Great example of how the west is ahead of PA in native fish conservation

Fish Sticks

Fish Sticks

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It would be great if PA did something similar with brook trout. Maybe a voluntary permit for brook trout (only) and use the funds for brook trout restoration (only). I would absolutely buy a brook trout permit if I could be sure the money wouldn't be used on some private stocked pay-to-play stream. Of course, they'd need to acknowledge and promote the existence of brook trout in the state first, which they seem reluctant to do.
 
this project could have been a native fish geared regulation, physical project, removal, or even just a sign in the ground saying these native trout are there and heres why their important.

It happened to be a comprehensive entire stream level management plan but that doesn’t matter. What struck me was not the project itself but the mindset of the managers.

This quote says it all


“Moving forward, Fish Creek will provide great fishing for anyone looking to catch a Bonneville cutthroat from its native range. Catching a cutthroat here will count towards an angler’s Cutthroat Slam completion, as well. The fish aren’t big, but trophy trout aren’t the management focus.

“We’re really kind of managing it as a conservation population, that’s kind of the focus,” Braithwaite said.”



You will never hear this kind of “conservation first” thinking and commitment from our PFBC social program first managers. Thats just the simple and honest truth.

In PA this would never happened.

If archeologists and historians discovered evidence of a child rodeo the natural history museum, the Smithsonian, and PFBC would have preserved heritage rodeo instead of heritage genetics.

And the barrier would have never been placed and the rare native trout would be managed under “wild trout” stream regs right along with protection of the invasive fish destroying them. There would be no acknowledgment those cutts even exist within the regulations.
 
Pretty neat. Utah has many species of trout.
 

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The fish aren’t big, but trophy trout aren’t the management focus.

“We’re really kind of managing it as a conservation population, that’s kind of the focus,” Braithwaite said.”
Meanwhile, the concept of angling regulations for brook trout died in PA with a program (WBTEP) and paper whose stated goal was "increased average fish size." Imagine conserving a species simply because it is earmarked for the increased conservation effort in a state wildlife action plan.
 
Meanwhile, the concept of angling regulations for brook trout died in PA with a program (WBTEP) and paper whose stated goal was "increased average fish size." Imagine conserving a species simply because it is earmarked for the increased conservation effort in a state wildlife action plan.
Yea exactly, the antithesis of what other states are doing when they intentionally try to manage native fish for conservation.
 
Most of the brook trout were reintroduces after the timber cutting and the great fires that sweep the wilds of Pennsylvania. After the fires rains and flooding changed the stream beads and after the trees grew acid rain fell.
 
Most of the brook trout were reintroduces after the timber cutting and the great fires that sweep the wilds of Pennsylvania. After the fires rains and flooding changed the stream beads and after the trees grew acid rain fell.
Stocking hatchery fish for sport has different genetic realities than getting conservation genetics or life history information to determine best source populations. For example stockings for sport could take a fish that evolved in canada and put it in a Pa stream where its genes are maladaptive and will sabotage other population’s genes.

Many streams were likely recolonized through movement of other wild native population’s as well. Some watersheds show lower evidence of introgression when genetics are studied.

Technically after PFBC wiped out big spring one might be tempted to call the hatchery fish they dump in l, spawned and are now wild reintroduced. But had they not stocked it and instead reintroduced spring creek dwelling brook trout from near by with a similar life history that would have boded much better for todays brook trout of big spring’s suitability to that stream.
 
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