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INTRODUCTION <br />Study Site <br />Tusher Wash Diversion Dam is an 840-foot long dam that spans the width of the Green <br />River approximately 8 river miles north of the town of Green River, Utah (Figure 1). This <br />structure was built in 1906 and consisted of wood cribbing filled with rock. A concrete cap was <br />poured on the 12 foot wide structure in 1936, and this configuration is still in place. The 8-foot <br />high diversion dam was designed to force water into a canal on the west side of the river and past <br />a water wheel on the east side of the river (Figure 2). The sluiceway on the east side of the river, <br />which feeds the water wheel, is 11-feet wide and approximately 3-feet deep. The water wheel is <br />in operating condition, but was only used for a few days during 1998 (personal observation). <br />Another sluiceway is located near the center of the dam. This notch is about 150-feet long and <br />0.5-feet deep. <br />Flow measurement devices are not used on any of the irrigation or power generation <br />facilities. However, estimates suggest that approximately 715 cubic feet per second (cfs) of <br />water from the Green River enters the canal system on the west side of the river, when all <br />components of the system are operating at full capacity. After flowing approximately 2,500 feet <br />down a canal that is locally known as the raceway, the water reaches the Thayn Power Plant and <br />pump station. At this point, about 200 cfs is used to turn a turbine that pumps 35 cfs up hill to an <br />irrigation canal (known as the 42 foot ditch or the Thayne ditch). The remaining water can be <br />used to turn two additional turbines and fill another irrigation canal, known as the Green River <br />Canal. The power plant has the capacity to pass 600 cfs through its turbines to produce <br />electricity (Thayn and Thayn 1987). The power plant was run at full capacity until early in the <br />summer of 1999. However, a recent court decision ruled that a maximum of 435 cfs can legally <br />pass through the power plant and pumping station (Reed Harris, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, <br />personal communication). At the present time, the Green River Canal is taking 80 cfs during the <br />irrigation season (Keith Rose, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, personal communication). During <br />recent years, when the power plant and pump station was running at full capacity, irrigation <br />diversions amounted to 0% to 4.9% of the of the average monthly discharge of the Green River, <br />while the total diversion at Tusher Wash Diversion Dam amounted to 5.9% to 29.3 % of the <br />average monthly discharge of the Green River (Table 1). <br />Native fish species, including the four endangered species of the Upper Colorado River <br />Basin (Colorado pikeminnow (Prychocheilus lucius), razorback sucker (Xyrauchen texanus), <br />humpback chub (Gila cypha) and bonytail (G. elegans)) have been captured both upstream and <br />downstream from Tusher Wash Diversion Dam. Subadult and adult Colorado pikeminnow have <br />been documented to move upstream and downstream past Tusher Wash Diversion Dam (Tyus et <br />al. 1980; Tyus 1985; U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service 1998). However, in most cases, discharge of <br />the Green River at the time the fish passed the dam is not known, since several months or years <br />had passed between the times of capture and recapture. Little data has been collected in relation <br />to movement of other native fish species past Tusher Wash Diversion Dam or on passage of any <br />fish species during low flow periods. A limited study conducted in 1995 and 1996 showed no <br />fish movement past Tusher Wash Diversion Dam (Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, <br />unpublished data). However, this study only included three days of sampling and 139 marked <br />fish. Therefore, the probability of documenting f sh moving past the dam was quite low. <br />