A four-month fishing tournament held for the purpose of helping Colorado Parks and Wildlife manage the kokanee salmon population in Blue Mesa Reservoir near Gunnison will end Wednesday with $10,000 in prize money at stake.
This is the fourth year CPW has held the tournament with the goal of reducing the number of lake trout in the reservoir in order to benefit kokanee salmon there. The tournament began Jan. 1. The reservoir is located eight miles west of Gunnison and is fed by the Gunnison River.
For CPW the goal of the tournament is to reduce the number of lake trout that measure 24 inches or less. According to a CPW news release, the lake trout “harvest” helps biologists sustain an adequate supply of recently hatched kokanee salmon, known as fry, by limiting “predation” from the lake trout.
“Unchecked lake trout population growth caused significant declines in kokanee abundance in previous decades,” according to the CPW release. “CPW research shows that smaller lake trout, those 24 inches and smaller, consume the most kokanee. Consequently, the tournament is focused on removing those fish.”
A CPW survey of the reservoir last year showed that the lake trout population was rising.
“Lake trout are prolific,” CPW angler outreach manager Dan Brauch said in the release, “and recent monitoring has documented an increase in numbers of smaller lake trout, so ongoing harvest of small lake trout is needed to maintain numbers at appropriate levels.”
Maintaining a large kokanee population in the reservoir not only benefits kokanee anglers, according to the release; it also provides a source of kokanee eggs that can be used for restocking kokanee at two dozen other Colorado locations.
The winner of the tournament will receive $3,000, with $1,500 going to the runner-up. Third place will be good for $1,000 and fourth place $500. Other anglers will go into a raffle with one entry for every trout they caught. The raffle will pay out 20 $200 prizes.