A local lake has a population of white perch and this lake is good for walleye and bass. Problem is the white perch are an invasive fish and they walleye and bass eggs. Since there is no limit on possession I was kinda looking to build up a fish fry with some white perch. Has anyone eaten any white perch and are they good ?

If there's a good population of Walleye and bass now there won't be for long!  I've never fished for White Perch, so I have no advice on that topic. 

The Classic Michigander 

If the walleye population is healthy they should control the perch unless they have exploded in population. Tom

i thought white perch was an ocean fish

Posted By kalang on 13 Aug 2010 09:34 AM
i thought white perch was an ocean fish

The White Perch was originally a saltwater fish, but was found to be able to live in freshwater, too.

The Classic Michigander 

i have not tried any white perch yet. i just moved to ohio last nov. and this spring i catch a dozen or so of them-- my 1st. ever-- and i catch 2 tonite when i was out fishing. i have talk to a few people about eating them and they say they can be eaten but taste a bit oily. most of them say the clean them like any other fish and deep fry them.

when looking at a white perch for the 1st time i thought that they looked a bit like a ciscoe or a small white fish. so i can't see why you couldn't fix them the same way you would them and they are not bad eating.

Yeah they pretty much destroy fish populations by eating fish eggs. They came from the Great Lakes via the Atlantic Ocean and can live in both fresh and saltwater. Did some looking up on the internet and found that white perch are related to white bass and striped bass. No recipes yet so deep fry is the way to go. From what the local bait shop told me, someone bucket stocked them into the lake (LaDue) and they've taken off. On the downside the walleye don't seem to be there in the numbers they were before. So I'm replacing walleye with white perch to help the walleye. This is the only clear water walleye lake in the area and it's fun to test some walleye tips on this lake. Oops, forgot this was for panfish, I'll let you know how the white perch taste and what everyone else thinks.

hey streets....i'm new to the area and i live just a few miles north east of ya.

make fish tacos

Mr Bill welcome to the tri lakes area. Depending on who you talk to determines the three lakes that they mean. Where are you based at ?

i'm up in ashtabula area.....i have driven down and fished east branch a couple times this spring...
i caught a couple of white perch out of the grand river a couple nites ago.

We have invasive white perch in Kansas too. They came in accidently with some striper fingerlings. They are an east coast anadromus spieces, but anywhere else they are a plague o'er the water. The length limits on predetors have been increased and bags decreased to combat these vermin. It sees to be helping, but they have a boom and bust cycle like crappie, so there is no guarantee. They are good eating, and they make (when dead) good bait for stripers, hybrids, and blue cats.

Some time ago I used to catch a lot of them in Sunken Meadow State Park on Long Island, NY. There is a brackish water wetlands and the area was filled with white perch and american eels. There were some trails through the reeds for bank access. The fish would respond to small metal lures like the kastmaster and the red and white daredevil, but the best sucess was on a mepps comet minnow, size 1. The fish would trip over themselves to hit it.

As for eating, they were damn good. easy to clean and not many bones.

Thanks to everyone on their input. Jbackos you answered the important question I had about the bones. Looks like some good fish fry coming.

we got lots of them in nj. a couple of years ago the blue gills out numbered the perch 2-1 but now the perch out number the sunnies 3-1

btw fish near cover

man,white perch are my favorite to eat! here where i live its the first fish to make its spring run up the creeks.the roe is good to eat too especially with scrambled eggs

well i don't know about you folks,, but up here in maine the white perch in our cold lakes are the best eating of all imo,,, yeeeeha,, some deep fried fresh fillets !!!! they run in a top water school and are a blast to chase around the lake and catch a feed.. and like i say, i have no idea of other folks area's,, but they don't hurt our trout and salmon, it may be due to the cold water, we also have a "splake" up here,, they have done very well and getting some decent sizes.. mmmmmmm now i'm hungry...

oh, sorry,,, a splake is a cross breed of a brook trout and a lake trout,, if yer wondering..

Posted By Givrsum on 19 Oct 2010 05:10 PM
oh, sorry,,, a splake is a cross breed of a brook trout and a lake trout,, if yer wondering..

We have Splake here in Michigan, too.  They seem to be hardy and are regularly stocked in large, cold, clear lakes (mostly in northern Michigan).

I agree with the fish tacos,

They are ok to eat but nothing like the yellow bellies, I have heard they don't freeze wel but have never tried thatl. Chunck them up and remove all the dark meat, spice it and fry it great in tacos or a toasted fish sandwich. That said I would try to find the yellow bellies. We did well 90 none less than 10" last Wednesday. We could have been done in and hour and a half but we decided to go for nothing less than ten since we were in shallow water and we were not killing the 8 and  9 inchers when we let them go. It ended up taking us about 6.5 hours.

Good luck everyone and get out and fish.