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When anglers in the early 1900s fished, they would turn their noses up at Alberta’s native bull trout species — the top predator in the waters — and considered them a “garbage” fish.
They’d deliberately pluck the critters out of the water and leave them to dry up on the banks, making room in the river for more favourable trout species that were introduced from eastern North America and Europe.
This took a toll on their population and despite being more prized in recent decades, the province’s official fish, the bull trout, is in trouble.
Late this summer, the species “finally” found itself covered by Canada’s Species at Risk Act, a move University of Calgary biologist John Post said was recommended seven years ago. |
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Now Post, who sits on the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (an independent advisory panel of scientists and experts who identify at-risk species), along with other conservationists, is sounding the alarm for the indicative fish species or, as Post puts it, the “canaries in a coal mine.” If they’re not doing well, it’s a sign that other organisms in the waters might not be doing too well, either.
“If we lose them, it’s not just those fish species (affected), it’s other organisms — either other fishes or invertebrates, insects, native fauna — in these rivers (that) are at risk as well,” he said.
“It’s not just a fish story, it’s an ecosystem sustainability issue, really.”
The species, which are technically not true trout but char, mostly inhabit cold and pristine snow-melt-fed waters that flow into some of Alberta’s larger rivers, including the Bow, the Oldman and the Red Deer. Decades ago, the bull trout used to be found farther downstream in those areas, but now they’re mostly seen in the Eastern Slopes watersheds of the Rocky Mountains and the foothills of southern Alberta. |
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