The National Park Service, in cooperation with our Arizona Game and Fish Department partners, manages the 15.5 mile (25 km) long Glen Canyon Reach below Glen Canyon Dam as a Recreational Rainbow Trout Fishery. A Group EffortThe US Geological Survey’s Grand Canyon Monitoring and Research Center (GCMRC) and the Arizona Game and Fish Department have been conducting monitoring and research on the rainbow trout population in the Glen Canyon Reach for many years. The Bureau of Reclamation and NPS work closely with these partners who perform many of these studies with funding allocated through the Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive Management Program. The partners in this effort have 3 primary goals for the fisheries program in the Glen Canyon Reach:
All of the partners agree that the recent increase in brown trout is a significant concern and that this species of fish is undesirable in the Glen Canyon Reach and should be controlled. They also agree that the efforts to control them should also continue in key areas in the Grand Canyon. A Focus on Brown TroutWith brown trout reproducing and increasing in numbers upstream of Lees Ferry since 2014, they present a concern in this location for several reasons:
The NPS, in cooperation with their partners are preparing to launch an Incentivized Harvest program that will make payments to anglers who focus on and remove brown trout from the Glen Canyon Reach. By targeting and removing large numbers of subadult and adult brown trout the goal of this program is to maintain, and, over time, reduce the overall population of brown trout in the Glen Canyon Reach. The specifics for this program will soon be announced during the year 2020. Focused removal of brown trout by anglers is expected to help maintain the recreational rainbow trout fishery in the Glen Canyon Reach, as well as ensure that the NPS and partners do not have to use mechanical harvesting or other tools that may disrupt the rainbow trout fishery. These efforts may also reduce the likelihood that large numbers of brown trout migrate downriver and threaten endangered fish in Grand Canyon. Monitoring will continue throughout the implementation of the Incentivized Harvest program to analyze the efficiency and efficacy of this management tool. |
Last updated: February 6, 2020