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? r III. BIOLOGICAL DATABASE AND INFORMATION TRANSFER Biological data that is collected on the rare Colorado River fish should be pooled into a single database to provide more complete information on the entire upper basin and to be able to pool sample sizes. Much of the information on the UCRB rare fish through 1984 has been compiled by Dr. Richard A. Valdez of the Ecosystem Research Institute in Logan, Utah for Tom Pitts of the Colorado Water Congress. These data should be made available to the UCRB Coordinating Committee. The UCRB Coordinating Committee should determine who should be responsible for maintenance and updating the database, responding to requests for data, and providing peer reviews for proper analysis or correct interpretation. This information should be updated at least annually and made available for use by others in conducting studies of the UCRB. The investigators who collected the data should verify the data that are entered into the database and review and comment on any analyses and interpretations. Information transfer of printed reports should be accomplished through a central contact point. Since the modeling efforts will be done by the staff of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Region 6 with assistance from the Instream Flow Group of the Western Energy and Land Use Team, published papers or progress reports that summarize the information gsed in the models should be distributed by the Regional Office in Denver, Colorado. All data should be thoroughly analyzed, carefully interpreted, and the results published promptly upon completion of the study objectives to make such information readily available. Information transfer can also occur during the annual meeting of active field biologists in the UCRB and at other meetings such as the Desert Fishes Council, Annual Conference of the Western Association of Game and Fish Commissioners, and various chapter meetings of the American Fisheries Society. All biological or related hydrological studies being conducted on the UCRB should be summarized on the form used in the "Upper Colorado River Basin - Catalog of Fish Studies". This catalog should be updated annually by the UCRB Coordinator. As new studies begin, the completed form describing the study should be mailed to all active workers in the upper basin. Other items of interest could be mailed periodically through a newsletter from the Regional Office to field investigators, agencies, and other interested persons or the field workers could mail a short note with significant observations or findings. IV. MONITORING OF RARE FISH Although a standardized sampling scheme was used by the CRFP in 1979-80, experimentation with various gears occurred after 1982 in an attempt to improve efficiency and to sample various habitats in the river environment more thoroughly. Therefore, studies of the rare UCRB fish have been made with various sampling gears and varying sampling effort in different stream reaches of the UCRB. The active field investigators and the Biological Subcommittee recognize the need for a standardized monitoring program for the different life stages of the rare fish. 5