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stated that fishing in Twin Lakes is "tolerably good" but the trout are small. In 1885 the Colorado Fish Commission commenced taking eggs from trout at Twin Lakes. Judge Louis B. France of Denver, writing under the pen name of "Bourgeois," described a trip to Twin Lakes in 1885 in the American Angler. He described a trout used in the spawning operation with very small, pepper- like spots, characteristic of yellowfin trout, but added a note of confusion by emphasizing their "green backs." In contrast to the reports of the catch- ing of hundreds of trout per day 10 years before, Judge France found trout fishing in Twin Lakes to be abysmally poor in 1885 and characterized the lakes as a "sucker hole" in need of stocking. In 1875 the official population of Leadville was zero; by 1880 it was 25,000. This historical period would be instructive for the assessment of potential present impacts on fish and wildlife from overexploitation caused by instant boom towns. The discovery of the large yellowfin trout is first mentioned in the 1885- 86 report of the Colorado Fish Commissioner, General John Pierce. Commissioner Pierce's remarks were published in the 1885 Report of the U.S. Fish Comission- er and probably influenced the decision to construct the first federal trout hatchery west of the Mississippi at Leadville near Twin Lakes to serve as a source of cutthroat trout eggs for distribution around the country. David Starr Jordan believed that the cutthroat trout was superior to the rainbow trout as the species for mass propagation. His opinion was accepted by the U.S. Fish Commissioner (Marshall MacDonald, in whose honor Jordan named the yellowfin trout macdonaldi) and Pierce's report of an abundance of large (4 to 10 pounds) trout in Twin Lakes for propagation led to the construction of the Leadville hatchery and the first federal involvement with the propagation of cutthroat trout. From 1891 through 1897 both greenback trout and yellowfin trout eggs were II