Laserfiche WebLink
fish for mink food from 1930 until 1950. According to his records on the <br />Gunnison, he took 50 squawfish and a large number of Razorback suckers in <br />one of the better years (Ralph Vernon, Personal Communication, 1976). <br />Table 1 presents a summary of data collected in the five Gunnison River <br />sampling areas.- These five sampling sections are shown graphically on Figure f. <br />i" <br />A rating of relative abundance of each fish species shown in Table 1 <br />reflects the best expert judgement of N.F.R.I. on the present status of Gunni- <br />son River fishes. <br />The most common large species of fish captured during this segment of <br />the study in order of decreasing numbers were: F-lannelmouth sucker, Blue- <br />head sucker, and Roundtail chub. No federally classified endangered fish <br />species were captured. Razorback suckers classified as endangered by the <br />state of Colorado were observed in the lower reaches of the study near Grand <br />Junction. Also, a Razorback sucker was taken from the Gunnison River in <br />1975 near Delta, Colorado. <br />With exception of the Colorado Squawfish and Razorback sucker, the other <br />native species of fish are faring quite well in the Gunnison River. It <br />must be noted here that N.F.R.I. does not consider the Gunnison River as <br />historic habitat for the B onytail or fi.umpback chubs. <br />Many of the exotic or introduced fish species were found to be abundant <br />to common in all sampling sections. The smaller species such as dace, shiners <br />and minnows are the most numerous introduced species now found in the Gunnison <br />River. Game fish such as trout were found only in the uppermost section near <br />Delta, while catfish were considered common only in the lowermost section near <br />Grand Junction. <br />Age-growth data for fish in the Gunnison River near Delta is presented <br />in Table 2. <br />(13)