Key Ingredients Michigan Foodways

Cheboygan Foodways: Fast Facts

Pentamere winery

Lake Whitefish is a major industry along the Straits of Mackinac. About 400,000 pounds of the fish were harvested east of the Mackinac bridge and in the Cheboygan area of Lake Huron in 2005.

Whitefish & Fishing
Commercial fishing of Whitefish along the Straits of Mackinac is a major industry. In 2005, more than one million pounds of whitefish were harvested in the Mackinac Straits area of Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. In the area near St. Ignace, west of the Mackinac Bridge and stretching east to Marquette Island in the Les Cheneaux Islands and south to Cheboygan, 400,000 pounds of whitefish were harvested in 2005. The value of the local fishery in 2005 was estimated at $2.2 million. When whitefish conditions were at their peak in the early 1990s, the local fishery brought an estimated $7.65 million into the community's economy.

In recent years, Lake Huron whitefish have not had enough body fat to make a good smoked fish, and thus driving local market prices down to about $0.75 per pound. Invasive species, including zebra mussels, quagga mussels, and round gobies have reduced the food supply of whitefish and other native fish. It has made this fish stock less attracive to the major markets of Chicago, New York, and Detroit. According to Mark Ebener of the Intertribal Fisheries and Assessment Program, "current decline in whitefish quality is owing to a shrinking food supply that came at a time when the population was teeming. Whitefish populations were burgeoning in the early 1990s, just as zebra mussels were beginning to get established in the lakes. The fish population was probably due for a natural decline at the same time that its food source virtually disappeared."

Maple Syrup
For 50 years, Cheboygan's Lowell Beethem has been in the syrup business. He and his family have an operation which consists of a 5x14 wood-fired pan with approximately 1600 trees. Beetham's production is small, in part due to the smaller-sized trees on his property. The operation produces approximately 250 gallons of syrup per year. The produce is sold out of the family home, local farmers’ market and several roadside stands. Beethem also produces and sells maple candy.

Native Americans in the area have been harvesting maple syrup in the area for hundreds of years.

References:

Brisson, L. (2006). Cheboygan Key Ingredients Michigan Foodways 2007-2008 Application.

Northern Michigan Maple Syrup. (2006). Spring 2006 Newsletter. [online resource]

Paquin, E. (2006). Lake Invaders Stress EUP Commercial Fishery. St. Ignace News. March 23, 2006.

Paquin, E. (2006). Weighing the Value of the EUP Commercial Fishery. St. Ignace News. March 23, 2006.

Key Ingredients Michigan Foodways
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