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Building an Exclosure on Comanche Creek
Over the past 7 years various organizations andagencies have come together to help restore Rio Grande cutthroat trout (RGCT) habitat along Comanche Creek. Here is a chance for you to contribute to this important effort.
If you can’t come Friday, still come on Saturday. Rio Gande cutts are in the stream once again for fishing. Free camping is available.
Details and registration with Quivira Coalition here:
http://quiviracoalition.org/Workshops___Events/index.html
The first segment of the large Rio Costilla project was completed today as the NM Department of Game and Fish, the federal agencies, and volunteers from TU stocked out the first batch of Rio Grande Cutthroat. Kevin Reilly participated in the stocking, and hopefully he’ll have some pictures next week.
TU has contributed over $100,000 and countless hours to this project.
Here is the press release from NMDGF:
It’s still a tenuous existence for Gila trout. Even thought they were downlisted from “endangered” to “threatened” a couple years ago, there are still so few populations that fish need to be helicoptered out to avoided the ash flows resulting from wildfire.
A couple years ago, fish from the Whiskey Creek lineage were quickly transported to another creek under threat of wildfire. Hopefully, a sustainable replicate population of the Whiskey Creek fish can be established, or that population may be lost.
Lots of information is flying around about the San Juan below Navajo Dam these days. Unfortunately, almost none of it is grounded in hard scientific data.
Before anyone takes action on the San Juan, a science-based study needs to take place to determine what is changing about the river and what steps might be prudent to correct those problems.
I think pretty much everyone who has watched the San Juan over the last decade would agree that the river is changing. Is that change the result of oil and gas development and is it likely to degrade the fishery? Maybe, maybe not.
Read the rest of this entry »
Come get your hands dirty and help clean up the Pecos River.
Meet at the offices of the Upper Pecos Watershed Association, 78 Main St., Pecos, NM
Coffee and pastries from 8:30 to 9:00.
Barbeque to follow from 12:00 to 2:00 at the Jamie Koch Recreation Area. Bring the kids for fishing demonstrations. Raffle prizes for participants.
Sponsored by the Upper Pecos Watershed Association, the Truchas Chapter of Trout Unlimited, U.S. Forest Service, Tas no Mas and the New Mexico Department of Game & Fish
McCrystal Creek
The Coalition for the Valle Vidal has given NMTU $9,100 to do stream restoration work in the Valle Vidal, primarily of Middle Ponil, North Ponil and McCrystal Creeks.
In order to accomplish this work, a coalition of groups, similar to what has been done on Comanche Creek, will be formed to do on the ground projects that will improve the riparian habitat for Rio Grande cutthroats.
It will take several years to accomplish this work. The work plan for 2009, is to determine just what needs to be done, and what can be done similar to Comanche. From there we will add more grant money to the pool so that something significant can be accomplished to improve fish habitat.
The New Mexico Council of Trout Unlimited has joined with several other sportsmen’s groups to form the San Juan Quality Waters Coalition. The purpose of this group is to address the issues that have resulted in a general decline in the trout fisheries on the San Juan since the Bureau of Reclaimation changed the flow regime out of Navajo Dam in 2002.
Though the stated purpose of the flow change was to improve habitat for the Colorado Pikeminnow, it was fairly obvious to anyone who read through the EIS, that the real, covert reason was to suck as much water out of the river without violating the Endangered Species Act restrictions as they pertain to the pikeminnow.
On February 25th, the coalition sent this letter to the San Juan Recovery Imlementation – Coordination Committee asking them to address the numerous problems on the San Juan river that have impacted the fishery. The San Juan remains New Mexico’s premier destination trout fishery, and the actions of the BoR have had serious negative impacts on the economy surrounding the fishery.
Governor Richardson today proposed that the property owned by the NM Game Commission be moved to the Parks Deprtment and be turned into Pecos State Park.
This is something that the conservation community including the Upper Pecos Watershed Association (UPWA) has wanted to see happen for a while. This is the first step that must be taken to deal with th camping complex in the Pecos canyon. For years, the canyon has been plagued by overuse, trash, and habitat degradation due to unchecked camping in the canyon.
Trout Unlimited has participated in Clean-ups in the Canyon twice a year for the last several years, and every time we do this, volunteers pull tons of garbage out of the river and off the riverbanks. Hopefully this will help stem the tide of garbage in the canyon.
This year’s fall clean-up in conjunction with Dia del Rio will happen on October 11th. If you are interested in participating, we will meet at the office of the UPWA at 9:30 AM. The office is located a couple blocks south of the main intersection in Pecos, and is easy to find.
It appears that the algal bloom known as Didymo (Didymospenia geminate), also known as “rock snot” has been confirmed in the Pecos River. This is not a good thing, as there is no known solution to the problem. There are also anecdotal reports of it in the streams in the Jemez Mountains.
More on this situation as information becomes available.
UPDATE: A letter from NMED Surface Water Quality Bureau to TU regarding the Pecos can be found here.
William Schudlich
gregmcreynolds
kevinvreilly
