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<br />and we suggest continuing efforts started by Martinez (2007) to standardize <br />electrofishing gear by providing field crews with technical assistance in testing and <br />maintaining electrofishing equipment to insure that it operates at maximum potential. <br /> <br />Although we observed declines in abundance that we attributed to our annual removals, <br />compensatory mechanisms (e.g., recruitment and immigration) likely off-set some of <br />our removal effort. This is to be expected in any fish removal program based on <br />stock-recruitment dynamics and the meta-population structure we observed in this <br />particular system. For example, throughout our study period, recruitment appeared <br />robust based on abundant young-of-year smallmouth bass captured with electric seine <br />and the wide distribution and high abundance of yearlings captured by boat <br />electrofishing. Immigration of smallmouth bass into our study sites was documented <br />based on the movement of fish between our two study sites, invasion of escapees from <br />Elkhead Reservoir, and movement of tagged fish from other reaches such as South <br />Beach, Maybell, and Yampa Canyon. The potential for smallmouth bass movement <br />among reaches was shown by movements of up to 50 miles in less than a year and up <br />to 100 miles after periods of more than a year. Documenting the rate of immigration <br />into our study sites and improving our knowledge of movement dynamics in the Yampa <br />River will require increased tagging effort in the Craig, South Beach, and Maybell <br />reaches. Long-range movements of smallmouth bass throughout the Yampa River <br />suggest that expanded and higher removal rates are needed river wide if we are to <br />sustain removals in our study reaches. <br /> <br />We documented that recapture rate (the proportion of tagged fish recaptured at least <br />once) was lower than removal rate in almost all years. A large portion of tagged <br />smallmouth bass (58% at Little Yampa Canyon and 70% at Lily Park) were never seen <br />again after their release, suggesting that the proportion of tagged fish in the population <br />was reduced by some combination of emigration, tagging mortality, or tag loss. And <br />that these rates were higher at the shorter (5 mile) Lily Park reach than at Little Yampa <br />Canyon which was 24 miles long. Smallmouth bass moved equally in upstream and <br /> <br />23 <br />