04-21-2011, 03:38 AM
Rainbows and brook trout are a much greater threat to the cutthroat populations. The rainbows because of hybridization, and the brook trout because their ability to out populate just about any other fish in a stream. The brook trout will take over the headwaters and spawning streams. They pushing the cutts out by their shear numbers and by devouring the stream's food resources.
Large browns may prey on cutts, but the big browns generally only populate the lower and slower sections in any numbers. They are much more geographically limited, by their preferences. They may be the higher percentage species in sections, but they don't really threaten to be the major species in the whole drainage. Browns and cutts seem to cohabitate ok.
The 16" limit is good as it helps to allow harvest of some of the larger browns, but also allows a lot of nice browns to stay in the river to be caught and released too.
I don't think that the purpose in helping the cutts to become reestablished is to remove all other non- natives, only the ones that are causing the depletion or gene dilution of the cutts in the system as a whole.
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Large browns may prey on cutts, but the big browns generally only populate the lower and slower sections in any numbers. They are much more geographically limited, by their preferences. They may be the higher percentage species in sections, but they don't really threaten to be the major species in the whole drainage. Browns and cutts seem to cohabitate ok.
The 16" limit is good as it helps to allow harvest of some of the larger browns, but also allows a lot of nice browns to stay in the river to be caught and released too.
I don't think that the purpose in helping the cutts to become reestablished is to remove all other non- natives, only the ones that are causing the depletion or gene dilution of the cutts in the system as a whole.
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