Why does DNR use food laced with antibiotics...is it that hard to keep trout healthy? I don't know if that should be a concern or not. I suppose it's fine. I don't know if DNR is still doing it, but they used to do it frequently.

I would suspect that they have way too much to lose if a disease takes hold in a hatchery

Probably so.

Antibiotics are used when there is a bacterial problem like cold water disease or columnaris in trout. The use is heavily regulated and prescribed by a veterinarian, probably the state vet in your state. FDA withdrawal periods are adhered to to ensure that the antibiotic is not detectable when fish are stocked and consumed. All approved aquaculture drug withdrawal times are determined by species since trout might metabolize them at a different rate than tilapia, the testing takes years for approval. There is a lot of antibiotic conspiracy theorists out there but I’ll bet you are safe to eat them. No different than any other livestock drug use, fish get sick just like cattle.

Most commercial fish feed in Europe has antibiotics in it. Farmed salmon from northern Europe and Norway is some of the worst. Wild salmon sells for about 60 bucks a pound here.

Pete

When ever fish are given drugs, they have to be held in the hatchery for a prescribed amount of time before they can be stocked into the wild.They are not given drugs close to stocking time because of the time wait.

That's good to know. I was told to eat more protein and I'm thinking I may increase the level of trout in my diet.

Finding good fish at the store is tough. Too often the fish is from China.
And I heard some farm fish are given growth hormones, but that may not be the worst thing, I don't know.

at the store, we only buy wild caught
I will eat some stocked trout during the year, State probably does use antibiotics but i dont let it worry me....not for the number
of them I may eat a year

It doesn't surprise me at all.

Buy the time a white mushy meat trout turns orange the antibiotics should be long gone, stock trout are not much good to eat, until they turn orange

Without antibiotics in our lives, many of us wouldn't be alive today...myself included. I have bigger problems to worry about.

I'm looking forward to catching some stocked trout coming up early next month. They are good eaters, & good protein. With the challenges of grocery shopping during the COVID lock down, trout are sounding pretty good right about now

You can get plenty of protein from beans and vegetables and not worry about the antibiotics. Just the pesticides.

Our Sportsmen’s Club is a co op hatchery with the fish commission. They raise about 20,000+ trout a year. There are several antibiotics applied every season. Several years ago, there was an outbreak of gill lice and everything had to be destroyed. We had to switch from brook trout to rainbows as a result.

The trout are raised in raceways on a mountain stream. They are kinda in between the taste of a wild trout and a state stocked fish. I keep them and pan fry them about once a week. I won’t keep a mushy state stocked fish.