Creek Treatment Postponed June 13 2008

Home Browse Search

44 Creek treatment postponed' By Gregory Moore Herald Outdoors Editor If it's possible for fish to "breathe a little easier," there's a stream full of brook trout and a few rainbows doing just that in Hermosa Creek. The upper section of the creek, above the Hotel Draw area about 10 miles west of Purgatory, is part of an effort by the Forest Service, the BLM and the Colorado Division of Wildlife to restore native Colorado River cut- throat trout m the Hermosa Creek drainage. As part of that plan, the DOW was scheduled to chemically treat the stream this year to remove non - native brook trout and rainbow trout before reintro- ducing the cutthroat. But that step has been postponed. "The project is still planned," said Mike Japhet, senior aquatic biologist with the DOW in Durango. "We've de- cided to do some additional preparation work, so we've put off treating the stream for a year." The treatment step is necessary to re- move the brook trout, rainbow trout and cutbows (rainbow - cutthroat hy- brids) that are now in the creek. "I'm guessing that about 75 percent of the fish up there are brook trout," said Japhet, adding that brookies tend to decimate native cutthroat popula- tions when the fish occupy the same habitat. Brookies are also fall spawners, while the cutthroats (and rainbows) spawn in spring. "In planning for the chemical treat - mcnt of the stream, we have to hit it at just the right time," Japhet said. "The treatment is not effective against fish eggs in the gravel, so this gives us a year to prepare for the window of time when the rainbows are all spawned and out of the gravel, and before the brook THE 1 I UNG0 HERALD lAL Friday, June 13, 2008 `7n planning for the chemical treatment " of the. steed m, we ue to hit it at, jiest`lFP e* w g i time.,, t s aqubiologtst Duteno ' trout spawn." Last year, a stone barrier was con- structed downstream of the section of the creek scheduled to be treated. From all indications, the barrier — constructed to keep the non - native species from re- turning to the upper stretches of the creek — has held up under high spring flows in the stream" The year's reprieve for the nori �datYVe fish in Hermosa Creek may turn` into more than that. While most local anglers support the plan to reintroduce Colorado River cutts into the Hermosa drainage, some local anglernd the local chapter of Trout Unlitniffid, questioned the neces- sity of killing all the brook trout and other non - natives in the creek as part of the project. "Pushing this back a year provides an opportunity for Trout Unlimited and other folks to go in this summer and move some of these fish down below the barrier," Japhet said. No date for such a project has been set, Japhet said, but it would not take place until sometime in July or August. gregmC durangoherald. com x:. -3M-Jd ,14 - ;a te 4 , -1 A r �a,4