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~he Denver Post Online - News ODiJ893 Page 2 of3 c Squaw Creeks. In Colorado, the Animal Fonnerly Known as Squawfish is principally known as the federally pTotected endangered species that has blocked construction of the Animas-La Plata water project south of Durango. Once the dominant predator of the Colorado River system, the fish has been decimated by decades of dam-building and even poisonings by game-and-fish officials, who at one time tried to cut populations to make Toom for sport species such as bass, catfish and pike. The silvery fish, which grows to 6 feet and weighs up to 100 pounds, now survives in a few silty desert streams, including downstream Teaches of the Colorado, Yampa, White, Green and San Juan rivers. It was added to the federal list of endangered species in 1967. Biologists say they aren't sure how the squawfish got its name. One tum-of-the-century text said, "This fish is highly esteemed by the Indians, hence its most popular name." Another interpretation holds that the name was a mispronounciation of "squawkfish," because the fish squawks when taken out of the water. Regardless, the name offended some tribal groups. In the Pacific Northwest, another species of the fish became so common - and so hungry for the increasingly rare salmon - that government agencies placed a $3 per fish bounty on it. "Some of the fishermen would talk about hunting squaws. It got way out of hand," said Keith Hatch, a fisheries official for the Siletz tribe of OTegon. So the six-member Names of Fishes Committee, staffed by some of North America's leading fish scientists, gave the creature a new name. "I grew up in British Columbia with the name squawfish. To me, it was just a name," said Nelson of the Names of Fishes Committee. "But when we found out just how offensive the name was - no Indian group stands up to say they are squaws - we decided to change it. "It's a fairly big deal to go about changing a common name, but we felt this term was so derogatory that the change made sense." The harder part was deciding on a new name. Committee members said they wanted to use an Indian name. But one tribe's word for the fish, qw'a'lh, was tough to pronounce for even the Latin-schooled fish scientists, and another tribal name, huhssei, also created pToblems, "Can you imagine replacing squawfish with a name that sounds like hussy? We'd really have a controversy on our hands," Nelson said. The compromise name was pikeminnow, though committee members wrote in Ihe September 1998 issue of the scientific journal Fisheries that they weren't completely happy with the result. "We do not regard the matter as closed," they wrote. http://www.denverpost.comlnews/news0328c.htm 3/31/99