Glacier National Park is taking public comment until April 17 on a proposal to use a fish toxicant called rotenone to remove non-native Yellowstone cutthroat trout in the upper Camas drainage and stock the waters with native westslope cutthroat trout and bull trout.
The project would use rotenone, a naturally occurring toxicant that affects gill-breathing animals such as fish, to kill non-native Yellowstone cutthroats in Camas Lake, Lake Evangeline and Camas Creek above Arrow Lake and then relocate three native species — westslope trout, bull trout and sculpin — into Camas Lake and Lake Evangeline, according to an environmental assessment (EA) that evaluates the proposed action’s impacts on park resources.
“This would be done to establish a native fish assemblage that is secure against the threats of non-native fish and climate-related habitat degradation,” the EA states.
“Action is necessary to reduce the overall risk of hybridization in the Camas drainage and increase the protection of native westslope cutthroat trout populations downstream and throughout the North Fork system,” the EA continues. “Establishing a new, genetically secure population of westslope cutthroat trout would expand the distribution of pure westslope cutthroat trout, and protect the genetic characteristics of North Fork of the Flathead westslope cutthroat trout.”
The park paused a larger fisheries planning effort initiated in April of 2016 to instead evaluate and focus on targeted fisheries management projects that can be analyzed in site-specific detail. Based on the success of these smaller-scale actions, the park may or may not continue with a plan that identifies fisheries actions at the park-wide level at some point in the future.
The National Park Service said public scoping was not re-initiated for the current EA because scoping for the larger fisheries plan provided the opportunity for early comments on the use of rotenone and the translocation of native fish.
The EA is available on the National Park Service Planning, Environment & Public Comment (PEPC) website at http://parkplanning.nps.gov/UpperCamas. Comments can be posted on the website or sent by mail to Superintendent, Glacier National Park, Attn: Upper Camas Fisheries EA, P.O. Box 128, West Glacier, Montana, 59936. The EA may also be requested by calling (406) 888-7898.