Controversy surrounds Sierra stream poisoning
By Louis Sahagun, Los Angeles Times
WALKER — State fisheries biologist Dave Lentz poured poison into a remote High Sierra stream and watched quietly as every rainbow and golden trout in the water turned belly up.
After the rotenone spread along 11 miles of Silver King Creek last Wednesday, other biologists poured in a neutralizing agent, making the river again habitable — and a suitable home for the rarest trout in the world.
Kneeling beside a small brass spigot that dripped the milky white toxin into a pool edged with alders, Lentz, a conservation coordinator for native trout with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, smiled and said, “Looks like everything is working as intended. The Paiute cutthroat trout belongs in this stream, not the nonnatives in here now.”
The Paiute trout is native to the Alpine County stream in the Eastern Sierra’s Carson-Iceberg Wilderness of the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest. But it had been squeezed out by rainbow and golden trout, which are not native to this portion of Silver King Creek.
The plan to restore the Paiute trout had been held up in federal court for more than a decade by opponents who believe that poisoning a stream is about the worst thing that could happen in a designated wilderness. They also question the safety of rotenone and worry about its possible long-term effects on wildlife and regional water supplies.
Not impressed.
THIS IS INTERFERING WITH NATURE. Sometimes a well intentioned act is more detrimental than doing nothing. Obviously they killed trout to manipulate the population of fish in the way they chose. I’d be willing to bet that if this decision was put to a public vote, 80% of the vote would be against such action. It is natural for weak species to die and become extinct. I wouldn’t recommend killing off a weak species either. If the paiute trout were to become extinct, (naturally) only the fish biologists would be saddened by the loss. The rest of the fish and us people would do just fine. I’d prefer that the streams have healthy populations of fish, rather than a small population of rare fish.
Mr. Lents sounds like a masochist to me. Why poison a river and see fish belly up?
In the 60’s and 70’s WE dropped fish from helicopters in high alpine lakes and streams. All for better fishing. Now in 2013 and an over abundance of these fish we now have to deal with the problem WE created. Nothing is affected from this poison but the fish. Should we leave the gold fish and cat fish in Tahoe?
I can’t drive or walk into a certain forest because liberal whack jobs are worried about a yellow frog. Yet, they can POISON a stream!! You fools are using your own pathetic agenda’s. Hypocrites!
Keep in mind, native fish doesn’t mean it was ever in that stream before, it means they are an old fish.
I hope these officials with Dept. of Fish and Wildlife are happy. What a waste of our tax dollars.
Actually, native fish means they are only found in or are only from a particular river system. Rainbow and golden trout are non-native fish to that particular stream, they were planted in the early 1900’s. Paiute cutthroat are native to only a few rivers of eastern Alpine county and they are a subspecies of the Lahontan cutthroat. Both at one time were on the endangered species list. Rainbow trout hybridization with the Paiute is causing the extiction of pure strain Paiutes. CA Fish and Wildlife are only trying to right a wrong created decades ago with the introduction of non-native fish to Silver King Creek. Most purest fly fishers would agree there is more to be said about catching an 8″ Paiute in its native water instead of an 18″ planted Rainbow which was raised in a concrete tank. Kudos to CalWild!!
Will we next kill off all non-native Californians.
The Big Picture! Which tributary of which river does this “remote” high Sierra stream eventually run into? How far did the poison really spread? 11 miles they say. Now since the Rainbow and Golden have been living and migrating for obviously a great number of years, how long till they return? Hopefully the Paiute trout is well established before these “evasive” species return to their home spawning areas and repopulate the creek. Opps, then Fish and Game can now repoison the creek to get rid of the “invasive” species yet killing all of the Paiute trout in the process just to start this whole silly thing again.
wtf is an evasive species?