The Bull Trout

By Kevin Husten

 The Bull trout was not long ago a very common fish found throughout the Pacific Northwest, ranging all the way from North California to the Bering Sea. They once traveled one of the longest migration routes of any trout in North America for thousands of years. These fish are members of the char subgroup in the salmon family. Native to the Northwestern section of North America, these Bull Trout can grow to over 20 pounds when found in the right environment for them such as a lake. The Fish receives its name from its abnormally large head and mouth, which gave it the name of a Bull. The Migratory bull trout are typically much larger than resident bull trout, which usually only grow to be around 4 pounds in size.

Bull Trout are distinguished from trout and salmon by the missing teeth in the roof of their mouth, and presence of light colored spots on a dark body. They are found distributed farther north than any other group of freshwater fish except Alaskan black fish, and are very well acclimated for life in cold water conditions. The younger Bull Trout eat aquatic insects but shift to preying on other fish as they grow larger. Large Bull Trout are primarily fish predators. They evolved with whitefish, and other trout and use all of them as a food source.

The population of Bull Trout that inhabit the Northwestern area is at a critical low right now. In 1998, the populations of Bull Trout, within the United States were federally listed as threatened by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. In 2008 a status report was done on the population and status remained stable. Currently there is a total of 163 local populations in the Columbia Headwaters Recovery Unit, which is a site specific management tool. 

Bull Trout are vulnerable to many factors in nature that they can not control. One problem they are facing is a degradation of their stream water. The Trout face a major problem of combined issues, not just one. Human activity is polluting the quality of their water and destroying habitat by eroding sides of rivers and lakes where the fish live. These poor conditions have severely reduced or even eliminated migratory bull trout as the water temperature, stream conditions and other water quality problems fall below the range of conditions which these fish can tolerate.

Juvenile Bull Trout Catch

In response to the ultra-low population of Bull Trout, a list was organized and a plan was created to make a plan that would bring back the Species. Included here is some of the criteria. To conserve bull trout in a way so that they are geographically widespread across representative habitats and demographically stable in six of recovery units that have been established. We need to effectively manage and act against the primary threats in each of six recovery units at the core area so that bull trout isn’t likely to become endangered in the near future. We need to build upon the numerous and ongoing conservation actions implemented on behalf of bull trout since their listing in 1999, and improve our understanding of how various threat factors can affect the species, so that we can stop them in the near future.

The Recovery Plan covers both the short term and the long term conditions of the Bull Trout. In the Short Term, the young fish are being focused on the most. With a strong healthy young population the future will have a better chance. In the long term, the national services are trying to get a better grasp on industrial factors. These factors such as gold mining will destroy the habitats because of pollution such as acid run off and mercury, both in turn harming the water conditions. The industries need to be better educated for the future so that the fish are not having their ecosystem harmed in a negative way.  The prevention of habitat fragmentation and destruction caused by urban and industrial disturbances is key to survival of this species.

In terms of the actual plan to recover this once striving animal, the government agencies have to take a big part in instilling rules and education to big business' and industries. At the core of the plan’s strategy are six specific geographical plans, which identify specific conservation actions needed to attack threats such as loss of habitat connectivity, water conditions and passage barriers, and the effects of poor land-management practices and water pollution from large industries and mining operations  

What Can We Do?

       We can reduce or stop altogether practicing actions that degrade or destroy river or stream sides that can erode and destroy the homes for these fish. Or publish a small letter to private land owners who may not know these fish live in their stream and teach them how to protect them.