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Colorado Parks and Wildlife working to restore Greenback Cutthroat Trout population

KRDO

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Tuesday, biologists with Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW) spent the morning at Bear Creek spawning Greenback Cutthroat Trout.

The Greenback Cutthroat Trout is considered Colorado's state fish, but it's also under threat.

CPW says Bear Creek at one point had the only wild population of Greenback Cutthroat Trout left in the state.

Teams of biologists went into the creek Tuesday and shocked the water using electro fishing backpacks to collect the trout that were ready to reproduce.

Aquatic biologist Cory Noble then stripped the eggs and sperm, which will be used to improve the quality of stock in the hatchers where fish are made to restore the species.

CPW says they did see a population decline from 2017 to 2020.

"It definitely is concerning. It's concerning to see any decline. It’s always good to see it stable or increasing, so we don’t know a lot about the long-term population dynamics. It is common for populations to expand and contract over time, some species are fairly cyclical," said Noble.

CPW collected more than a dozen Greenback Cutthroat Trout and was able to fertilize 60 eggs yesterday. Noble said from that they may bet around 20 trout.

Greenback Cutthroat Trout are native to the South Platte Drainage. Right now, CPW is working near South Park, Clear Creek near the Eisenhower Tunnel, and Fort Collins to help restore the population.

CPW will be back at Bear Creek on Tuesday to do the spawning again. This is something they do every day but did skip 2021 because of the population decline.

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Jessica Gruenling

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