Cool off this summer with a trip to Swift Trail in Graham County
If the triple digit summer heat is getting to you, you can escape and to enjoy cooler temperatures and a whole new view of southeastern Arizona with a trip up the Swift Trail in Graham County. And if fishing hooks you, there's great fishing at Riggs Flat Lake located near the end of the Trail.
A fish's tale
The story of the Apache trout isn't just another fish tale about the one that got away. It's a success story of a once-endangered native species that is again getting along swimmingly in the streams
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The Apache trout was quite popular among the early white settlers in east-central Arizona, not just as sport but also as an easy food source. In the 1880's, families trekked to the White Mountains to gather fish, preserving them in salt and keeping them in barrels for the winter. The July 5, 1888, St. Johns Herald newspaper attests to this popularity:
"Thomas Carsen took a trip to the head waters of the Black River for the purpose of enjoying a short season of sport in hooking and delivering some of the speckled beauties that are known to abound in the streams. The flies were so numerous that he could only stop one day, otherwise he was afraid he would have no horse to ride back."
The flies may still be numerous, but the Apache trout numbers have dropped significantly, in part from over-harvesting. That over-harvesting led to the eventual stocking of non-native trout species--rainbow (Oncorhynchus mykiss), cutthroat (O. clarki) brook (Salvelinus fontinalis), and brown (Salmo trutta)--in the Apache trout's habitat as early as 1910.
Rainbow and cutthroat trout are so closely related to Apache trout that they interbreed. Their hybrid offspring, also capable of reproducing, continued to dilute the Apache trout population to the point where hybrid fish predominated and the native fish became rarer with each successive generation. Brook and brown trout, though not able to hybridize with Apache trout, are fierce competitors for food and space. Before long, the non-native trouts displaced the Apache trout.
Historically, the Apache trout occupied some 600 miles (965 kilometers) of streams in the headwaters of the Salt, San Francisco, and Little Colorado rivers, all of which drain the White Mountains. By the 1940's, however, Apache trout occupied fewer than 30 miles (48 km) of just 12 streams. It was then that the White Mountain Apache Tribe interceded; recognizing the inherent value of its native fish, the tribe closed streams to fishing.
"White Mountain Apaches view the native trout as much a part of the land as they do themselves," says Jon Cooley, Director of the White Mountain Apache Wildlife and Outdoor Recreation Division. "It's just natural for Apaches to appreciate its intrinsic value."
Some would argue that the Apaches also had foresight. "The Apache trout was close to extinction," says Dr. Stuart Leon, the Fish and Wildlife Service's (FWS) Region 2 Recovery Coordinator for Native Fish. "The White Mountain Apaches were very forward-thinking. They stepped in to head off extinction fully 30 years before the Endangered Species Act came to be."
Stewart Jacks, Project Leader of the FWS Arizona Fishery Resources Office, agrees. "Without the leadership of the White Mountain Apache Tribe, the Apache trout could be in serious peril, if not extinct. Instead, the Apache trout offers a viable sport fishery. What's more, it could soon be the first living fish species taken off the endangered species list."
With FWS assistance to the tribe, the Apache trout truly has rebounded. Since 1983, the Alchesay-Williams Creek National Fish Hatchery (NFH) complex, located on the Fort Apache Indian Reservation, has produced several million Apache trout specifically for restoring the sport fishery in streams while maintaining the species' genetic integrity. The hatchery also propagates Apache trout for stocking in immensely popular fishing lakes that draw anglers from around the globe. The Arizona Game and Fish Department, via the FWS Sport Fish Restoration Program, uses Apache trout from the hatchery to restore trout streams on national forest lands. The FWS Pinetop Fish Health Center assists in recovery by keeping fish diseases in check. Fish health biologists monitor wild Apache trout populations and frequently inspect Alchesay-Williams Creek NFH for disease pathogens.
The FWS Arizona Fishery Resources Office lends technical assistance to the White Mountain Apache Tribe in restoring the Apache trout to its native range. For example, FWS biologists and tribal members built barriers to protect Apache trout from invading non-native fish. They also have worked together to enhance trout habitat through riparian revegetation, livestock exclosures, and non-native fish removal. Last year, they protected some 75 acres (30 hectares) of riparian vegetation surrounding Apache trout streams and reintroduced fish to another stream, Ord Creek. The species' recovery plan calls for maintaining 30 self-sustaining, non-hybridized stream populations, and Ord Creek may be number 29.
"After three decades, we're happy to see this fish return to its native habitat," says Daniel Parker, White Mountain Apache tribal member and biologist with the FWS Arizona Fishery Resources Office. "We stocked adult trout, so they've already spawned this year. When we establish one more stream population, we could make history."
According to Stewart Jacks, the FWS and tribe are close to satisfying the recovery plan's requirements for delisting the Apache trout.
Craig L. Springer is a Fishery Biologist with the FWS Division of Fisheries in the Albuquerque, New Mexico, Regional Office.
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