Fish and Game counts trout for conservation

The Idaho Department of Fish and Game is conducting snorkel surveys of the Potlatch River to ensure the water and its tributaries support young steelhead trout.

The surveys will provide data on trout density, which helps resource managers make informed decisions for steelhead survival.

The data also guides the Idaho Department of Fish and Game habitat improvement projects, in cooperation with private landowners.

For example, to improve streams for juvenile steelhead, or parr, Fish and Game adds woody debris to the trout habitats. Debris increases the complexity of the habitat, which provides cover for the fish and helps recharge the floodplain. The treatments generate a fish response that can be detected with appropriate monitoring, like snorkel studies. The fragile parr will reveal the successes or failures of treatment programs.

Annual snorkel surveys are conducted in June. The number of snorkelers depends on the extent of necessary testing or data.

This year, crews will survey 160 sites across the Potlatch River basin.

Similar snorkel surveys will be conducted this summer to benefit wild salmon and steelhead trout throughout Idaho. The studies guide restoration, like identifying the need for large woody debris where cover is scarce or for managing water where stream channels go dry.

The Potlatch River teems with young and old steelhead trout. Adults enter the Potlatch to spawn during late winter through early spring, where their young remain in the river tributaries.

Seasonal flows can range from a trickle in some reaches during the summer to a raging torrent in the spring.

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Scott Putnam is a fisheries regional biologist with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game.