Yellowstone River Cutthroat - End of an Era?

My friend, Dave, and I love to fish for Cutthroat trout in the Yellowstone River in the Park at this time of the year. We've been fishing the river there for the past 35-40 years, and it is sight fishing for rising trout at its finest.

As most of you know, the Yellowstone River's Cutthroat population, at least in the several or more miles below Yellowstone Lake, is on a serious decline, with notably fewer fish this year than last, and the few remaining fish (almost all very large ones) appear to be in the last year or two of their lifespan.

Whether the cause of this decline is due to an exploding population of Lake Trout in Yellowstone Lake, Whirling Disease found in Yellowstone tributaries, the recent half dozen or so years of drought that dried up prime spawning tributaries, or a combination of all of those, I can't help wonder if the end of this great fishery is now imminent.

Dave and I have fished this great river several times during the past month, and both of us have been able to hook and/or land one or two of these fish each time. Here's a picture of one of these majestic fish that Dave caught last week, that is more or less typical or the very few native fish that remain there. This one measured 21" -- note the fly is still in the fish's mouth.

http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/j...Cutthroat1.jpg

A short time after this fish was caught and released, we spotted a group of rising fish a short distance farther up the river. There appeared to be at least a half dozen or more fish in this pod, but something about the rises looked much different from the large Cutthroat rises that we had been seeing. They looked like much smaller fish, and were aggressively feeding over a rather large area. Although they were well out of casting reach when we first spotted them, we were able to cross the river father downstream, and a half hour later were finally able to get into casting distance. Although most of the rises had stopped, I was able to finally hook and land one of these fish that I'm sure was one that we had seen rising -- imagine my surprise (and horror!) to find a 9" Cuttbow on the end of my line!

That's the first Cuttbow that I've personally seen or heard about in the river there. I wonder if anyone else has seen or heard of them there? There are some mighty stupid people that do some mighty stupid things - like stocking rainbows, perhaps. I don't know. But, I have to wonder if we have finally seen the beginning of the end of another wonderful fishing era.

John