Western Native Trout Initiative

Wolf Creek is a small, first-order stream located in the Chama River watershed on the Rio Grande National Forest. Rio Grand cutthroat trout were first reported from Wolf Creek in 1980. At their discovery, Rio Grande trout were the only trout found upstream of a large concrete/rock railroad culvert which has an approximate 3.5 foot outflow drop. In 2005, a single brown trout was captured during an electrofishing survey upstream of the railroad culvert.

Surveys in 2006 and 2007 documented additional brown trout upstream in the culvert, with a robust brown trout population in Wolf Creek. A large deep pool has formed at the outflow of the culvert and it is believed that the pool provides an avenue for brown trout to leap the barrier and access the stream habitat above the culvert.

This project proposes to construct a concrete splash apron and concrete walls to remove the pool to help prevent nonnative trout from jumping the existing plung from the culvert. Project is a remote area of the forest and access to the downstream outflow is difficult and will require extensive effort to get equipment and material to the site.