Crochet’s Every Fish Matters banquet raises $$$ to stock bass in, around Basin

Published 12:00 am Wednesday, July 31, 2024

NAPLEONVILLE – South Louisiana outdoorsmen and outdoorswomen made another investment in the future of bass fishing July 25.

Nearly 300 people attended the 3rd annual Every Fish Matters Conservation Banquet that Thursday night here at the Assumption Parish Community Center. They paid $50 at the door for a night of camaraderie, a bite to eat among like-minded bass anglers, mostly, and raise money to buy bass fingerlings.

It’ll pay off next spring when thousands of largemouth bass fingerlings are delivered to Veterans Park-Assumption Parish District #2 to Every Fish Matters Foundation founder Cliff “The Cajun Baby” Crochet and dozens of volunteers who distribute, or stock, them around Lake Verret and in the Atchafalaya Basin. Like Crochet has done the past two springs, baby bass will be ordered from the American Sport Fish Hatchery in Alabama to make a new home in the heart of the Sportsman’s Paradise.

Crochet’s inaugural fundraiser was held July 28, 2022, in a church hall in Pierre Part. That successful event took in $82,000 and Every Fish Matters was off and running with two fish release events in Spring 2022, March 26 (15,000 2-inch long F1 “Tiger bass” fingerlings) out of Doiron’s Landing, Stephensville, and April 15 (50,000 1.5-inch F1s) at the park in Pierre Part.

The 2nd annual Every Fish Matters Conservation Banquet was moved to the local community center, a much larger site, and drew approximately 400 people. Most of the money raised purchased 82,000 pure largemouth bass fingerlings that were released May 11. (Crochet wisely put some of the money aside for a rainy day, so to speak, such as another hurricane that wipes out the bass population like Hurricane Andrew did in 1992.)

After the recent banquet, Crochet thanked the banquet-goers, sponsors and volunteers who combined to make it another successful event “for the waters that we all love. Can’t wait … for our spring release.”

What has been called the biggest private project of its kind in the country got its start with a germ of an idea during Winter 2021-22. Crochet, a veteran bass fishing pro who fishes the Major League Fishing Bass Pro Tour, shared a plan with family, friends and the community to stock the region’s waters with fingerlings.

“Every Fish Matters began when I realized something needed to happen because nothing was going on. OK, so raise some money, get as many fish as possible and as many fishermen involved as possible, the more raised, the more fish,” Crochet said in The Advocate posted following the latest banquet that also featured TikTok chef Stalekracker, whose actual name is Justin Chiasson.

“We needed to kick the ant pile. It was more than about fish. It was promoting conservation groups to go to Wildlife and Fisheries and ask questions. It turned out we wanted to bring the whole issue (about the Atchafalaya Basin) to someone who could help,” he said.

At this spring’s stocking, while being interviewed on site by WAFB-TV, Channel 9, he said, “The whole focus of the project is conservation and giving back to the resource. Our first goal is to get to 1 million.”

Every Fish Matters also is raising awareness. That was documented two nights before the banquet when nearly 200 attended a public meeting in Baton Rouge called by the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries to discuss the status of the Atchafalaya Basin and its fishery. After a fisheries biologist’s presentation showing declines in the bass population, LDWF officials heard comments and questions about the nation’s last great overflow swamp.

Hopefully something will be done, soon, to start righting the wrongs in the Atchafalaya Basin. Crochet said that’s what it’s all about.

“Water quality is the main point in the whole discussion. (Fish) stocking is what got us to this point, to raise awareness and take steps to get back to what the Basin can be. At least we’re trying and not sitting on our hands and waiting for someone else to do it. That’s what South Louisiana people do,” he said in The Advocate story written by Joe Macaluso.