Sportsmen aim to put Browns Canyon on Denver Map

 Preserve Browns Canyon as a national monument

Denver—On a beautiful October evening, a crowd gathered in downtown Denver to watch Browns Canyon come alive on the façade of the McNichols Building, in an eye-popping display of light and images. The Oct. 17 event, called “Browns Canyon Live,” was sponsored by Sportsmen for Browns Canyon, a grassroots coalition of hunters and anglers committed to preserving Browns Canyon as a national monument.   Here’s a recap video of the event:

Click here to read the whole story

The group also paid for two billboards along I-70 through Denver from early September until the first week of November. One billboard features a striking image of an angler fishing in the canyon, and another shows the canyon awash in a starry nightscape, with the message: “Monumental: Protect Browns Canyon.” The billboard messages will reach an estimated 180,000 people a day who travel this major east-west corridor.

“We’re getting the word out: We have to protect this place or risk losing it,” said Kyle Perkins, Campaign Manager.

For more information, go to www.sportsmenforbrowns.com.

CTU Welcomes our new communications intern!!

Colorado Trout Unlimited is happy to introduce Rachel, our Fall Communications Intern.  She comes to us with passion and experience uniquely suited to TU’s mission. An avid angler and river enthusiast, she guides for ArkAnglers on The Arkansas River and studies Communication at Regis University. “Besides the obvious need for clean water for our own survival, I regard rivers as magical places. Fishing allows me to really be a part of that magic.”  Rachel recently took a leave from her position as a Lieutenant, Firefighter, and Paramedic at a large front-range fire department to follow her passions and complete her degree.  She is excited to expand her stewardship for trout and their hiding places in this new role.

Tyler Baskfield, Colorado Field Coordinator, SCP

Family, wildlife and wild places drive Tyler Baskfield. These influences took effect on Baskfield at an early age in the woods and on the lakes of Northern Minnesota. “We had this little duck hunting cabin on a lake in Northern Minnesota that had been in my family for a couple of generations,” said Baskfield. “We would go up there on weekends and take walks in the woods, fish or hunt together. There weren’t any distractions when we spent time there. The cabin taught me how wonderful my family was and how fascinating nature could be. Even as a young kid, I couldn’t imagine a lifestyle that didn’t have outdoor recreation or nature as a significant focus. ” After graduating from the University of Colorado in Boulder, Baskfield worked at the Craig Daily Press in Craig Colorado as the Outdoor Editor and Staff Reporter. After working for the newspaper for a couple of years honing his writing skills, he went to work for the Colorado Division of Wildlife in the media relations department. He spent the next 10 years at the Division working to educate the public about Colorado’s wildlife resources and promoting outdoor recreation opportunities in the state. By the time left the agency he managed the Public Affairs Department. “It was a great experience working for the Division of Wildlife,” said Baskfield. “There were a lot of great people who worked at the agency by design in order to dedicate their professional lives to enhancing the wildlife resources and opportunities in this state.”

Baskfield left the Division to start his own company, but didn’t cut ties with the outdoors. “I had this idea for a motion duck decoy,” said Baskfield. “I was consumed by it. I had to take a shot at putting it in the hands of duck hunters and Duck Creek Decoy Works was built to help people have more enjoyable hunts.” Baskfield has spent the last year obtaining a patent and engineering the decoy. It is expected to hit the market sometime this fall. “We have created a product that will help hunters be more successful,” said Baskfield. “It will be extremely rewarding to help an inexperienced hunter have a better day in the marsh and perpetuate the great tradition of waterfowl hunting.”

Baskfield looks to take his entrepreneurial spirit to his new role at Trout Unlimited as Colorado Sportsman’s Coordinator. “Working with the sportsman’s community to protect areas of the state that are cherished by hunters and anglers is a mission that I couldn’t be more proud to be a part of and TU is an effective organization that I am thrilled to work for,” said Baskfield. Baskfield’s long track record of communicating with hunters and anglers will help him be effective in his new role. His passion for the wild places and the people who enjoy them provides the motivation for getting some big conservation wins. “Hunters and anglers all have certain places that have given us wonderful memories and experiences,” said Baskfield. “There is an inherent bond among the sportsman’s community derived from our knowledge of how critical it is to protect these great places and the experiences they provide.”

Baskfield lives in Denver with his wife Heidi, their two boys, Gray, 3 and Hank, 1, Lou, a high-strung mutt that loves riding shotgun in the family pickup and Dutch, a bird hunting black lab who has Baskfield almost completely trained. When Baskfield isn’t hunting or fishing he enjoys working on his farm located on the Platte River south of the town of Platteville. “My family’s duck hunting cabin in Minnesota taught me how important it was to have a place where my family could go to focus on enjoying each other and the outdoors,” said Baskfield. “Before I even had kids, I wanted to provide them with a place where I could teach them a good work ethic and about nature first hand. I want my boys to learn about wildlife by holding a frog or a turkey feather in their own hand or seeing a deer or an owl in the river bottom, Not by looking at a photo on an iPad.”

Tyler Baskfield can be reached at Tbaskfield@tu.org.

Update: Hermosa Creek Bill

For those of you following the Hermosa Creek Watershed Protection Act, you may find the amendment made this week a little concerning. Read the press release from TU below for more information. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE      

Sept. 18, 2014

Contact: Ty Churchwell, 970-903-3010 or Keith Curley, 703-284-9428

Hermosa Creek bill passes House Natural Resources Committee        Congress alters bill, creating concern among stakeholders                           

DURANGO, Colo.— Trout Unlimited and other local stakeholders today expressed concern with a substitute amendment released on Tuesday, Sept. 16, that alters key provisions of the Hermosa Creek Watershed Protection Act of 2014.

The bill is slated for markup in the House Natural Resources Committee today, Sept. 18. The original bill, H.R. 1839, introduced in May 2013, was the product of years of collaboration and consensus among numerous stakeholder groups in Colorado—and the bill enjoyed strong bipartisan support from its Colorado sponsors, Rep. Scott Tipton and Sen. Michael Bennet. The bill was widely seen as noncontroversial, and a model of collaboration.

Then, two days before this week’s markup—without input from stakeholders—the bill was amended to alter key habitat protections.

“The version of the bill that went into committee was the product of years of hard work and consensus—and it had broad, bipartisan support among local stakeholders, from sportsmen’s and conservation groups to local businesses and county officials,” said Ty Churchwell, Hermosa coordinator for Trout Unlimited. “The amended bill raised a number of questions about whether the original consensus was still being honored.”

One of those questions concerns the 108,000-acre Watershed Protection Area to maintain the health of the Hermosa Creek watershed, safeguarding the purity of its water, its native trout fishery, and its recreational values (§4 of H.R. 1839). That provision was altered by committee to say the land “may be called” the Hermosa Creek Watershed Protection Area. “In the last 48 hours I have heard varying interpretations of the Watershed Protection Area language,” said Churchwell. “I hope there will be an opportunity to get clarity before the bill progresses further in Congress.”

The original bill also established a Special Management Area to be managed for conservation, protection and enhancement of watershed, cultural, recreational, and other values, and for the protection of the Colorado River cutthroat trout fishery. The new version of the bill released Tuesday removes that language and replaces it with a broader management approach.

“It takes hard work to reach consensus on a bill like this,” said Tim Brass, Southern Rockies coordinator of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers. “Congress should make sure that the goal of the original bill is honored as it moves toward becoming law.”

“The Hermosa Creek proposal is the product of Westerners rolling up their sleeves and finding common ground,” said Joel Webster, director of western public lands for the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership. “Sportsmen ask that the House Natural Resources Committee advance legislation that honors the intent of the original stakeholder proposal.”

Trout Unlimited and other stakeholders called on Congress to ensure that the Hermosa Creek Watershed Protection Act is true to the proposal put together over three years by a broad stakeholder process that was open, inclusive and transparent.

"Rep. Tipton has been a strong leader on the Hermosa Creek Watershed Protection Act since he introduced the bill early last year,” said Churchwell.  “We are talking with his office and gaining a better understanding of the changes, but we have remaining concerns with the language in Tuesday’s amendment. We look forward to working with Rep. Tipton and others in our congressional delegation as the bill moves through the legislative process to ensure that it fully reflects the stakeholder agreements.”

Trout Unlimited is the nation’s oldest and largest coldwater fisheries conservation organization dedicated to conserving, protecting and restoring North America’s trout and salmon and their watersheds. Follow TU on Facebook and Twitter, and visit us online at tu.org.

Outdoor Mentors - connecting kids with the outdoors

Young people today experience the world in a very different way than a generation previous. Time once spent exploring neighborhood fields, splashing in the creek down the street, and strolling through a nearby forest has been replaced by time spent navigating online worlds, diving into the latest season on Netflix, and scrolling through Facebook. Friendships and adventures now are built out of online interactions rather than shared journeys in nature. The people who care about and protect our fisheries and watersheds came to care about them by spending time in them with other people who also cared. If youth lose their connection to the outdoors, it has repercussions for our tomorrows which cannot be ignored even in our successes of today. Be it through a family member or a friend, it is likely somebody else introduced you to the magic of the natural world. That connection usually won’t come as a single moment of insight but rather as an ongoing path, eventually leading to the love of the places you have been and the desire to protect those places. Imagine what your life might be like had you not had such experiences. Colorado Trout Unlimited has developed a program to reach youth who otherwise might not have those experiences, and giving them the chance to fall in love with Colorado’s outdoors, fish, and rivers.

Outdoor Mentors is a coalition of conservation organizations, state agencies, youth development organizations, and other key outdoor recreation stakeholders coordinating their efforts to expand opportunities for disadvantaged youth to participate in outdoor recreation and learn the importance of our conservation heritage. Based on a successful model from Kansas, Outdoor Mentors in Colorado now involves multiple youth mentoring groups, from Big Brothers Big Sisters to Denver Kids Inc. With two large festivals held annually, as well as individual programs offered by sportsmen’s groups, Outdoor Mentors continues to get kids outside. Colorado TU’s participation includes fishing days, science camps, fly fishing day trips, and overnight outings.

On August 16, the coalition held its Outdoor Mentors Festival at Barr Lake State Park, drawing participants both from mentoring organizations and individual families. The event featured the brand new archery range at the Park. As hosts for the festival, and by providing a central point for sportsmen’s groups to coordinate efforts, Colorado Parks and Wildlife has been a leader in the ongoing success of Outdoor Mentors. At Barr Lake, kids and their mentors had the chance to try archery, birding, flycasting, fishing, geocaching, and target shooting.  The Park and the festival provided a great opportunity to showcase the fantastic outdoor resources on our public lands.

Fly fishing is just one way for kids to experience the outdoors. Colorado Trout Unlimited is hopeful that Outdoor Mentors will be the vehicle for many youth to find a new hobby or passion in our state’s wild places. Whatever it may be which interests a youth in your life, I encourage you to be a mentor in your own way. If you care about the amazing places in which you fish, hunt, and recreate, there is no better way to care for them than to pass on your passion.

For more information on the Outdoor Mentors Collaborative, to become a partner, or to volunteer as a mentor, please contact Garrett Hanks at ghanks@tu.org.

Willoughby: Roan deserves protection

For years, Colorado TU and our Grand Valley Anglers chapter have been working to protect and enhance habitat for native cutthroat trout atop the Roan Plateau.  From involvement in a legal challenge against a BLM oil and gas leasing plan that lacked adequate protections for watersheds, to volunteer work days with fencing and riparian restoration - from water quality monitoring and securing "outstanding water" protections, to construction of a fish barrier to secure native trout habitat from invasion by non-native brookies - TU has been, and continues to be, hard at work in protecting this unique place within Colorado. As part of a four-part series on some of Colorado's best wild lands and efforts to conserve them, Scott Willoughby of the Denver Post recently took notice of the efforts by TU and our partners on the Roan.  TU's Corey Fisher noted some of the challenges:  "Our Grand Valley chapter out of Grand Junction has been working on stream restoration projects up there for over 15 years, so our engagement up there in fisheries conservation goes back long before the oil and gas issue really got going on the Roan.  But those leases and areas that could be developed theoretically could cover the entire top of the plateau, including all the trout streams up there."

Read Scott Willoughby's full Sunday feature on the Roan here.

Trout Unlimited Partners With the Forest Service to Restore

The U.S. Forest Service (USFS) along with residents, local governments, other agencies and many others, have a long road ahead of them to restore what was damaged during the 2013 floods in Northern Colorado. To begin this process the USFS needs to assess the damage of the rivers. They have turned to Trout Unlimited (TU) because we have an expansive network of dedicated volunteers that care about the watershed and want to make a difference.

This is the beginning of a multi year partnership to bring back the healthy river ecosystems in the South Platte Basin after the floods; and we already have volunteers trained and ready to get on the river!!

The USFS hosted the first training for TU members on August 20, 2013, and it was a huge success. Dan Cenderelli and Matt Fairchild from the Forest Service developed a unique scientific assessment aimed at gathering data to develop a prescription to restore the entire watershed. This assessment is unique in many ways, but the big one is that there is an app for it!! Yes, an app for your smart phone. TU volunteers were not only trained on the science of the assessment, but also how to enter the data into their phones and instantly submit their results into the USFS database.

TU and the USFS were very anxious to get this project going. Planning and developing this partnership began shortly after the floods in September 2013. We are excited that the first bunch of volunteers have been trained and are ready to get out on the rivers and be true citizen scientist.

Because of the high demand from volunteers we will be hosting another training. We are working on scheduling it and should have details ASAP. If you are interested in being a part of this ground breaking partnership then please let us know. Contact Stephanie Scott at sscott@tu.org or 720-354-2647 to learn more and get signed up.

Hidden Treasure Mine Decommissioning and Rehabilitating Project

Saturday, August 23, 2014 We are calling for a maximum of 20 hearty CCTU volunteers to join forces with the Coalition for the Upper South Platte and the city of Alma to complete the  Hidden Treasure Mine, aka. Orange Fence Mine Decommissioning and Rehabilitating Project.  By closing access and rehabbing the site, this work will both help to preserve the historical aspects of the area, populations of rare plants recently discovered at the site as well as to improve water quality of Buckskin Creek  and ultimately the important fishery of the Middle Fork of the South Platte River.

Where and When:  We plan to meet on Saturday, August 23rd at 9:00 AM at the Alma Town Hall located at 59 Buckskin Street, Alma, CO 80420.  There is a lot of work to do so we are planning on working till 2:00PM.  

Lunch!  A BBQ Lunch  will be provided by a generous supporter for all volunteers.

Project Description:  Work will include rehabilitating the  abandoned mine site on USFS property 4 miles  outside of Alma on County road 8..  The site has significant erosion issues exacerbated by illegal digging with heavy equipment.  Runoff flows over tailings and goes subterranean before entering Buckskin Creek, which then drains into the Middle Fork of the Upper South Platte.   Part of the project entails creating a diversion to curtail water moving over the tailings.  The illegal use activity also created access point for off road vehicles, multiplying the damage.  Work will minimize the issues through decommissioning the site, re-seeding with native perennials, transplanting trees and shrubs.  This work will  reduce degradation of this ‘attractive nuisance’ and enhance regeneration at this polluted site, improving downstream water quality. The Town of Alma will donate heavy equipment and staff for the project, CUSP will donate staff and seed, and a generous supporter will provide a BBQ lunch.  This project will be completed through genuine dedication of key local community members and committed efforts of CCTU volunteers.  Please plan to join us on this collaborative and impact-full effort.

Important Notes:

CUSP will provide materials and necessary tools to complete project work.

Events may be canceled or rescheduled due to bad weather, which could create hazardous conditions for volunteers and staff.  Staff will monitor weather and notify you of any changes in a timely fashion.

Please Bring:

Any applicable medicines (including epi-pen and inhalers, if needed)

Sun block and sun glasses (or safety glasses)

Layered clothing appropriate for outdoor work

Waterproof work boots

Work Gloves

A container for water, the use of reusable containers is encouraged, refills will be provided

Please Call Jim Klug at 303-565-7504 to sign up and to arrange for car-pooling.

Rio Grande Cutthroat: A Colorado Treasure

In 1951, Francisco de Coronado and his expedition went west looking for cities of gold. They never found the fabled cities, but they did find another treasure: the Rio Grande Cutthroat Trout. The Rio Grand cutthroat (RGCT) is a subspecies from the Colorado River cutthroat around 70,000 years ago. Both species of fish share a common ancestor, the Rainbow trout. Around 2 million years ago, the Colorado River cutthroat branched off from the rainbow.

Rio Grande cutthroats only occupy 10-12 percent of its historic range. Due to these low populations, the species is a candidate for protection under the Endangered Species Act of 1973.

Different factors have contributed to the decrease in population of RGCT over the previous years; the biggest factors being environmental changes, mining development and the introduction of non-native trout species.

Rainbow trout as well as brown and brook trout were all released into the same areas as the Rio Grand cutthroat. In return, this led to more competition for habitat and prey amongst the species. These other species of trout also have the ability to hybridize with the RGCT and make vulnerable the genetic make up for the population.

The RGCT generally lives to between five and eight years old and are between 10”-15” in length. In some lakes, they can reach over 20”.  The fish present red and orange on their underbelly, transferring into a yellow along the sides, with a green coloration on the back.

Although these fish are decreasing in population, with help from Colorado TU and Colorado Parks and Wildlife, there are over 80 recreational populations throughout the Rio Grande basin in Colorado. CPW helps maintain these populations through stocking.

To help improve the entire population of RGCT, Colorado TU and CPW and working together to help restore habitat, improve streamflow as well as other projects to help improve the Rio Grande cutthroat species.

Colorado TU also appreciates any angler feedback about this wonderful species, therefore we ask you to take a few minutes for a brief survey about the RGCT.

For more information on how to help protect this beautiful species of trout, contact Kevin Terry at Kterry@tu.org or check out the Colorado Parks and Wildlife conservation strategy.

Boulder Creek TU River Cleanup

We'll meet at 9:00 a.m. October 11th for registration and clean-up beat assignments.

The cleanup will get underway at Boulder Flycasters Memorial Park approximately 2.5 miles up Boulder Canyon. The park is about 150 yards past the tunnel on your left.

Bring gloves and waders if you'd like to pull out trash from in the stream. An old rake can do wonders to help with in-stream work.

Each volunteer will be responsible for about 1/2 mile of stream and we'll have teams of two so bring a buddy or another family member to help us!We'll have plenty of trash bags and safety vests provided by the county and they'll pick up all trash we gather later on during the week.