Fisheries, Aquaculture and Aquatic Sciences Celebrate 75 Years at Southern Illinois University Carbondale

The Center for Fisheries, Aquaculture, and Aquatic Sciences at Southern Illinois University Carbondale just celebrated its 75th birthday.

Nearly 200 alumni, students and friends of the Center gathered in southern Illinois this March to tour the Center’s facilities at Southern Illinois University Carbondale (SIU), enjoy talks by alumni, and learn about current research conducted by SIU students. Highlights of the event included an open house at the 8,000 square-foot Saluki Aquarium wet lab facility in SIU’s Gower Translational Research Center showcasing live corals, aquaponics, and farmed sportfish, demonstrations of the Center’s boats and field equipment, a celebratory dinner hosted by SIU at Giant City State Park Lodge, and family fishing and music at the Center’s 100-acre, 90-pond research facility and lake adjacent to the park. Sage Thole, a SIU student who helps curate the Saluki Aquarium, was excited to host the Center’s guests and tell them about the unique experiences that SIU provides. “It’s nice to have hands-on experience with the species we work with. That’s not something a lot of universities offer.”

This anniversary celebration was only possible because of the vision and hard work of the Center’s first Director, Dr. William M. Lewis. In 1949, Lewis was a newly minted PhD in fisheries biology at Iowa State University when he was hand-picked by SIU’s visionary president, Dr. Delyte Morris, to train a new generation of fisheries managers and help Illinois grow economically. Morris and Lewis recognized that recreational fishing and private fish farms benefit local businesses, especially in southern Illinois. They were right. Sportfishing generates greater than $1 billion of annual economic activity in the state. Fish farms produce more than $5 million in aquaculture sales each year, creating regional economic opportunities that propagate throughout the region. During his long tenure at SIU, Lewis was able to see the investments by SIU, the state and other agency partners to the program pay off. He and his students produced hundreds of publications and outreach activities that fueled innovative fisheries management and aquaculture in the state.

After retiring in 1983, Lewis remained active in research and continued cultivating his fish farms. He set a trajectory for success at SIU that continues today. The Center now includes full-time faculty members in fisheries biology, aquaculture, aquatic toxicology, and fish genetics who train about 15 full-time graduate students annually and teach many upper-level undergraduate and graduate courses in aquatic sciences. Since 2000, the core faculty of the Center have published more than 1,100 peer-reviewed research articles. Many research initiatives that Lewis began more than 50 years ago, such as backwater rehabilitation of large rivers, continue to be pursued by SIU researchers today.

Maintaining a diverse and meaningful research portfolio has contributed to the Center’s longevity.

“We are the people that natural resources agencies go to help with research in their areas,” said Shane Kemp, an alumnus and current researcher at SIU.

The Center averages $1 million annually in grants and contracts from federal, state and private sources. In the state, the Center contributes to projects that help the Illinois Department of Natural Resources control invasive bighead carp and manage sportfish. Research extends nationally and internationally, including contaminant mitigation in chinook salmon stocks on the west coast, conservation of endangered sturgeon in the Missouri and Mississippi rivers, drone monitoring of outdoor pond rearing facilities, and developing indoor farming systems for intensive culture of marine shrimp.

During the past 75 years, Center faculty and students have played important leadership roles in the profession of fisheries and aquaculture. Three of the Center’s faculty scientists, Drs. Bill Lewis, Chris Kohler and Jesse Trushenski, have been elected by their peers as Presidents of the 156-year-old, internationally recognized American Fisheries Society (AFS). The path to the AFS presidency is a multiple-year commitment, where elected officers serve on the society’s executive committee and travel across the country to work with the society’s geographic divisions. In 1963, SIU played a crucial part in the founding of the Illinois Chapter of the AFS when the state’s fisheries professionals held the chapter’s first meeting in Carbondale. Numerous Center students have held or currently occupy positions across the world as fisheries chiefs, academic deans, agency directors, policy advisers and industry executives. Countless others serve as lifelong stewards of fisheries natural resources and aquaculture operations on several continents. SIU has long played a leadership role within the USDA North Central Regional Aquaculture Center and other directorial boards such as the Pallid Sturgeon Recovery Conservation Team with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The Center’s 75th anniversary celebration featured two accomplished alumni who represented distinct eras at SIU. Dr. Hal Schramm, retired Unit Leader of the Mississippi State University Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, graduated from SIU in 1977 under the supervision of Dr. Bill Lewis. He has accomplished much professionally in the conservation of Mississippi River habitat and is a world-renowned expert on the management of sportfishes. He contributes regularly to the In-Fisherman and North American Fisherman media outlets, when he is not fishing, of course. Dr. Rob Colombo completed his PhD at SIU in 2007 under the direction of Drs. Roy Heidinger and Jim Garvey. After graduating, he grew his own fisheries research and training program as Professor of Biological Sciences and Director of the Center for Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences at Eastern Illinois University. Rob and his students at EIU contribute markedly to fisheries management in Illinois and throughout the US. Rob is an expert in stream and river fisheries biology, with a thriving long-term research program sponsored by the Illinois Department of Natural Resources and other agencies. He first assessed the Wabash River’s phenomenal catfish fishery as a graduate student at SIU and continues this research today. The academic connection between SIU and EIU has led to regional research collaborations that benefit Illinois’ natural-resources students. Similar connections among SIU, Illinois universities, state agencies and the Illinois Natural History Survey–Prairie Research Institute foster opportunities for conservation and management of fishes in the state.

Many of the students and alumni who attended the 75th anniversary celebration are practicing aquaculturists who trace their love of fish back to SIU. In the Center’s labs and outdoor ponds, the students develop a unique bond with the fish under their care.

“I really enjoy seeing the personalities of each of our species,” said Sage Thole about working in the Saluki Aquarium facility. “You wouldn’t think they have a big personality. But each one, you can know they can tell who you are when you come to see them.”

This tradition of fish-keeping led the Illinois state legislature to recognize SIU as the state’s aquaculture center in 1989, with the Center having the only aquaculture program recognized by the Illinois Board of Higher Education since 1992. Many SIU graduate students are leaders within the state’s hatchery program which produces warm- and cool-water fishes for recreation and conservation in Illinois. Dr. David Bergerhouse, a SIU graduate, oversees a 42-year-old hatchery run jointly by SIU and Constellation Energy near Cordova, whose primary mission is to enhance native fishes of the Mississippi River through stocking. The Center assists the state by monitoring diseases such as viral hemorrhagic septicemia to keep wild and farmed fish safe. Through the efforts of fish-farming specialist Paul Hitchens, SIU has helped Illinois fish farmers grow, harvest, and market nearly a million pounds of fish and prawns annually for more than 20 years via the Illinois Aquaculture Technical Service Program. Demand for farmed fish exceeds supply each year, meaning that there is much opportunity for this industry to grow in Illinois.

In their speeches to the crowded room at Giant City Lodge, alumni Hal Schramm and Rob Colombo were visibly emotional when looking back at their times at SIU. Schramm held up a dog-eared copy of a classic fisheries stock assessment book and noted how much he had learned about fish at SIU. The Center’s educational tradition continues. Colombo, who graduated 30 years after Schramm, echoed Schramm’s sentiment. The speakers agreed that the camaraderie among the students and their lifelong relationships ensure that the Center punches well above its weight in the tight-knit network of fisheries professionals throughout the world.

Larry Wawronowicz, alumnus and retired Natural Resource Director for the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians in Waaswaaganing said of the event, “It was most enjoyable to see the young ones engaged in the Center’s activities and explaining their work…that makes me smile.”