Alpine Lakes Still Get Stocked With Fish

SEATTLE —  If an alpine angler wants to catch a trout, build a fire and cook it, somebody has to plant the fish in the mountain lake first.

The longtime practice of stocking alpine lakes continues at North Cascades National Park Complex in northwest Washington, where rainbow trout are added to 25 lakes despite national policy against it.

The Trailblazers--hikers under state contract--carry plastic water jugs of tiny rainbow trout and battery-operated oxygen pumps in their backpacks.

They hike through the high country to the lakes and plant the fish. Other trout are dropped from airplanes.

North Cascades has an exemption from national policy against introducing fish into fishless lakes--hammered out in an agreement between federal and state officials--so that the long-standing practice can continue.

The exception has been extended until 2002, said North Cascades Supt. Bill Paleck, while scientists study the effects and park officials analyze their findings.

“The stopping of stocking has been a contentious issue in the National Park Service for some time,” Paleck said.

He added that national policy does permit stocking game fish in reservoirs like Ross Lake, a lower-level water body that also has a natural population of fish.

Outside the national parks, many other high lakes around the West are still planted with fish.

About 16,000 high mountain lakes exist in the West, mostly in the Cascades, Rocky Mountains and Sierra Nevada, according to a 1992 survey by Peter Bahls of Oregon State University. Most are in glacial basins, and about 40% originally had no fish, he said.

Many lakes in mountainous areas are routinely stocked with trout by state agencies, Bahls said.

The goal, said fish biologist Jim Johnston of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, is to provide a wilderness experience that many people enjoy.

Johnston said stocking can be done without wrecking the lake’s food supply if numbers are limited and the fish do not reproduce. The state of Washington mainly uses rainbow trout that do not reproduce in high lakes, he said.

In Washington, he said, some 200,000 anglers visit the high lakes every year.

“These are backpackers with a fishing rod,” he said. “Trying to satisfy their desire for fish without planting at ungodly rates that cause environmental harm is one of the biggest challenges to fish management biologists.”

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North Cascades National Park Complex: https://www.nps.gov/noca/home.htm