Hiking through the woods, Mark Miller carried a cylindrical backpack about three feet long. But rather than provisions, the bag was filled with cold oxygenated water and about 40 fry of Colorado’s state fish—the greenback cutthroat trout.
After a mile-long journey, Miller reached the stream where he gently acclimated the two to four-inch juveniles to their new home. He submerged the backpack in the water like a goldfish bag, adjusting the trout to the new temperature. For Miller and other members of the Rocky Mountain Flycasters chapter of Trout Unlimited, this strange-sounding experience is rewarding and impactful.
“It was just a great feeling to open that bag up and watch the fish swim away,” Miller, outreach chair of the Flycasters chapter, said. “So it is really rewarding.”
The Flycasters serves the Northern Front Range area of Colorado. The chapter’s membership of about 1,000 works to conserve, protect and restore coldwater resources in the Poudre and Big Thompson watersheds. The Flycasters are a group of fly fishing enthusiasts, many of whom are lifelong anglers. In addition to their greenback cutthroat restoration, the group hosts myriad events including youth day camps, a fishing expo and group fishing trips. Behind the philosophy of their chapter, however, is conserving the habitats for future generations.
“When I’m in the mountains or along a trout stream, I am in my happy place. There is something restorative or therapeutic about it that never ceases to amaze me,” said Conservation Chair Scott Baily. “I joined because I love trout fishing and I believe that Trout Unlimited acts in the best interest of salmonids and the cold water habitats they need to survive.”
Colorado waterways face a variety of threats, both natural and manmade, although the line between the two is becoming increasingly unclear with climate change.
“I believe that a blatant disregard for ethics has a lot to do with where we find ourselves today, environmentally speaking,” Baily said. “Unless we appropriately modify our behavior, the health of the environment will continue to deteriorate.”
The status of the state fish of Colorado is a fitting reminder of the impact humans have had on this state. Greenbacks were native to Colorado waterways, but white settlers introduced foreign trout species including the rainbow, brook and brown trout starting in the late 1800s.
“People would stock almost any kind of fish anywhere,” Miller said. “That’s why we’ve got Eastern Brook trout that are not native to this area. Rainbow trout are native to the West Coast.”
The introduction of these more aggressive trout species led to competition, predation and a lower breeding rate among greenbacks. Crossbreeding between species increased hybridization, killing off the greenback lineage. Other factors like logging, mining and water diversion further decimated their numbers, leading to the greenback’s current status as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act.
When these native trouts were believed to be extinct in 1937, the title of state fish was unofficially taken by the invasive Rainbow Trout. When Greenbacks were discovered to still live in Colorado waterways in the 1960s, conservation efforts ramped up as people worked to remedy the devastation.
“We realized the errors of our ways in the past. The U.S. Forest Service is the lead agency for the greenback trout,” Miller said. “And we just said, ‘We want to be involved however we can.’”
The culminated efforts of the Flycasters, U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Colorado Parks and Wildlife and Colorado State University, among others, is the Poudre Headwaters Project—a decade-long project to create a suitable habitat for greenbacks.
“If the Poudre Headwaters Project succeeds, it will help to remove the greenback cutthroat trout from the threatened and endangered species list,” Baily said. “Otherwise, the greenback’s status could slide from threatened back to endangered, or even worse.”
The Poudre Headwaters Project, or PHP, is a multi-step plan to remove invasive species, build a secure habitat along the Poudre River using barriers and restock the area with greenbacks. The project area spans 40 miles of connected rivers, several lakes and the Long Draw Reservoir. Once completed, it will be the largest interconnected restoration area protecting greenbacks in Colorado.
“The PHP has achieved a few major milestones, but it still has a long way to go,” Baily said. In my opinion, the project is at a critical juncture.”
According to Baily, organizational reshuffling and a change of leadership among some organizations has slowed progress on the PHP.
“I think when I first heard about it, it was going to be a 10 to 15-year project. And now we’re in about the fifth year and it’s going slowly,” Miller said. “A lot I think, is because of funding.”
Although there have been setbacks, Miller is hopeful for the completion of the PHP. The restoration events the Flycasters take part in—like backpacking fish through the woods—are hosted during the summer and bring dozens of volunteers in to give their time. Even when the project seems slow going, the work at its core lets people show their love for the outdoors which got them involved with the Flycasters in the first place.
“It can be some pretty, pretty challenging work, but it is fun. I’d say it’s really rewarding,” Miller said. “And I think a lot of people think like me that we’re doing that for future generations. So that’s pretty cool to have that kind of an impact.”
