My WebLink
|
Help
|
About
|
Sign Out
Home
Browse
Search
7124 (2)
CWCB
>
UCREFRP
>
Copyright
>
7124 (2)
Metadata
Thumbnails
Annotations
Entry Properties
Last modified
8/11/2009 11:07:39 AM
Creation date
8/10/2009 12:36:32 PM
Metadata
Fields
Template:
UCREFRP
UCREFRP Catalog Number
7124
Author
McAda, C. W. and R. S. Wydoski.
Title
Technical Papers
USFW Year
1980.
USFW - Doc Type
\
Copyright Material
YES
There are no annotations on this page.
Document management portal powered by Laserfiche WebLink 9 © 1998-2015
Laserfiche.
All rights reserved.
/
23
PDF
Print
Pages to print
Enter page numbers and/or page ranges separated by commas. For example, 1,3,5-12.
After downloading, print the document using a PDF reader (e.g. Adobe Reader).
Show annotations
View images
View plain text
that they had disappeared from this area by 1937. <br />Reservoir impoundments apparently do not affect <br />adult razorback suckers as much as they affect other <br />endemic species. When Lakes Mohave and Mead were <br />formed on the Colorado River, the Colorado squawfish, <br />bonytail chub, and humpback chub were drastically <br />reduced in numbers, but the razorback sucker <br />remained abundant in Lake Mead and common in Lake <br />Mohave (Wallis 1951). Jonez and Sumner (1954) found <br />many razorback suckers in the Colorado River below <br />Davis Dam, but none have been reported from this <br />region recently (Minckley 1973-. As late as the 1940's, <br />razorback suckers supported a commercial fishery in <br />Arizona. One fisherman harvested some 5.4 metric <br />tons from Sahuaro Lake, an impoundment on the Salt <br />River, in 1949 (Hubbs and Miller 1953-. However, no <br />razorback suckers were found when Sahuaro Lake was <br />drained in 1966 (Minckley and Deacon 1968). In fact, <br />the species has apparently disappeared from the entire <br />Gila River arm of the lower Colorado River basin <br />(Minckley 1973-. Lakes Havasu, Mead, and Mojave <br />still contain razorback suckers, but only mature fish <br />are found, indicating that successful reproduction has <br />been greatly curtailed or does not occur. <br />The razorback sucker appears to be more widespread <br />in the upper Colorado River basin, but has never been <br />reported to be abundant there (Banks 1964; Deacon <br />1968; Vanicek et al. 1970; Miller 1972; Stalnaker and <br />Holden 1973; Holden et al. 1974; Holden and Stalnaker <br />1975a,1975b). <br />There are few early reports about the abundance of <br />the razorback sucker in the upper basin. Jordan <br />(1891) wrote that razorback suckers were abundant in <br />the area, but documentation is limited. The inacces- <br />sibility of the canyon areas and the violent turbulence <br />of the river made sampling of fish difficult, and early <br />efforts were cursory at best. Vanicek et al. (1970) <br />reported the elimination of razorback suckers from the <br />tailwaters of Flaming Gorge Reservoir, but theorized <br />that they were uncommon there even before the reser- <br />voir was impounded. Holden and Stalnaker (1975b) <br />found scattered individuals throughout most of the <br />upper basin and discovered concentrations of 10 to 15 <br />fish in the mouth of the Yampa River in March and <br />November 1970. Razorback suckers were reported <br />recently in a pond separated from the lower San Juan <br />River near Bluff, Utah (N. Armentrout, personal com- <br />munication, but their abundance was not determined. <br />During the present investigation, razorback suckers <br />were found to be most common, though never numer- <br />ous, at two locations-the mouth of the Yampa River <br />at station 3 (Echo Park) during early spring, and the <br />Colorado River at station 8 (Walker Wildlife Area) <br />throughout the year. Occasional razorback suckers <br />were also found at station 3 during the fall and at sta- <br />tions 4 and 7 (Table 1-. <br />Table 1. Numbers of razorback suckers collected <br />from the upper Colorado River basin, by dates and <br />location, August 1974-November 1976 <br />Year and <br />stations <br />Dates No. <br />collectedb <br />1974 <br />Walker Wildlife Area (8) 24 Oct.-1 Nov. 22 <br />Echo Park 131 14-18 Nov. 3 <br />Sand Wash (7) 9-12 Dec. 1 <br />1975 <br />Walker Wildlife Area (8) 3-10 Apr. 11 <br /> 24-28 May 24 (8) <br /> 15-17 June 3 <br /> 4-9 Oct. 9 <br />Island Park (4) 4-16 Apr. 2 <br /> 29 Oct.-1 Nov. 1 <br />Echo Park (3) 1-22 May 24 (1) <br /> 14-16 Nov. 1 <br />1976 <br />Echo Park (3) 2-5 May 1 <br />Walker Wildlife Area (8) 12-16 Apr. 5 <br />sSee Fig. 1 for locations of stations. <br />bNumbers in parentheses indicate number of tagged recap- <br />turesincluded in total. <br />The razorback suckers moved into the area of the <br />confluence of the Yampa and Green rivers (Echo Park; <br />station 3) in late fall and apparently remained there <br />through the winter (Table 2-. Although considerable <br />sampling was done in the lower sections of the Yampa <br />River during summer and early fall, no razorback <br />suckers were collected during that period in 1975 or <br />1976. Nor were razorback suckers collected farther <br />than 2 km upstream in the Yampa River, despite con- <br />siderable collecting effort at our stations 1 and 2 <br />(Table 3). However, a single razorback sucker was col- <br />lected at station 1 in July 1979 by investigators from <br />Colorado State University (E. Wick, personal com- <br />munication. Sampling was not possible during winter <br />because of ice cover and the inaccessibility of the <br />canyon areas. Some razorback suckers probably <br />remained in the area over winter, where they were <br />joined the following spring (in late April) by other fish <br />moving from the Green River into the mouth of the <br />Yampa. A female razorback sucker, captured and <br />tagged in the Green River at station 4, was recaptured <br />2 weeks later at the mouth of the Yampa River, 21 km <br />upstream. Inasmuch as the fish was ripe when recap- <br />tured, it may have been collected during a spawning <br />migration. <br />Razorback suckers apparently leave the mouth of <br />the Yampa River in late spring or early summer as <br />streamflow decreases and water temperature in- <br />creases. <br />A total of 23 razorback suckers were collected at <br />
The URL can be used to link to this page
Your browser does not support the video tag.