Armstrong fish hatchery severely Impacted by Helene: Commission responds to continue Public Mountain Trout program
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The North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission’s (NCWRC) Armstrong State Fish Hatchery in McDowell County north of Marion sustained significant damage as a result of flooding and landslides during Hurricane Helene.
Some of the hatchery’s trout escaped during the flooding; however, most of the 600,000 fish of various sizes died when the storm compromised the water supply to the raceways and hatchery building. Currently, Armstrong State Fish Hatchery is closed indefinitely. Fisheries staff along with agency engineers continue to assess the damage and are developing plans to return the hatchery to normal operations.
While the damage to Armstrong is significant and will require extensive repairs to restore operations, the Bobby N. Setzer, Table Rock and Marion State Fish hatcheries received limited damage and are fully operational. Therefore, the Commission has decided to temporarily delay the already planned renovation to the Bobby N. Setzer State Fish Hatchery until the Armstrong is back fully operational to ensure stocking in Public Mountain Trout Waters, and staff at Setzer have begun to ramp trout production back up to full speed.
Delayed Harvest Trout Water locations that will be stocked can be found at ncwildlife.org/trout.
As information becomes available regarding Armstrong State Fish Hatchery’s restoration and future Public Mountain Trout Waters stockings it will be posted on the agency’s website at ncwildlife.org/trout.
