At first cast, it seems the ultimate conflict between two diverse angling interests, the sort of us-against-them debate that stirs tempers and keeps fish managers awake nights.
On one rod, we have mass appeal, those many thousands of anglers who fish for kokanee salmon, lemon and butter always at the ready. On the other, cameras on point, we have the passionate few for whom a trophy lake trout is life itself.
These seemingly contrary sentiments clash like opposing tsunamis at Blue Mesa Reservoir, which claims the seemingly odd distinction as the best place in Colorado to fish for both species. There may be more than coincidence here, a corollary to be revealed a few lines below.
The trouble is two fold: Salmon are declining dangerously at the state’s largest reservoir, which happens to be the primary source of eggs that perpetuate this popular, yet artificial, fishery at Blue Mesa and elsewhere around the state.
Then there’s the undeniable fact that lake trout eat kokanee like popcorn.
Which is why, a few years back, a concerned Division of Wildlife expanded the creel limit on lakers to eight, no size restrictions, in an effort to crimp a population the agency feared was expanding rapidly at the expense of salmon. The howls from that zealous cadre of trophy seekers who gleefully watched the big impoundment produce serial state records was instant and enduring.
“The message from DOW is they want all the lake trout killed,” wailed Harry Colborn of Grand Junction, a big-trout enthusiast who wears a weekend rut into the highways leading to the lake.
“We feel this has brought a lot of slob fishermen into play,” Colborn says of the occasional stringers of large lake trout being hauled ashore, along with persistent rumors of fish being wasted. Colborn points to a recent creel census of tagged fish to maintain there are far fewer lake trout in Blue Mesa than DOW claimed earlier.
Against this complaint, we have the ringing revelation that, over the last decade, 88 percent of the catch at a fishery that contributes upwards of $2.5 million to the Gunnison County economy consists of kokanee salmon.
Here’s the catch. Last autumn, DOW collected just 2.5 million eggs from the kokanee run out of Blue Mesa, 300,000 less than needed to sustain a lake that once produced a grand excess to spread among other waters around the state.
Punctuating this dilemma, DOW last year barely collected enough eggs, 5.65 million, from its brood-stock locations to keep these six key reservoirs going. That left a bare 330,000 to share among a dozen other kokanee fisheries around the state. This means lost age classes and poor fishing in years to come.
It’s at this point of controversy that the region’s leading biologist steps in to dash cold water on the seeming strangeness of the situation. Sherman Hebein, who watches over western Colorado fish affairs from his Montrose office, sees an everyone-wins symbiosis in protecting kokanee.
“Lake trout have to eat something. If they don’t have kokanee, they won’t grow,” Hebein declared of a protein-rich source that delivers twice the calories of other food fish. “I don’t want to eliminate lake trout. I want the prey they feed on to be robust. I would say to the lake trout group that I’m their best friend.”
Hebein, who presented this argument to the Colorado Wildlife Commission last month, believes DOW’s back is against the wall in its struggle to sustain salmon.
“Other states can’t produce more eggs than they use themselves,” he said of what has become a make-or-break effort to reverse the salmon slide. “We have to do the job ourselves.”
Can kokanee and lake trout and the anglers who love them live happily ever after at Blue Mesa, Granby and other key reservoirs? Hebein is betting a good night’s sleep they can.
Listen to Charlie Meyers at 9 a.m. each Saturday on “The Fan Outdoors,” KKFN 950 AM. He can be reached at 303-820-1609 or cmeyers@denverpost.com.
