Brook Trout

1 Volume 19, No. 2 Spring 2013 Loved in eastern Canada, loathed in the Rockies:The Two Sides ofBrook Troutby Lesley Peterson, TUC Project BiologistGauging the spread of Brook Trout in Alberta. Brian Meagher Community Management is one of the four themes identified under TUC s National Conservation Agenda that guides our day to day conservation work. The key policy of this theme is to protect and restore existing native coldwater fish species and their communities. A major threat to na-tive Trout populations in some ecosystems is in-vasion by non-native fish species. Historically, non-native fish have been stocked into waters throughout Canada to increase angling oppor-tunities, by accident, through dumping bait buckets, or for various other reasons that may have, Seemed like a good idea at the time. Re-cently, TUC has witnessed an increase of inva-sive species expanding their range in part due to climate change or transferring from one wa-ter system to another.

2 Fisheries managers now have a better understanding of the impacts on native fish populations and the value of native species. As a result the policies relating to non-native fish have changed in many areas. For ex-ample, the Alberta provincial government no longer stocks flowing waters where non-native fish could threaten native fish populations. In Ontario, fishery workers are obligated to de-stroy certain invasive species such as Asian carp when they are incidentally captured dur-ing research has almost three times more non-native fish species than all of the fish species found in Alberta combined! 186 invasive spe-cies have been identified in the Great Lakes BRONTE CREEK: THE FISH HAVE SPOKEN! ARCTIC GRAYLING IN ALBER TA NEWS FROM NATIONALT rout Unlimited Canada s National Newsletter1 Currents: Volume 19, No. 2 Spring 20132 COVER STORY: THE TWO SIDESB asin alone. Asian carp are a particular con-cern, and pose a threat to native species such as Brook Trout .

3 Why care? Native species have had thousands of years to adapt to local conditions, Native species coexist with the other spe-cies with which they have adapted, Native species are resilient to the natural disturbances regimes within their home ranges, Altering a part of this complex system and food web has the potential to exert irrevers-ible changes to functioning ecosystems over time, and We need to if we do not protect na-tive species in their native range, just where will they be protected from extinction?One species that is of particular interest to TUC is Brook Trout because, depending on where you are in Canada, it is either a beloved native species, east of Manitoba, or, west of Manitoba, a maligned invasive species. TUC works towards protecting Brook Trout and its ecosystems within its native range in eastern Canada through a variety of initiatives and programs like the Bronte Creek Watershed Renewal Program.

4 Brook Trout face threats in-Like every single person who works or volunteers for Trout Unlimited Cana-da, I care passionately about the envi-ronment. The same could be said for people who work for or support any of the other great conservation organizations in Canada. For forty years our particular interest at TUC has been cold water Trout streams and the land that impacts them. The ethic that inspires the work we all do is the same whether a person supports an organization that looks like it is concerned with one species ( Trout , salmon, ducks, elk, sheep, ) or supports an organization that works to protect all of our world and its beautiful was asked recently how we keep up our energy in the face of what sometimes seem to be constant and difficult challenges the search for stable funding; constantly denying that we have to choose between the economy and the environment; being caught in what I think of as the reasonable zone between the closed-minded fringes of industry and the equally closed-minded fringes of the environ-mental group world, not being truly trusted by either side.

5 More recently we have been chal-lenged by the enormous amount of energy required to argue have a meaningful discus-sion with our federal lawmakers about the sense of rolling back the accomplishments of the past 100 years or so by downsizing the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, by changing the Fisheries Act, the Navigable Waters Protection Act, the Environmental Assessment Act and (soon to come) the Spe-cies at Risk were good laws, developed over a long time period with a lot of thought and effort. A little tweaking in the name of effi-ciency might have been in order, but we don t believe the wholesale assault that has taken place will have a net positive impact. We have been assured by the powers that be that the new world order will be better. I guess we have no choice but to wait and motivates us to keep going? The short answer is that people who have had the opportunity to fish or hunt become very con-nected to the natural world.

6 You can t spend a day on the Skeena with a fly rod or in a blind somewhere without having it happen to you. We understand that our food doesn t really come from the grocery store; it comes from the land and from the water. People who become connected to the land and water are more likely to notice and care about what have been called slowly emerging catastro-phes that others might not recognize. The more we each get out on the land, the more we each learn about science and ecology, the more likely we are to develop this kind of ethic. The more informed we are about our laws and how they are made and changed, the more comfortable we are with getting in-volved and taking action to protect the things we think are important. If you want to learn more about the legisla-tive changes that have taken place over the past year, check out the excellent analyses done by West Coast Environmental Law ( ) and by Ecojustice ( ).

7 And if you just want to get more involved, give your support to Trout Unlimited Canada or one ofthe other great conservation Cana- dian conservation s Going On?by Jeff SurteesTUC NEWS FROM NATIONALTUC CEO Jeff Surtees. TUC s east slopes cutthroat habitat is no place for imported brookies. Hidden Lake outlet, Banff National Park. Lesley Peterson from Page 1 Trout Unlimited Canada s National Newsletter3OF Brook Trout by Lesley Petersoncluding habitat loss, competition from invasive spe-cies, and degraded water quality issues. Similar chal-lenges face native species in western Canada such as bull Trout and westslope cutthroat Trout . Brook Trout are an invasive species that threaten native fish throughout the east slopes of Alberta. Introduced in Alberta in the mid-1900s, Brook Trout have become entrenched in many watersheds. TUC is currently in-volved in two programs in Alberta aimed to remove or suppress Brook Trout to facilitate a recovery by na-tive cutthroat Trout and bull year, the Stewardship Licence Pilot Project is entering its fourth year.

8 This unique project is-sues anglers, who successfully complete an educa-tional species identification test, a Fish Research Licence. These anglers are authorized to harvest an unlimited number of non-native Brook Trout from selected streams along Alberta s east slopes. The se-lected streams either have a low or zero retention limit in place. The Stewardship Licence Project is a joint initiative between TUC and Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development, and is based on the successes of the Quirk Creek Brook Trout Suppression Project which has demonstrated the success of using angler education as a management tool. In 1948, Quirk Creek contained only cutthroat and bull Trout , but by 1995, these native species only com-prised 8% of the population, Brook Trout made up the remainder. Since 1998, qualified anglers have removed over 9,600 Brook Trout , reducing Brook Trout to 30% of the population in the lower reach of Quirk 2012, TUC received funding from the Alberta Con-servation Association s Grant Eligible Conservation Fund and from Devon Energy, allowing us to train additional anglers and complete more supervised outings to qualify anglers for the Fish Research Licence.

9 Angler effort qua-drupled from the previous year resulting in the harvest 2,080 Brook Trout ! The response from the fishing com-munity has been extremely positive. Anglers appreciate the opportunity to put their passion for fishing to use benefitting the resource while taking a few fish home for other project underway in Alberta in-volves a partnership with Parks Canada on an innovative Brook Trout removal project in the Corral Creek / Hidden Lake system within Banff National Park. Upper Corral Creek and Hidden Lake were once home to westslope cut-throat Trout until Brook Trout were introduced in the 1960s. Brook Trout eventually pushed out the cutthroat Trout , which now only live downstream of an impassable waterfall on Loved in their native ranges east of Manitoba but often loathed in the west, in Alberta introduced Brook Trout (top, Lesley Peterson photo) displaces native species like cutthroat Trout or bull Trout (pictured above, on spawning beds: Andrew Gustavson photo).

10 From Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise allowing us to lend a hand to the matter where you are in Canada, it is important for anglers to know how to properly identify between fish species, whether you are harvesting fish or practicing catch and release. Taking time to educate oneself to understand what you are catching and whether it is a na-tive or non-native species adds a new dimen-sion to your experiences. Catching a native species within its native range is becoming more and more difficult. When you do catch anative fish, you might just appreciate the experience that much Creek. The project goal is the removal of all of the Brook Trout within the creek and lake above the falls, by electrofishing, gill net-ting, and angling. When the Brook Trout are gone, pure cutthroat Trout , sourced from below the falls, will be translocated into the lake and creek above the falls. This project is an out-come of the provincial Cutthroat Trout Recov-ery Strategy to increase cutthroat Trout habitat.