Splake Splake The splake or slake ("Salvelinus namaycush x Salvelinus fontinalis") is a hybrid of two fish species resulting from the crossing of a male brook trout ("Salvelinus fontinalis") and a female lake trout ("Salvelinus namaycush"). The name itself is a portmanteau of speckled trout (another name for brook trout) and lake trout, and may have been used to describe such hybrids as early as the 1880s. Hybrids of the male lake trout with the female brook trout (the so-called "brookinaw") have also been produced, but are not as successful. The intrageneric hybrid is of the genus "Salvelinus" and, hence, is
Splake in an effort to replace collapsed lake trout stocks in the Great Lakes. Due to mediocre results, the experiment never really progressed beyond Georgian Bay. The theory was that splake would grow more quickly and mature sooner than lake trout with the hope that they would be able to reproduce before being attacked by the invasive sea lamprey. Unfortunately, although splake are relatively unusual among hybrids in that they are fertile, fertility in nature is behaviourally problematic—very few natural progeny are produced by introduced splake populations. After some experimentation in the late 1970s, stocking in the Great Lakes and, especially,