Yellowstone Cutthroat Recovery Presentation

[Mark Landerman]

Last night I was able to attend a presentation given by Robert Gresswell, a biologist for the USGS, on the recovery program for the Yellowstone Cutthroat trout and its fight with the lake trout.

He discussed their study’s findings and what he felt could and should be done about the lake trout problem.  I found it funny that with all the research, data collected, and expert opinions on the matter, the biggest problem seemed to be money.

Currently, the only real thing the Park is doing about the situation is gill netting. However, this is just killing lake trout not learning more about them, primarily where they spawn. He said that if they were able to target these few areas they could drastically reduce the lake trout population. He showed some of the methods that were being researched to target lake trout eggs and fry…………..very interesting. However, knowing that gill netting alone can’t reduce the problem, I found it hard to swallow that money is the only thing holding back the protection of this precious resource.  

Oh well, there was my rant. >:(

If you want to read more, here is a link to a 1995 report………

http://www.nps.gov/yell/planyourvisit/upload/laketrout2.pdf

Here is some more information on the lake trout spawing situation.

http://www.eastyellowstonetu.org/…/Yellowsto … -9-092.doc

Man, I sure hope my children’s children have a chance to fish for these amazing species.

[Corey Kruitbosch]

Thanks Mark … Is there any sort of fund, or group that is collecting money, that would go specifically to the recovery program?

[Mark Landerman]

The TU chapter was taking donations, but nothing was said specifically about raising money. However, this is a post that was made by Whitefish Ed (Yes, he is a bit crazy, but don’t let him fool you) that may explain things a bit better.

ok gents..as they say in the ice cream cone department..here’s the scoop. gonna try my best to do a readers digest version…

back in 06, i heard a presentation by the park’s fishieries biologist who talked about the problem at a seminar i attended. i was surprised how long it was going on, but little was being done to fix it cuz of lack of money. after the presentation, i asked him if anyone was helping raise funds. he said nobody ever approached him before. we blabbed a bit more..he set me up to meet the biologist in charge of the lake trout control, then followed up thru emails when i returned home.

when i got back to boise, i went to work and formed a non profit…cuttsinc.org (now dissolved). got the org going, built a website and got it up and running on the net. i had to do this stuff to prove to them that i meant busiiness and wasnt the flake i come across as otherwise. during this time the lake biologist kept educating me on the entire lake ecosystem including the pelican creek gig, and other things like tribs being cutoff from the lake due to drought times. but still…the lakers were the major problem. we set an initial goal of around 250k for needed research and equipment.

when i had my ducks in a row, the lake biologist set me up to meet the park’s chief biologist. drove over to bozeman that october and had a four and a half hour meeting with him. we reviewed the stratedgy, and got them to believe the lakers could indeed be erradicated if enuf bucks were tossed at doing so. he liked what he saw and took it to the park super..who also approved it.

now the catch..and failure. a lotta of us fly fish types always wondered why funds were being raised for other park fishieries projects, but not the lake. where was the yellowstone park foundation? i was also asked by others during my stint…where was tu? i had no answers for them.

now i have answers. if one makes a donation directly to yellowstone for a specific purpose, it goes into the federal general fund instead and not the park. for donations to go directly to the park..ones gotta go thru their foundation. the park people took my proposal to the foundation to set up an account and they refused. the ynpf dictates to the park what they will and will not support which is just the total opposite of their function according to irs law. foundations are supposed to work at the behest of the park..but not the ynpf..just the opposite. this sucky attitude puts the park people between a rock and a hard place. they dont want to bite the hand that feeds them in other areas of raising funds..cuz the ynpf has raised tons of millions over the years for other non fishing park stuff. quite the predicament huh?

i was told that the foundation would not set up a lake restoration account cuz their stance was to let nature take its course with the lakers. kinda hypocritical when considering other fisheries projects that killed critters isnt it? thus when i asked the biologist that their stance was to let the cancer kill an entire ecosystem instead of killing the cancer..he confirmed this. do yous guys smell a dead fish now??

at the following year’s yellowstone river opener..a lotta my buds asked for a status report. told them just what i wrote here. one of my buds went back to his tu chapter in cody and told what had come down. pissed off a lotta people..so the cody tu chapter knew some people at montana state who the lake biologist also knew and they got together to raise some bucks for the research side of laker liquidation..legally bypassing the ynp foundation. however, money for equiment needs is still lacking cuz these bucks have to go thru the foundation for the park to buy the equipment. i was also told that tu national was worthless in helping cody’s efforts. all they wanted was a cut of collections and cody told them to take a hike.

i will be happy to answer other questions if i can. thanks for taking the time to read all of this….

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