7081

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 7081
• Author: Chart, T. E.
• Title: Initial Effect of Impoundment on the Fish Community of the White River, Colorado.
• USFW Year: 1987.
• USFW - Doc Type: Colorado State University,
• Copyright Material: NO

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INTRODUCTION
lJntil 1984, the White River was one of the last free-flowing
rivers i~n the state of Colorado. With the completion of Taylor Draw
Dam and .the filling of Kenney Reservoir, the White River has now gone
the way of the Upper Colorado River and its tributaries which
collectively have been impounded more than 120 times (considering
reservoirs only in excess of 1.2 cubic hectometers (1000 acre-
feet))(Bishop and Porcella 1980). Regulation in the Upper Basin has
had a profound effect on the aquatic ecosystem, where biota had adapted
and evolved to extreme fluctuations in flow, temperature and turbidity
(Holden 1979; Behnke 1980; Behnke and Benson 1980; Molles 1980). A
series of four recently published papers (Stanford and Ward 1986,
1986a, 1986b; Ward et al. 1986) provide an in depth review of the
history, development and ecology of the Colorado River system.
The lower White River of Colorado supports seven native
species and an equal number of introduced species, although the fish
-- community in the vicinity of the Taylor Draw project is still
predominantly native (Carlson et al. 1979; Holden 1979). The federally
endangered Colorado squawfish (Ptvchocheilus cius) is still found in
the White River of Colorado and Utah. Due to their highly migratory
nature, which was reported in early accounts (Sigler and Miller 1963)