Currently browsing… wild trout
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Minnesota’s 2020 Driftless Area restoration overview
Despite challenges posed by the pandemic 2020 was a busy year for Trout Unlimited Driftless Area Restoration Effort in Minnesota. TU and its partners collaborated on a number of habitat restoration projects in the state. Here's a rundown of the projects. Rice Creek (Fillmore County) – Minnesota DNR stabilized eroded stream banks totaling 900 feet. Sloped and…
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How to turn ‘movers’ into ‘eaters’ when streamer fishing
A few days ago a friend was telling me about a fishing trip when he used a familiar phrase. “We moved quite a few fish,” he said of the float trip on a Pennsylvania stream known for its big brown trout. That sentence, one I’ve uttered plenty myself over the years, is basically a euphemism…
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Delaware River Basin Commission bans fracking in watershed
As infrastructure to support natural gas extraction expanded across the Appalachians over the past decade, the Delaware River Basin remained untouched as the group responsible for the coordinated management of the watershed considered the practice. Now, after years of uncertainty, a vote by the Delaware River Basin Commission has formalized a ban on high-volume hydraulic fracturing — often called “fracking” — in the basin. In a special business meeting on Feb. 25, 2021, commissioners…
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Federal budget includes boost for Delaware basin
Trout Unlimited’s efforts in the Delaware River Basin will get a boost as a result of the federal 2021 budget. The Delaware River Basin Restoration Program (DRBRP) received $10 million in funding as part of the fiscal year 2021 Appropriations bill recently approved by Congress and signed by President Trump. The sum is a modest increase from the $9.7 million budgeted last fiscal year. The…
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Wisconsin project shows it’s not always about the money
By Chris Collier Working with the Town of Beaver and Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, Trout Unlimited recently helped replace a fish passage barrier on the North Branch Beaver Creek located in the middle of a state fishery area. Surveys at the site indicated fish passage and flood risk concerns associated with the existing, four-culvert…
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A wet road is no place for wild trout
By Mark Taylor During her hundreds of days wearing an electrofishing backpack in Pennsylvania, Kathleen Lavelle has searched for trout in just about every kind of stream, from tiny trickles to plunging, boisterous mountain rivers. But on a day in August 2019, she experienced something new. Lavelle and her crew were shocking fish in a road. …
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Battenkill Home Rivers Initiative hits the ground running
By Jacob Fetterman In the first official year of Trout Unlimited’s Battenkill Home Rivers Initiative, we are thrilled to have completed two restoration projects and one reconnection project within the watershed. The projects to enhance cold-water and spawning habitat took place on three tributaries — Camden Creek, Juniper Swamp Brook, and Coulter Brook — all supporting native brook trout. …