Trout Unlimited honors Klancke's distinguished service

from the Winter Park Manifest

by Stephanie Miller

Kirk Klancke, a longtime Fraser Valley local and environmental advocate, received Trout Unlimited’s Distinguished Service Award for his dedication to protecting the Fraser River.

Klancke, who is a member of the Colorado River Headwater’s Chapter of Trout Unlimited (TU), received the award at TU’s annual meeting, held last month in Boise, Idaho. The award recognizes outstanding individual volunteer or professional contributions to TU and its mission of conserving, protecting and restoring North America’s coldwater fisheries and their watersheds.

Klancke, however, said the award isn’t about him. Instead, he hopes it draws more attention to the plight of the Valley’s natural environment — especially its rivers.

The Fraser River and the headwaters of the Colorado River are facing serious challenges, a recent TU newsletter says. Years of transmountain diversions to supply water to the Denver metropolitan area and northern Colorado have taken their toll on the rivers through low flows, increased temperature levels, algae and sedimentation — all of which are threats to the rivers’ gold medal fisheries and cutthroat trout populations.

Klancke hopes the award highlights the issues in the upper Colorado River that are threatening fisheries. More than half of the Fraser River is used for outdoor lawn irrigation on the Front Range, “and to grow Kentucky Bluegrass,” he said.

“It’s one of the most threatened coldwater fisheries,” he added. “ I see the state of Colorado destroying the natural environment to create an artificial environment on the East Slope.

“The state has to wake up.”

Scott Linn, president of the local TU chapter, pointed out that the Fraser River was nationally highlighted in 2005 by American Rivers as the third most endangered river of the United States — thanks to Klancke’s efforts.

“Kirk’s efforts have been instrumental in bringing local, regional and national awareness to the birthplace of the Colorado River,” Linn said.

Klancke also had good things to say about TU and its efforts. When he received the recognition award, he told the room of about 150 TU members that the organization is “the most active national environmental association in the Colorado headwaters.”

“We have a David and Goliath battle with the diverters and before (TU) came, we didn’t even have a slingshot,” he said.

Other accomplishments Linn added that Klancke is also a key promoter of “Fly Fishing with Ike,” a campaign that brings national awareness of the historical significance of the Fraser river, a favorite fishing spot of former President Dwight D. “Ike” Eisenhower.

This year, Klancke worked with the Fraser Valley Lions Club to raise more than $82,000 for a sculpture of the former president to be placed in Fraser, which will help further that connection, Linn said.

Klancke also helped start the Headwaters Outreach Initiative at the East Grand Middle School — a program that teaches children the aspects of a healthy watershed and human impacts.

Klancke is also the president of the East Grand Water Quality Board, a co-founder of the Friends of the Fraser, a board member of the Grand County Water Information Network, a board Member of the Quality/Quantity Committee of Northwest Council of Governments, a member of the Grand County Water Forum, and a Grand County representative in the Colorado River Headwaters Round Table (a group established by state law to make decisions about future water needs, including instream flow needs of the Colorado River Basin within Colorado).

He is also manager for the Winter Park Ranch Water and Sanitation District.

Western & Colorado Water Project Staff Notes

October 2007  On the Road: We spoke at an American Groundwater Trust conference about TU's interest in sound ground water management, made some new contacts and garnered some good press. We also attended the biennial Colorado River Symposium at Bishop's Lodge in Santa Fe and talked about TU reconnect and restoration projects in the Basin, as well as had many productive conversations about climate change's effects on trout and the energy-water nexus. Finally, we spoke to Light Hawk volunteer pilots at their annual Fly-In, held this year in Boulder, about the Western Water Project and the power of seeing the watersheds. 

Santa Fe River: While in Santa Fe, we spent time with the Director of the Santa Fe Watershed Association, toured the river, and made a presentation about river re-connect and restoration strategies used around the west at a forum the Association sponsored. The Santa Fe River was listed as the most endangered river in this year's American Rivers report. The Association would like to partner with TU to bring this river, which used to support native Rio Grande cutts, but now is dry for months out of the year, back to life. 

Flow Mapping: Colorado's mapping of environmentally and recreationally important stream reaches that need flow protection continues to inch forward. On a recent call, the steering committee set a state-wide meeting to explain and discuss the coarse and site-specific flow characterization models that we hope to use. 

Black Canyon: TU and the other parties to the Colorado water court proceedings to quantify the Black Canyon reserved water right are engaged in mediation. The court has stayed proceedings until middle of January to allow negotiations to continue. 

Colorado Headwaters Forum: We attended the Colorado Headwaters Forum in Silverton 

The Yampa: We spent the better part of a week surveying streams in the Yampa River Basin with Colorado Division of Wildlife staff in anticipation of bringing recommendations for instream flow rights to the CWCB. We are continuing to work with staff to advocate for Denver to release reasonable winter flows from the Williams Fork Reservoir. 

Temperature: We continue to collect, analyze and summarize stream temperature data in anticipation of the Colorado River Basin-wide hearings this winter. We are working to help improve the state's model of expected stream temperatures. This model is being developed for the Aquatic Life Workgroup as part of their effort to delineate the expected conditions against which actual stream health is compared. We also assisted with a large scale sampling effort led, in large part, by the EPA in Peru Creek that is part of ongoing efforts to restore the stream and cleanup the ongoing impacts from acid mine drainage.

Reed, Hunt work to curtail drilling that threatens cutthroat trout

By Charlie MeyersThe Denver Post

Article Last Updated: 10/06/2007 09:15:20 PM MDT

IDAHO FALLS, IDAHO - It is more than mere commitment that connects these trout conservationists, north and south. More than native trout restoration, more than roadless protection, more than battles against the relentless hum of off-road- vehicles. More, even, than the stench of oil and gas.

When Tom Reed leaves his home in Bozeman, Mont., to fight the infidels in Montana and Wyoming, it's always with a glance back down the continent toward Golden, where he was born and where his parents still live.

From Chris Hunt's perch in Idaho Falls, he often can sail southward to Colorado, where he grew up in Littleton and gained his degree at Western State.

Now here's the strange part, another of those links that keeps winding through the passions of the people who seek to protect trout and other wild things in a time of rampant development: Hunt worked as a college intern at the Gunnison Country Times newspaper. Reed was his editor.

Their paths took separate turns - Hunt to various jobs at small southern Colorado papers before joining Trout Unlimited, Reed through deeper curves to the National Outdoor Leadership School in Lander, Wyo., then as information supervisor of Wyoming Game and Fish, then to TU.

Having come full circle, they now find themselves standing at the same streamside, preaching a gospel of moderation against drilling platforms that threaten both rare cutthroat trout and the downstream watersheds that harbor rainbows and browns.

Reed, who carries a nebulous title - backcountry organizer - spends much of his time on rampant energy issues in both states.

"Drilling is the major thing, but secondarily it's the impact of all the housing development associated with it," he says.

Reed's current preoccupation also includes a campaign to bring Wyoming water law into the 21st century as a way to boost in-stream flows, much like a similar initiative in an equally backward Colorado.

"We're working on a lot of things. We work hard on it," Reed says.

As director of TU's public lands initiative, Hunt's endeavor takes him all over the West. Not surprising, much of his attention focuses on oil and gas - from Colorado's Roan Plateau to a fresh wave of leases in Montana on the Beaverhead and the Clark Fork of the Yellowstone.

"That's the issue connecting everything we're doing. The Bureau of Land Management is becoming much more aggressive in its leasing policy. Instead of the usual pattern of issuing leases every four months, they're now down to two."

Trout Unlimited's endeavors in the northern Rockies include other connections, much closer to home. Matt Woodard, Hunt's neighbor in Idaho Falls, works as TU's project manager on an initiative to maintain populations of indigenous large-spotted cutthroat trout on the Snake River below Palisades Dam.

"I'm a valley native. I fished all over this country since I was a kid," said Woodard, a TU employee since 2001.

As he says this, Woodard holds the oars of a drift boat on the Snake's 10,000-cubic- foot-per-second crest, a liquid platform that makes rowing, and fishing, less than easy.

But it's what happens at an earlier time on the Snake that holds Wood- ard's concern. His primary focus is to keep rainbow trout from degrading the historic cutthroat habitat below Palisades Reservoir. To that end he works in concert with Idaho Game and Fish and the local TU chapter to stifle rainbow spawning, to promote more advantageous flows, improve habitat and remove as many adult rainbows as possible to curtail hybridization.

"This is one of the great populations of Yellowstone cutthroat left in the wild," Woodard said. "It's certainly worth saving them."

That's the sort of commitment that trout lovers everywhere can understand.

National championships conclude

By Zak Brown Saturday, October 6, 2007

LOVELAND — As he climbed out of Big Thompson River on Friday afternoon, Eddie Pinkston was hoping to go out on top.

The fly fisherman from Asheville, N.C., was in third place going into the final session of the National Fly Fishing Championships on Friday. He needed a good day on his assigned piece of water, just below the Idylewild Dam. If that happened, he had a solid chance of winning what could be the 58-year-old's last national championships.

"Well, this is probably my last one. I don't know how much longer I can handle fishing like this for three straight days," the tall, lanky Pinkston said. "This is really made for those fishermen who are in their prime, but have still had enough experience on the water."

Friday was the last day for the championships, which brought more than 150 competitors to northern Colorado for the three-day event. The competitors fished on the Big Thompson River, the Poudre River and Parvin and Dowdy Lakes in the Red Feather Lakes area.

Because of the wide area of competition, the final scores for the competition were still being determined late on Friday night. But the competitors were already trying to figure out the winner Friday afternoon. The fish stories were flying around the Big Thompson, but these ones were actually accurate. Pinkston caught seven in a three-hour period, which gave him — and others — hope.

Pinkston is known around the championships as a character, which is why several people congregated around him when he finished his day. When one of the spectators shook his hand they said, "I think I'm shaking the hand of the gold medalist."

Even if he didn't win the gold medal, Pinkston was happy to just be fishing Colorado waters on a beautiful fall day.

"There's plenty of trout waters where I'm from, but not the volume of fish there are here," he said. "You all have some beautiful rivers here."

Conservation Day

Trout Unlimited will have a free Conservation Day at the Millennium Harvest House today from noon-5 p.m. to give Colorado families a glimpse into the world of stream conservation.

There will be exhibits, activities and speakers. Experts will talk about oil and gas drilling on Colorado's Roan Plateau, balancing oil and gas exploration with wildlife, implications of climate change for western waterways and nitrogen and mercury deposits in Colorado's high mountain lakes and streams.

Children's activities include the Colorado Division of Wildlife's giant aquarium with trout and other Colorado fish and a fly tying table for young people.

A barbecue lunch will be available for $7 from noon-2 p.m.

For an event schedule, including information about tickets for tonight's banquet with keynote speaker Gov. Bill Ritter, visit www.cotrout.org.

NFFC has international flair

By Mark Riley For the CameraFriday, October 5, 2007

 In the spirit of international camaraderie, and also to intensify the competition, the National Fly Fishing Championship organizers invited three international teams to compete in this week's event. The Irish National Team, the British Army Team and Team Canada are all competing on northern Colorado waters this week and staying in Boulder, the headquarters of the championships.As a member of the organizing committee, I had the chance to show the Irish team around Boulder last weekend. These gentlemen represent Ireland well. They are friendly, gregarious, master storytellers and, I've heard, excellent anglers. After visiting a couple of local fly shops, we had lunch at Conor O'Neil's Irish Pub (they don't get enough Irish pub fare in Ireland?). The team was thrilled to see a sign in the pub referring to a small town only a few kilometers from one of their own home towns."We're having a great time in Colorado. The weather is lovely, the scenery is spectacular and the people are welcoming and friendly," team manager Denis Cronin said. "I had read that Boulder is widely considered to be one of the finest cities in America. After only a few hours here, I can clearly see why."The competition concludes today at noon. The individual and team results will be posted at Boulder's Outlook Hotel, the headquarters of the championship.The competition is taking place on the Big Thompson River, near Loveland, the Cache de la Poudre River and Parvin Lake and Dowdy Lake in the Red Feather Lakes area, near Fort Collins. For further information on the competition visit www.nationalflyfishingchampionship.com.

Mark Riley lives in Boulder and is the treasurer of Boulder Flycasters, the local Trout Unlimited Chapter.

New temp standards set to protect trout

Global warming a wild card in new rules, experts say

http://www.summitdaily.com/article/20071004/NEWS/71004014 

By BOB BERWYN summit daily news October 4, 2007 BRECKENRIDGE — Along with monitoring concentrations of toxic pollutants like heavy metals from leaky mines, local streams will also soon be subject to strict temperature standards. After a rigorous scientific process, the state is adopting new rules to protect fish and other aquatic life by setting maximum temperatures.

The idea is to make sure that impacts like discharges from water treatment plants and urban runoff don’t kill fish, or impair their ability to reproduce.

Temperature standards are important because the body temperature of fish basically matches the temperature of the surrounding water, said U.S. Geological Survey research biologist Andrew Todd.

Trout and other species have evolved and spawn under very specific temperature conditions and don’t have a mechanism to adapt to temperature changes in the short-term, Todd said, speaking Wednesday during a water quality summit in Breckenridge.

“When we introduce heat, we disrupt metabolic and reproductive functions,” Todd said.

A number of factors can affect stream temperatures, including sunshine, shading from stream-side vegetation, stream flows and water quantity, as well as direct discharges from point sources like factories and treatment plants.

The latter are less of a factor in the High Country, but increased urbanization around local streams and runoff from paved areas, as well as diversions for snowmaking and other needs, could conceivably influence water temperature in Summit County.

The biggest wild card in the deck is air temperature, which is beyond human control.

Given recent climbing temperature trends associated with climate change, it’s not clear how the state’s new rules will be effective in stemming any potential impacts from global warming.

But as they now stand, the temperature standards are stringent enough to protect even cutthroat trout, most sensitive of the trout species.

“Cutthroat trout drove the setting of the table-value standards,” Todd said, adding that 85 percent of the state’s cold-water streams qualify as cutthroat trout habitat.

Todd explained that the existing standards, set in 1978, were not considered to be scientifically defensible, and that the rules lacked any clear mechanism for enforcement and implementation.

The new temperature limits were determined after scrutinizing hundreds of scientific studies based mainly on laboratory work.

Todd said the rules include criteria for acute conditions (peak temperatures that can kill fish within days), and for chronic conditions — warm temperatures that, over a longer period, can impair reproduction and growth.

The limits also take into account seasonal spawning requirements and are broken down for different types of fisheries, from high mountain trout streams to lowland ponds and rivers with habitat for completely different species.

The rules cover eight cold-water species and 43 warm-water species.

Even these new protective limits may not be adequate to fully protect the resource in the long run, Todd said, explaining that the rules, for example, don’t cover thermal shock, a very sudden change in temperature that can kill fish in a short time.

The state may address that issue during a future round of rulemaking in 2010, he concluded.

The Breckenridge conference included tours of local river restoration projects, streams impacted by mine drainage and other presentations on watershed planning and water quality.

It brought together groups like the Colorado Watershed Assembly, the Colorado Watershed Network and the Colorado Riparian Association.

Local activist Sandy Briggs said the conference was a great networking opportunity, and that he was surprised that no local government officials attended, as far as he knew.

A presentation Tuesday evening by Rocky Mountain Regional Forester Rick Cables focused on the important role of forest health in watershed protection, a crucial issue in Summit County’s beetle-stricken and potentially fire-prone forests.

Wetlands rules could hang streams out to dry

Trout Unlimited letter to Ritter points out flaws with federal regs http://www.summitdaily.com/article/20071003/NEWS/71003004

By BOB BERWYN

Summit Daily News Summit County, CO Colorado 

October 3, 2007 SUMMIT COUNTY — New rules outlining federal control over impacts to wetlands have caused one environmental group to write a letter to Governor Ritter.

Only about 25 percent of the state’s streams and rivers flow year-round, while the rest are seasonal. Along with isolated wetlands, they could be completely stripped of protection under the new rules, Trout Unlimited wrote in July, calling on Ritter to support the federal Clean Water Restoration Act. The bill would offer crucial protection for streams and wetlands. especially in arid states like Colorado, according to Trout Unlimited.

Trout Unlimited advocates for conservation of cold-water fisheries, including reaches in Summit County that provide habitat for native cutthroat trout. These are fed by high-altitude wetlands and streams, which Colorado Trout Unlimited executive director Dave Nickum said would suffer through a “significant” decrease of federal protection — even thought the exact interpretation of the rules are still being debated.

“If we don’t protect the headwaters, how can we protect water quality downstream?” Nickum asked. The new guidance is written so narrowly that it doesn’t take into account the way watersheds work, he added. This counters the emerging trend of watershed-based planning, he added.

At issue is whether the Corps of Engineers has jurisdiction over seasonal streams that aren’t directly connected to “navigable” waterways. In a 2001 ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court set new standards, essentially requiring federal agencies to consider whether a wetland or stream has a direct connection to interstate commerce. That could call into question the Corp’s ability to regulate impacts to isolated beaver ponds around areas like Montezuma or willow wetlands in the headwaters of the Blue River, south of Breckenridge.

In Summit County, “the next navigable river is the Colorado at Grand Junction,” Nickum said. In his eyes, the new guidance places the burden on federal agencies to prove that “impacts to a single draw don’t affect water quality downstream.”

As they stood before the guidance was issued, federal wetlands rules have been a “cornerstone” of the cuntry’s modern environmental protection programs. At worst, the new rules would also cut or eliminate environmental reviews and public involvement on decisions affecting wetlands, Nickum said.

One solution might come from Congress, which is considering a Clean Water Restoration Act. The bill would remove the word “navigable” to clarify that the Clean Water Act is principally intended to protect the nation’s waters from pollution, and not just maintain navigability.

The legislation would restore the regulatory status quo prior to the SWANCC ruling; it does not create “new” protective authority. The bill has been languishing in committee for several years, but has strong support from the environmental community.

Experts keen on refilling aquifers

As the West faces supply issues, many say it's crucial to inject even treated water underground. "Overall, the environmental trade-offs in many cases are going to be worth doing underground storage," especially compared with dams, said Melinda Kassen of Trout Unlimited. http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_7048900 

By Steve Lipsher The Denver Post

Article Last Updated: 10/01/2007 01:25:47 AM MDT

Colorado Springs - Artificially refilling aquifers - even with treated wastewater - may be the best answer for the West's strained water supplies, according to water supply experts. Still, hidden and complex subterranean geology makes aquifer storage an inexact science, said water officials at the American Groundwater Water Trust forum here last week. "This is a very difficult challenge," said Harris Sherman, the executive director of the state Department of Natural Resources. "The use of groundwater is interrelated to everything we do in Colorado," Sherman said. Rapidly growing cities throughout the West are looking to groundwater supplies to offset shortfalls in streams, the primary water source for most municipalities. Water levels in major aquifers are falling at alarming levels, water officials say. Pools in the massive Denver Basin are dropping as much as an inch a day in some areas, for example, requiring ever-deeper wells and prompting concerns over whether there are adequate long-term supplies for municipalities. In places as varied as Orange County, Calif., and the San Luis Valley, officials have found success injecting excess water back into the ground during wet years to replenish aquifers and even bolster aboveground streams. "Managed recharge has been going on for years," said Andrew Stone, executive director of the nonprofit groundwater trust. The Centennial Water District has injected water into existing wells for more than a decade, and Aurora's under-construction Prairie Waters project includes a groundwater recharge effort intended to filter wastewater for reuse. Storing water underground minimizes evaporation losses typical for surface reservoirs, and the process can serve as filtration because most aquifers aren't open caverns so much as porous "sponges" of cobble and sands. Nearly one in five residents in Colorado depends on groundwater, but diminishing supplies already are affecting places such as Douglas County, where development has been limited by dried-up wells. Environmental concerns with aquifer recharge center on water- quality issues such as contamination, but they can be limited if the water is cleaned first. "Overall, the environmental trade-offs in many cases are going to be worth doing underground storage," especially compared with dams, said Melinda Kassen of Trout Unlimited.

Colorado Water Project Notes, September 2007

We assisted the CDOW with fish sampling on the Snake and Blue Rivers. The Snake continued to show the effects of a large runoff event that appears to have brought a lot of metals in from mines upstream. In other words, we only found two fish. Conversely, we sampled a recently restored stretch of the Blue River and found too many fish to count. Well, not really, but this is one happy fishery. CDOW is currently working up the resulting data. We are also continuing to assist the CDOW’s efforts to collect data for instream flow appropriations. We attended a retreat for Colorado environmental leaders to set a 2007-2008 strategic agenda and think about even longer term planning. At that meeting, Colorado's water future was one of the top three statewide issue campaigns (along with climate change/clean energy and habitat protection). There was much talk about the sportsmen-enviro alliance and hope that adding the land protection community (TNC, TPL et al) will make a strong voice more powerful. We have continued to focus on temperature monitoring in the Colorado River, Eagle River, and Roaring Fork River Basins. These efforts have not only been aided by other non-profits such as the Roaring Fork Conservancy, but by one of the big water districts, Northern. Northern have made their data available and are currently warehousing some of the data collected by the Grand County Water Information Network. Some of these data indicate some temperature exceedances. However, this winter the Colorado River Basin will go through the process of adopting the presumptive temperature standards. Until then, the less stringent and less enforceable interim standards are in effect.  We have been working to encourage Denver to release as much water as possible from the Williams Fork Reservoir this winter. Because the Shoshone Power Plant had a penstock explode this summer there will be no Shoshone Call this winter. Denver asked the CDOW to provide a minimum flow recommendation for the Williams Fork. Based on this analysis, they have agreed to release 25 cfs all winter long. This is more than the 15 cfs they are legally required to release, but somewhat less than they typically release.

Trout recovery effort based on best science available

CO Springs Gazette Letters

September 30, 2007

It was with a great deal of disappointment that I read The Gazette’s Sept. 13 Our View, “Fishy science / Preble’s mouse, meet greenback trout.” Rather than take the opportunity to educate the public about the release of this significant scientific finding, The Gazette chose to politicize this discovery. This was done by suggesting that the greenback trout recovery efforts implemented over the past 20 years were not performed using “sound scientific basis for its actions.”

It is the nature of science that “facts” once thought to be reliable become obsolete upon the discovery of new information. That is the case with the Colorado greenback cutthroat trout. As science develops greater insight into DNA, greater specificity between species and sub-species can be determined.

The greenback cutthroat trout has long been known to have evolved from a line of trout originating from the rainbow trout, with the Colorado River cutthroat trout being its closest relative. As a result, the genetics of the greenback are very similar to that of these trout. Only within the past 10 years have scientists been able to distinguish between “pure” greenback cutthroat trout and those that have been hybridized with the rainbow trout genes. The ability to distinguish between the Colorado greenback cutthroat trout and the Colorado River cutthroat trout using DNA has been discovered only in the past 12 months.

Using the latest science available, the Colorado Division of Wildlife has been attempting to bring back a stable population of the greenback cutthroat trout. The only tools available to distinguish the greenback from the Colorado River cutthroat were the location where they were found and their physical traits. Twenty years ago, DNA testing of their differences had not progressed to the point of being able to use that technique. These latest findings now allow for this determination.

I found this discovery to be a positive and exciting event. Not only do we now have another tool to aid in the recovery of this very limited population of trout, the findings confirm that there exists a number of pure Colorado greenback cutthroat trout populations, some of them right here in El Paso County, that can be used as brood stock.

The editorial suggested the DOW engages in “regulatory and scientific malpractice.” How so? The decisions were made more than 20 years ago based on the best science of the time. We all make decisions based on the best information available at the time; that is not malpractice, that is the nature of life. Allyn J. Kratz President Cheyenne Mountain Chapter of Trout Unlimited Colorado Springs