliefs that people hold about them. Suckers are delicious, and hopefully I can convince you to get out and try catching them to add to recipes.
Suckers, as with every other species, serves a purpose in our world, and they are the janitors of the freshwater lakes and rivers. They clean up things that fall to the bottom. This means anything from algae to small invertebrates to aquatic plants. This does not mean that they are ‘nasty’ or ‘trash’. The tilapia that people love and enjoy throughout the entire world are bottom feeding fish. What this does mean however, is that we need to take special care from where we get our Suckers and how we prepare them for consumption. Unfortunately industrial civilization has left a rather nasty mark on our waters and as such we cannot just eat fish every day. But that in no way means that we have to forever eschew them either.
Nothin’ like a bowl of Suckers!
White Suckers are an I.U.C.N. species of least concern due to their incredible fecundity, and their incredible powers of reproduction. In everyday speech I would say “There are tons of these fish”. While sustainability is a thing I love to adhere to in every endeavor I partake of, Sucker fishing is one of those things that almost begs you to not worry about it. Each and every female in a single stream can lay up to 10,000 eggs and provided there are males(don’t worry, there are always males) you can pretty much count on hundreds of thousands of baby Suckers coming to life in every stream in your area every single year.
Nature has a way of making you want to believe in a higher power the longer you spend interacting with it. Suckers are some of the most numerous fish in North America, and they serve as prey fish for many of the major game fish that anglers go after typically. Walleye, Trout, Bass, Northern Pike, Catfish, Muskellunge are among some of the fish that enjoy eating these bottom feeders. This predator-prey dynamic moves nutrients from the bottom to the top and when the big fishes die the cleanup crew on the bottom is waiting. I love finding these systems in nature.
Humans are absolutely a part of this complex web of life and it should be no different for this fish. Historically Sucker was always a major part of spring fishing all over North America as they move from deeper lakes up into shallow rivers and streams to spawn. Native North Americans construct all sorts of unique weirs and basket traps to gain the nutrients brought in the form of a fish that comes once a year. I am here to tell you that you too should partake in this yearly tradition.
One reason that I absolutely love to interact with this species is that Sucker is a completely wild species. Sadly, most game species that people love to catch are grown in an unnatural environment and then released into their environment giving people the impression that there is much more abundance than there actually is. Suckers are not stocked species. Their natural abundance is enough. Maybe that means nothing to you, or even to most people, but to me the fact that Suckers are completely wild and free and adapted to their ecosystem is such a treasure to my psyche.
Where to find White Suckers, and how to get them!
Depending on how far south you are Suckers should start their runs as early as March or in places like the Upper Peninsula of Michigan as late as May. There seems to be some debate as to what causes the spawn run to initiate, but there is some consensus that water temperature plays a role. Where I live, not far from Lake Michigan we can expect the spawn run to begin in early to mid April and last for approximately 6 weeks. During this time the Suckers of breeding age will emerge from the depths of Lake Michigan and fill every lake and stream coming off of this Great Lake. I personally visit 3-4 different streams each and every April to make sure we have an adequate supply for the year to come.
Most people where I live catch them using a rod and reel with a worm on the bottom. I find this method to be slow and you must rely on the hunger of the suckers in order to make sure you are able to bring some home. Rod and reel is more ‘sporting’ and less about bringing home food to eat. I can appreciate people using that method but in my family we use nets. Our typical family approach goes something like this: out of the 5 of us three will don waders and get into the creek with our handheld nets. Most of the time we have two chasers and one catcher. The catcher positions him or herself in a good narrow spot and puts the net into the water, while the chasers starting from far away chase fish toward the catcher. It is not uncommon to catch 5 fish in a single swipe of the net. Last year I caught 9 in one swipe.
Catching fish with nets typically requires that you find what we call a choke point. If you are in a river 20 feet wide your chances of catching a fleeing Sucker are very low. We like to look for creeks that narrow down to as close to four or five feet as possible. With more people it is entirely possible to catch fish with nets in bigger openings, but if you are going to give it a whirl I suggest you begin with small creeks and streams.
Across the country where legal(it is not legal where I live) people also use spears and/or fishing bows to secure their Suckers. Some places in the South also allow snagging as a viable option. This is where you use a big hook and actually drag the hook over the tops of a group of suckers in hopes of ‘snagging’ one. This is not legal where I live. Always make sure to have a valid fishing license and know the regulations surrounding any fish you are intending to harvest.
After the fish are caught and their innards are removed I do the same basic thing with every Sucker I catch; first I filet both sides of the fish making sure to obtain as much of the meat as possible and not be wasteful of an animal I just killed. The next step is to use a fish skinner to remove the skin(Pictured below). This step is important because of the basic fact that most toxins found in freshwater lakes and streams accumulate in the fat and the skin and the organs of these animals. Discarding as much of the fat and skin as possible will help you avoid the aforementioned toxins. Once all of your fish are cleaned, filleted and the skin has been removed you can go a few different ways, but I will suggest you pressure can these fish.
This tool is a godsend for people like myself that are not accurate with fish skin removal with a knife.
Suckers are very boney fishes! Pressure canning them however kindly relieves them of this pesky feature and makes them almost acquire the taste of canned Tuna. I like to add 2 or 3 Wild Leek bulbs (Allium tricoccum) to every single jar and this gives them a slightly oniony or garlicky flavor which my family seems to love. My gal Madelyn Walters from Bloom Wildcraft has come up with a Sucker Noodle Casserole dish that I think is absolutely wonderful. Usually there is nothing leftover as the entire family seems to swoop in and eat any remaining morsel.
One aspect of this life that I have really come to love is the circle of the seasons and the regularity in which things come back into my life. Suckers are a dependable fish that seem to never waver in their ability to feed us humans. I am very thankful that in all the chaos of this world, with so many species of fish that are at low numbers that this species remains abundant. Maybe you too will fall in love with this fish this spring. If you do, please share your thoughts and comments with me down below. And never forget to have thankfulness in your heart when engaging with any species in this beautiful world.
Thank you for reading this blog! If you enjoyed reading this blog and you would like to support me and my writing endeavors then all I ask is that you click through any of the amazon links on my website (like the one below) and do any shopping that you normally do. While this little step costs you nothing, Amazon will give me a tiny percent of anything you buy on their website thus helping fund my efforts!
