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THE STATE LIST, READ WHOLE · 1966–2024
The list: The Local Animals section documents that in 1972 the state's whole-river survey found its richest water at Mishawaka — the highest game-fish count and the highest total catch of its fifty-two stations at the Mishawaka Impoundment. No Indiana state record fish comes out of Mishawaka's water. The county's one entry on the list is a bullhead — 4 pounds 14.4 ounces, taken by Darren Robertson in 1994, at Potato Creek State Park, a pond fish from the county's west side, not a river fish from this city. The river itself does hold a state record, one state too far down: Michigan's record flathead catfish, 53.35 pounds and 48 inches, taken on 29 May 2022 by Lloyd Tanner of Hobart, Indiana, from the St. Joe River in Berrien County, Michigan — the same river, downstream, verified by a Michigan DNR biologist, breaking a 52-pound record set through the ice in 2014. The Mishawaka reach's documented distinction therefore stands where the survey put it: not the biggest single fish, but the richest counted water on the river in 1972 — a survey's finding, at a survey's strength, pointed to its home section rather than inflated into a record it never was.
Sources: Indiana Department of Natural Resources, Indiana Record Fish Program — the state record list read whole: no Mishawaka-water entry; the county's entry, Bullhead, 4 lb 14.4 oz, Potato Creek State Park, St. Joseph County, Darren Robertson, 1994. Michigan Department of Natural Resources (release of June 2022) — the Michigan state-record flathead catfish, 53.35 lb, 48 in, Lloyd Tanner of Hobart, St. Joe River, Berrien County, 29 May 2022, verified by Jay Wesley, MDNR. The Local Animals section of this history — the 1972 whole-river survey: 52 stations, highest game-fish count and highest total catch (300 fish) at the Mishawaka Impoundment.