If you have noticed fewer yellow perch on your line this summer off Port Stanley or Port Burwell, you are not imagining it.
Lake Erie’s yellow perch stock in the waters off Elgin County have fallen to the lowest level on record in the lake’s long-running assessment, and fishery managers responded this spring with the steepest quota cut anywhere on Lake Erie.
The Great Lakes Fishery Commission‘s Lake Erie Committee sets a total allowable commercial catch for perch every year and splits the lake into four management units. Local waters, including Port Stanley, Port Burwell, and Port Bruce fall within Management Unit 3. In late March 2026, the committee cut MU3’s perch quota 40 percent, to 1.274 million pounds, the steepest cut of any of the lake’s four units. Ontario’s share of that quota is 666,000 pounds. That quota, like all of Ontario’s perch allocation, goes entirely to the commercial fishery, not to sport fishing anglers.
Lakewide, the committee’s total perch catch limit fell from 5.866 million pounds in 2025 to 4.365 million pounds this year, a drop of 25.6 percent. MU1 and MU2 were each cut 20 percent, to 1.831 million and 778,000 pounds. MU4, the report’s Eastern Basin unit, held flat at 482,000 pounds. No other unit was cut anywhere near as hard.
The cut follows a stock assessment released in a March 2026 report from the commission’s Yellow Perch Task Group. The report ranked MU3’s perch population at the bottom of the scale it uses to track the stock over time, its lowest point yet. In 2025, before this year’s deeper cut, Ontario’s commercial fishers landed only 59 percent of their MU3 quota.
Capt. Ryan Morgan runs RnR Fishing Charters out of Port Stanley for sportfishing, and says the perch bite this season has been very poor compared to past years. He often runs sonar in the evenings while guiding scenic tours along the bluffs east of the harbour, and in past years, he says, the sonar screen would show large schools of perch holding close to shore. This year, they have been gone since late May.
He calls 2025 a record-breaking season for his own charters in the central basin, and says 2026 is shaping up to be even better. He points to the fish showing on his electronics, how fast mature walleye are coming in, and similar reports from other captains and anglers. He has also seen and heard reports of far more walleye being caught from shore off local piers, including Port Bruce, where anglers used to catch perch just a few years ago. Morgan believes the biggest driver is a boom in young walleye from several strong hatch years reaching maturity and preying on perch, along with colder deep water this season that kept walleye inshore longer than usual. This season, he says, large walleye have crowded into the shallow water where perch used to gather, which he thinks has pushed the perch to scatter or move elsewhere. He normally starts moving his charters out to deeper summer waters by early July, he says, but this year did not begin that shift until late in the month.
Further east in Port Burwell, Capt. Mike Bowman of South Coast Charters is seeing something similar. He believes perch numbers are down or have moved elsewhere in the lake, and says the commercial boats he hears from report them as definitely down. Walleye (pickerel), meanwhile, are up, averaging around two to three pounds this year. He is also seeing plenty of smaller fish coming up, which he calls a good sign for future seasons. Still, he worries there may not be enough food in the lake for all of them to grow. He says the lake flipped cooler after last week’s storms, and he is watching for a rapid drop in oxygen that could push fish out of the area as fast as they arrived.
If you are still fishing for perch yourself, the season runs all year. A Sport licence allows 50 a day and 100 in possession. A Conservation licence allows 25 a day and 50 in possession.
Sources: Great Lakes Fishery Commission: Report of the Lake Erie Yellow Perch Task Group, March 2026, Sandusky Register: report on the Lake Erie Committee’s 2026 quota decision, April 5, 2026, Ontario Fishing Regulations Summary: Fisheries Management Zone 19
By Anthony Zruna · About the LocVox Newsroom
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