Paiute Cutthroat update - The Good and the Bad

Last month I posted about the plight of the Paiute Cutthroat, which is a rare trout only native to one small stream in the Sierras of California. The original post (here) was to rally support of the restoration of these fish to their entire native range and there is some good news on that front. A couple weeks ago the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) announced that they have decided to go ahead with their plan to restore the Paiute to their native range. For the full announcement click here.

A California Paiute Cutthroat

The bad news is that the same environmentalist groups that stopped project in the 11th hour last time have filled a lawsuit in an attempt to complete stop the project. This is even in light of the Environmental Impact Statement put together by the USFWS showing that any impacts would be minimal and that the benefits to ecosystem from eliminating the nonnative trout would by far outweigh any potential impacts. With any luck the courts will see through the baseless lawsuit and let the facts speak for themselves.

For the news article on the lawsuit click the link below

http://www.courthousenews.com/2010/06/17/28157.htm

SAVE THE PAIUTE!! LAST CHANCE!!!!

The Paiute Cutthroat Trout is one of the rarest and most beautiful trout in the world and needs your support! Paiutes are unique in that they are the only North American trout completely lacking body spots. These fish extirpated from all of their native stream habitat, which includes roughly 10 miles of Silver King Creek in California below Llewellyn Falls. However, the US Fish and Wildlife Service and California Department of Fish and Game are proposing to reintroduce them. Last year I had the privilege to fish for these Cutthroat (outside of their native range) and they are truly amazing fish.

A Paiute Cutthroat

For more information on these fish click the following link: Paiute Cutthroat

There is an open public comment period for the Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the proposed restoration of the Paiute cutthroat into Silver King Creek below Llewellyn Falls until May 10th 2010. I strongly encourage all of my readers to write in support of the plan to reintroduce these fish, as this will be the LAST chance to get your voice heard before the final decision comes down! If you consider yourself a conservation minded angler please take the time to write!

Please write your letters in favor of option # 2 which entails eradicating the non-native trout below Llewellyn Falls using rotenone.

For more information and to see the EIS

http://www.fws.gov/nevada/protected_species/fish/species/pct.html

You can address your comments to:

Robert D. Williams, State Supervisor,

by US mail @

Nevada Fish and Wildlife Office

1340 Financial Boulevard

Suite 234

Reno, NV 89502

Or call: (775) 861-6300

Or fax: (775) 861-6301

September in the Southwest: Part 1 Paiute Cutthroat

For the last few years I have felt that the array of salmonids represented on my website was strikingly incomplete due to the absence several fish. The two particular missing fish that I felt left the largest void were the Apache and Gila Trout found in the Southwestern US. Since I began my native trout quest it has been a practice of mine to target several species on a single trip to get the biggest bang for my buck. However, the Gila trout have long been closed to fishing due to being listed as endangered under the ESA (Endangered Species Act). This meant that I would either have to make a trip just for the Apache Trout and a second trip when the Gila Trout were opened to fishing, or put fishing for Apache Trout off and just wait to just make one single trip for both fish. I chose the second option and finally the Gila Trout were downlisted to threatened in 2007 and shortly after several streams were opened to fishing. Last year I planned out a trip for these two fish, however in the end life got in the way and I was forced to put things on hold for a year. This ended up not being all that bad of a thing as the state of New Mexico expanded the number of streams that were open to fishing for Gila trout and one of these new streams looked extremely promising.

Thus I began to plan another trip for this year. One of the first things that I did when planning this trip was look at what other types of trout were missing from my list of North American salmonids and see if there was any possibility of targeting them at the same time as the Gila and Apache Trout. Two trout came to mind in California, the Paiute Cutthroat and the Eagle Lake Rainbow Trout. However, fishing for fly fishing Eagle Lake Rainbow Trout isn't is known to be best from late October through December when the fish move into the shallows, so I ruled it out. The Paiute Cutthroat on the other hand was my last missing subspecies of Cutthroat, but is closed to fishing in its native waters. However, outside of its native range was another story. For sometime I have known about a couple of extremely remote refuge populations that California Fish and Game had established to ensure that this trout would not fade into extinction. While both populations require long cross country hikes to reach, one looked like it could be done as a long day hike and might fit into my plans well. To round things off I decided to also target a large spotted strain of Rio Grande Cutthroat only found in the Pecos River drainage in New Mexico.

This was what I decided during September of 2008 and it gave me one full year to do research on these four fish; where I would find them and how I would go about making everything work to get to them. The shear logistics of this trip were maddening. Early on I asked my cousin Derek if he would want to join me and while he isn't the biggest on fishing, he thought it sounded fun so he was in. With Derek in I started to look into possible streams to fish and gathered info on them from a wide range of sources: other anglers, fisheries reports, biologists, online forums, etc. I also had to decide between driving and flying, which really came down to distances involved and money. If I flew I would save some time, but still have lots of driving. Plus I would have to find a central location as due to the distances between each fish, there would also likely be a lot of back tracking anywhere I went. The pros and cons of flying just didn't line up, so I decided driving was the way to go. Timing was the next big issue. Normally I choose to do my fishing trips during mid-summer, however that is monsoon season in the Southwest so fall or late summer would be a better choice. I also found out from the owner of the fly shop I work at that the fly fishing retailers show was during mid-September in Denver and since he said he would like me to go with him I decided to build the trip around that.

Day 1: Tuesday September 1st 2009: Fast forward several months and many of hours of planning and it was finally time to head out. We hit the road at 4:00 AM on what would be a full day of driving to reach the trailhead into the Paiute Cutthroat stream. All in all it was a pretty uneventful day with us reaching our campsite outside of Mammoth Lakes, CA a little before 8:00 PM. Prior to hitting the hay, Derek and I got our backpacks all set so that we wouldn't have to mess with them in the morning. 

Day 2: Wednesday September 2nd 2009: From all of the people that I had talked to about this hike, I heard that it was pretty much and all day affair to get in and out of the creek. Due to this I came up with the "brilliant" idea that we should hit the trail before the sun came up to gain some time. As such for the second day in a row Derek and I got up at 4:00 AM and guided by our headlamps and my "trusty" GPS unit we hit the trail. Before leaving home I programmed our route into my GPS and set an alarm to go off if we went off course. Unfortunately this was my first time using the alarm feature and apparently the alarm didn't go off. At about a two miles in I noticed that we had missed a fork in the tail somewhere and were now about a 1/2 mile to the east of where we should be. We had the choice between following the trail back to where we should have turned off or a shorter cross-country trip in the dark. We opted for the cross-country route, which while shorter ended up being a hands and knees scramble up a very steep thorny slope and a climb over a cliff face. I have no idea if we actually gained anytime with this route, but it did get us back onto to the right trail.

Pre-dawn on the trail

By the time that the sun actually started rising over the mountains, we were about half way up the peak that we had to cross to reach the creek. With the added light, the views of the surrounding mountains were stunning and things started warming up making tee-shirts a much better choice than the sweatshirts that we had started out wearing.

Early morning in the high Sierras

The trail up the mountain was an endless series of switchbacks and when things looked to be leveling off for a few minutes it proved to be nothing more than a false summit. After this brief flat section there was another brutal series of switchbacks before we finally reached the true top of the saddle. By the time that we finally reached the dry creek bed where we would start the cross-country leg of our trip it was already well into the morning so we decided to take a break for breakfast before continuing on.

Looking down the creek valley at the start of the cross country stretch

The cross country trek started out fairly straight forward roughly following the dry creek bed downhill through a mix of pine and fir forest, but before long things started getting a bit more complex. While in the forested section the gradient was fairly mellow, but before long we came to a huge slab of granite where the creek fell into a fairly deep and shear faced canyon. We were forced to clamber down a few pretty gnarly cliffs before we finally made our way out across a more level section of granite. We had probably been hiking across this slab of granite for about a half hour when I spotted what I thought for about a second was a big black dog. Of course my next thought was what in the world would a dog be doing way out here and I realized that it was a Black Bear. We watched as he minded his own business and clambered across the rock face in the opposite direction. Before continuing on we made sure to make a bit of noise in case he wasn't alone, but we never saw any sign of another bear.

A Black Bear on the way into the creek

Working my way across the backcountry

After our bear sighting we made our way to the end of the granite slab where once again we had to do some more scurrying down the cliffs, after which our way was barred by a wall of scrub brush. Another rough scramble through the bushes finally put us at the creek. While I had guessed this was the stretch of the creek that might hold these rare trout, I didn't know for sure so I started sneaking up to the pools to try to sight any fish. In the first pool I didn't see anything, but in the one below it I spotted several small trout holding in the current. Pay dirt!!

A Paiute Cutthroat holding in the creek

A nice pool on the creek

Knowing that we were in the right place we rigged up our rods, me going with a dry /dropper combo and Derek going with just a dry. I headed up to the first pool where I had spotted the trout while Derek headed downstream. Although these fish were hard to get to, they definitely were not difficult to catch and within a couple of casts I watched as one of the Cutthroat grabbed my nymph. After a short battle I brought my first Paiute Cutthroat to hand and although it was not very large, this spotless trout lived up to their reputation as one of the most beautiful fish in North America.

What we came for pure Paiute Cutthroat Trout

My first Paiute Cutthroat was quickly followed by another, which took the dry this time and after this I worked into to a rhythm of catching five or so cutthroat from each pool before moving downstream to sample some new water. Although the fish were quite numerous, they all seemed to be in the 5"-7" range and seemed to have very little fear of people. At first I started out trying to keep as low of a profile as possible and sneaking up on the fish. However, before long I started to notice that even when the fish saw me they would continue to hold their position instead of fleeing like most trout do. This was likely a testament of the remote nature of the creek and how few people fish it, and it sure made fishing a lot easier.

The creek

An underwater shot of a Paiute Cutthroat

We fished the creek until around lunchtime at which point we decided that we had caught plenty of trout and unless we wanted to be hiking out in the dark we should probably start working our way back. In some ways the hike out of the creek was easier and in others it was much more difficult. The thing that made it easier was that we now had a pretty good idea of the most efficient way back out to the trail and could avoid most of the cliffs. What made it harder was that we were already worn out from the hike in and the trek back to the trail was about as steep as it gets.

The "easy" way out of the creek

The fishless headwaters of the creek

After a brutal couple of hours of uphill bushwhacking out of the creek valley, we finally reached the trail and top of the mountain at around 2 PM. From here it was almost all down hill back to trailhead, so we made great timing for the next few miles until we reached the last uphill stretch between us and the car.

Derek on the hike down the mountain

Although the last hill probably wasn't all that steep, we were beat at this point and as such it was a very slow go. Knowing that it was all downhill to the car once we got to the top though, kept us going and at around 4:15 PM we finally emerged at the trailhead. After completing the hike Derek and I grabbed a bit of dinner and hopped in the car for a six hour drive to Las Vegas, where we would have a day to recover before heading back out on the road.

Support Needed for the Restoration of the Paiute Cutthroat

The Paiute Cutthroat are a subspecies of Cutthroat Trout only native to one small watershed in the Sierra Nevada of California, and they need your help. These fish were extirpated from their native stream - Silver King Creek, after non-native Rainbow and Brown Trout were stocked there. Paiute Cutthroat were only saved from extinction due to a chance stocking by a Shepard who carried a coffee can of these trout above Llewellyn Falls, isolating them from the invasive species below. Now the California Fish and Wildlife Department is seeking to restore them to their native waters below Llewellyn Falls in what could be the first project to fully restore a subspecies of Cutthroat to their entire native range.

 

The Paiute cutthroat, often called the rarest trout in North America: Photo Credits (USFS 2005)

The California Fish and Wildlife Department is asking for public support in favor of this project. As seen in the message from the department's threatened trout coordinator; David Lentz below:

I would like to request that Sac-Sierra TU write a letter of support for the Paiute cutthroat restoration project on Silver King Creek. This would entail endorsing the alternative number 2, eradicating non-native trout below Llewellyn Falls using rotenone, from the draft EIS/EIR that is in comment period now. Here are links to information about the restoration project. First, DFG's website which has the NEPA/CEQA documents(600+pgs, about 9MB). Comment letters can be snail mailed to DFG in Rancho Cordova or emailed, as well. Comment Deadline is May 4.-- www.dfg.ca.gov/fish/Resources/WildTrout/..._PaiuteCutRestor.asp Also, a link to Ted Williams, Conservation writer for Fly Rod and Reel Magazine that has a lot of background on the Paiute cutthroat project and other western native trout restoration issues: www.flyrodreel.com/node/11698 Letters from individuals (in addition to a chapter letter) that support restoring the Paiute cutthroat would be greatly appreciated--this may turn out to be "numbers game", supporters v. opponents, in certain of the approval arenas that the project must pass. There are several permitting steps that are vulnerable to opposition. Supporters should favor Alternative 2 in the EIS/EIR and support returning the Paiute to its native home. So, this would be asking a favor of you individually, as well to write. Letters to: Stafford Lehr, Calif. DFG, 1701 Nimbus Rd., Rancho Cordova, CA 95670 or email letters: SilverKingPublicComment@dfg.ca.gov let me know if you need more info. Have a great board meeting and keep up the good work!! thanks, Dave Lentz David Lentz Threatened Trout Coordinator California Department of Fish and Game Fisheries Branch 830 S Street Sacramento, CA 95811

I urge my readers to write in support of this project, so that in the future when people discuss the Paiute Cutthroat it will be about the success story of how this trout was completely restored to it's native range and not about how it was allowed to slip into extinction when there was every opportunity to save it.