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As an avid fly angler (130 days a year on average), I wouldn't lose any sleep if the San Juan (which I fished for years) turned back into a free-flowing desert river with nary a trout in the section below where Navajo Dam now stands. Or the Dolores (which I fish). Or the Gunnison (which I fish). Or the Madison, (which I fish)... We MADE those places. They are ARTIFICIAL. They have nonnative sport fish placed in them for our convenience.
The continued existence of rare and endangered species, and efforts to turn them back into UN-endangered species, is more important to me, as both an outdoorsman and as a biologist, than having some convenient place to catch trout. Especially if those trout are not native fish. I have fished a lot of tailwaters in my day, but I would still rather have native fish in free flowing waters, even if they are not trout or anything else I could catch on a fly. If this was MY tailwater, the one I fished every afternoon after work?
Yes, I would rather have darters and mussels and what have you than a handy fishin hole.
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I guess I should state how I feel about this: To begin with, I will have to stay in the middle because I am just a person who loves to tie flies and fish with a fly rod for any species of fish. If the only fish I fly fished for was trout, I could take a stand on this. In the beginning there was only the Elk River which contained many species of fish from small mouth bass, large mouth bass, black perch, bluegill, walleye, etc. When they built a dam across the Elk they created Tims Ford Lake. It was created to provide flood control and to generate electricity. The lake is approximately 25 miles long and has very few shallow areas. Overall average depth would probably be around 85 feet. There are several areas that are 100 feet deep and deeper. The thermocline is around 25 feet in the heat of the summer. This means there is not really sufficient oxygen to support a lot of fish once you go deeper than about 50 feet. They pull water from the base of the dam for their generator which will be very cold and very little oxygen in it. They do introduce oxygen to their release water. When they built the dam and started releasing water from the base of the dam, it made the Elk River below the dam too cold for the warm water fish that use to live there. To provide fish for the landowners who use to fish the Elk where it ran through their land, they started stocking trout. That is why they call it a "put and take" resource. They are trying to please everyone which does not work. I think what really "ticked" everyone off the most was they started to releasing warmer water by letting water through the dam at a higher point, and they never posted this action to receive any feedback from everyone. They just started doing it. This is not right but it is politics. Now you have some people who guide and they are not happy about this because some had access to some further down the river areas through private property and they felt this was their private area and now that area may become to warm for trout and the trout will move further up the river and now these guides will have to guide on the river with other guides instead of having their private access areas. I understand their situation and feel for them. They are not saying they intend to warm up the entire river below the dam. They will still release water that is cold enough for trout, but, the trout section of the river will be shorter. That could work out except that they are also talking about changing the way they generate by running the generator in "spurts" instead of running it for 3-4 hours and then shuting it down. The "spurts" will be like running the generator for 30 minutes to an hour and off and back up again for a short while a couple hours later. What this will do is eliminate a lot of wadable water and force more fishermen to use canoes or drift boats to fish. This upsets the person who just wants to wade fish and I feel for them. Do I feel there are hold over fish, yes, I do. I have caught 24" rainbows and 24" browns and I feel they were hold overs. I cannot say for sure if there is any natural reproduction going on, but, I just feel there is some but probably not enough at this time to maintain the river. I do know that there have been 5+ pound trout caught over the years. My thoughts on this, if they shorten the cold water section, would be to stock more browns since they can stand warmer water and we could possibly have a good brown trout river with reproduction. There are all kinds of battle lines drawn up on this and no one knows what the outcome will be at this time. For myself, I will continue to fish the Elk River for what ever species of fish is there and will continue to enjoy the Elk River and the peace and quiet it provides. I am just a fly fisherman who enjoys using the fly rod and I just need water and something to take my fly and pull back. I will just have to remain neutral on this even if it makes some upset with me. I do love catching trout, but, I also enjoy fly fishing for warm water species too. Just my opinions and nothing more......
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Well, people who made buggy-whips whined when Henry invented a car. Put horse thieves out of work too. Somebody put non-native fish in the Au Sable in Michigan too. Terrible thing except for the fact that somebody else jammed so many logs down it a few years back that the sawdust killed everything in it. I would rather fish for Grayling at Grayling, but will take what there is left and try hard to keep it going so others might have a shot at it too.
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DG et al:
Virtually every trout stream in the southeastern US, if not all, is an "artificial" trout stream when it comes down to it. Although there are numerous streams in, for example, GA, NC, SC, TN, and VA that have temperatures that are cold enough to sustain trout year around and permit stream breeding. But the only "trout" indigenous to the region is the brook trout, which is not a "trout" at all and is instead a char, and is more closely related to arctic char and dolly varden than rainbows or browns. The only reason there are "trout streams" in most of the eastern US is because of the penchant of the British to transport and stock trout, and later the states did it. This is true of the trout streams as far away as South Africa. There are a lot of "artificial" trout streams all over the country; but if one looks at the matter closely enough, those "artificial" streams are often some of the most productive, grow some of the largest trout, and pull fishermen from some of the greatest destinations. At bottom, a lot of what we might call "artificial" streams, like the San Juan and the Taylor, are some of the "best" and "most desirable" streams in the country.
One can not turn back the clock, the dams are not going to disappear, and the economic and recreational benefits of having trout there is much more perceptible than having warm water acquatic species. There is no payoff of living in a fantasy world an trading the bird in the hand for the hope of getting two in the bush.
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My guess is that if they turn it back to a warm-water fishery, bass, gar and other warm-water predators will move upstream and be an even bigger threat to the Boulder Darters (Etheostoma wapiti), and mussels.
In the case of the darters, the term 'endangered' is a bit misleading. The darters are threatened in the Elk River, but they are raised commercially by the Dale Hollow and Chattahootche National Fish Hatcheries for release into the wild, so the chances of them actually becoming extinct are slim. And they also occur naturally in other places along the Tennessee River drainage, in Tn., Ga., and Al. While not numerous, they are not in danger of extinction.
The reason for the Darters decline is not the Dam (although it probably didn't help), but the lack of boulders on the bottom, which these fish require for spawning. The darters have adapted to the temperature and the environment. My suggestion is to leave things as they are, and maybe just import some (lots of) boulders from somewhere else and place them all along the 63 mile stretch of river that they inhabit, and let them do their thing. Altering the water temperature can have catastrophic unintended consequences for all the river species. Importing boulders is a much less drastic, and safer alternative that would help the darters, and keep the trout fishery as well. Everybody, including the fish, wins.
Just my opinion, as a scientist.
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Information from the Cumberland Chapter TU.
Attention Elk River Fisherman: TWRA Contact Information
TENNESSEE WILDLIFE RESOURCES AGENCY
Frank Fiss
Aquatic Conservation Coordinator
ttp://files.e2ma.net/18348/assets/docs/tims_ford_draft_ea_twra_comments.pdf