William Robinson of Rogers is the winner of the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission's 2022-23 winter tagged trout promotion. His name was picked March 17 in a random drawing of anglers who caught a trout with a Game and Fish special tag.
Robinson receives a free half-day guided fishing trip on the White River for up to six anglers, including a free night's stay at White River Family Fishing of Arkansas lodge and a traditional shore lunch fish fry on the river during the day of fishing.
Robinson caught his prize-winning fish from Lake Atalanta in Rogers on Feb. 11.
In addition to the grand prize winner, three more anglers won guided fishing trips. The anglers will be able to bring up to three additional anglers for a day of fishing on the Little Red River below Greers Ferry Dam. They are Eric Pace of Conway, Tom Gatting of Hot Springs and Hugh Kynerd of Bartlett, Tenn.
The staff at the Game and Fish Jim Hinkle Spring River State Fish Hatchery raised and delivered roughly 50,000 catchable-size rainbow trout to Family and Community Fishing Program ponds throughout the state last winter. The Jim Collins Net Pen Facility on the west end of Lake Ouachita provided an additional 3,500 keeper-size trout to program ponds.
Special tags were placed 335 trout, which anglers could mail in to be eligible for the drawing to claim one of the fishing trips on Arkansas's trout tailwaters.