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Hunt Creek seeks to answer trout questions
By Bill Parker
Editor
Lewiston, Mich. — What’s causing the decline in the brook trout fishery on the Au Sable River? Do fish ladders have a detrimental effect on resident trout populations? What has a bigger impact on trout fisheries — angler pressure or other predators like mink and mergansers?
These are the types of questions debated annually in fish camps across the state by rookie and veteran trout anglers alike. Ask three different anglers the same question, and you’ll likely get three different answers.
When fisheries managers want answers to questions about trout, they’re quick to look up Andy Nuhfer’s crew at the DNR’s Hunt Creek Fisheries Research Station in Lewiston. Established in 1939, Hunt Creak focuses its research on coldwater species — primarily trout. Nuhfer is the station manager and a fisheries research biologist at Hunt Creek.
“A major objective of research at Hunt Creek is to find solutions to fisheries problems,” said Nuhfer, who has been stationed at Hunt Creek since 1986. “Because the waters in the research area have been closed to fishing since 1965, and because the use activities are rigidly controlled, Hunt Creek is an ideal location for controlled studies of the effects of habitat changes on fish populations.”
Hunt Creek encompasses nearly 3,000 acres and includes several miles of the mainstream of Hunt Creek — the headwaters of the Thunder Bay River — seven tributary streams and four lakes.
“In a sense, the research area is like a large outdoor laboratory,” Nuhfer said. “Experimental designs for on-site studies incorporate treatment-and-control methodologies, high replication, large sample sizes, and collection of data for long periods of time so that natural variation in fish populations can be distinguished from variation due to experimental factors.”
Current research at Hunt Creek is focusing on several different issues, including the effects of summer withdrawals of water from trout streams; long-term suppression of brook trout reproductive success by sand bed load; the effects of severe water withdrawal on the population and habitat of brook trout; patterns in community structure, life histories, and ecological distributions of fishes in Michigan rivers; and effects, if any, of competition between steelhead and naturalized populations of brook and brown trout.
Some results are surfacing.
“When young-of-the-year steelhead are introduced (through fish ladders) there is less survival of brown trout (of the same age class) to the next year,” Nuhfer said.
While findings like this can be somewhat predictable, interpreting those results can lead to different conclusions, depending on your perspective.
“There is potential, if you put steelhead in the right places, to get pretty good natural reproduction,” Nuhfer said. “On the other hand, people opposed to fish passages see them as detrimental to native populations.”
There also are long-term studies taking place.
During the past 30 years, some studies at Hunt Creek have focused on measuring effects of environmental degradation on trout populations. During the 1970s and ‘80s, research found that relatively small increases in sand erosion into streams severely degrades habitat quality and can reduce trout populations to as little as 25 percent of their normal abundance level.
Research has shown that sand traps can have a substantial effect on improving trout habitat in streams plagued by erosion. The DNR, the U.S. Forest Service, and dozens of private groups are “currently maintaining hundreds of sand traps on streams throughout the state to restore and enhance fish habitat,” Nuhfer said. “This research has also heightened awareness of the need to better control erosion into streams from common sources such as roads and pipelines.”
The staff at Hunt Creek consists of Nuhfer, research biologist Todd Wills, and fisheries technician Thomas Adams. There is a vacant position for another fisheries tech, and the facility usually receives the support of three seasonal workers.
“Our office is not open to the public, although we do participate in a variety of outreach activities,” Nuhfer said. Research, technical, and status of the fishery reports compiled at Hunt Creek are posted on the DNR web site. Go to www.michigan.gov/dnr. Then look for the “Fishing” link, then the “Research” link to get the Fisheries Division Library.
By Bill Parker
Editor
Lewiston, Mich. — What’s causing the decline in the brook trout fishery on the Au Sable River? Do fish ladders have a detrimental effect on resident trout populations? What has a bigger impact on trout fisheries — angler pressure or other predators like mink and mergansers?
These are the types of questions debated annually in fish camps across the state by rookie and veteran trout anglers alike. Ask three different anglers the same question, and you’ll likely get three different answers.
When fisheries managers want answers to questions about trout, they’re quick to look up Andy Nuhfer’s crew at the DNR’s Hunt Creek Fisheries Research Station in Lewiston. Established in 1939, Hunt Creak focuses its research on coldwater species — primarily trout. Nuhfer is the station manager and a fisheries research biologist at Hunt Creek.
“A major objective of research at Hunt Creek is to find solutions to fisheries problems,” said Nuhfer, who has been stationed at Hunt Creek since 1986. “Because the waters in the research area have been closed to fishing since 1965, and because the use activities are rigidly controlled, Hunt Creek is an ideal location for controlled studies of the effects of habitat changes on fish populations.”
Hunt Creek encompasses nearly 3,000 acres and includes several miles of the mainstream of Hunt Creek — the headwaters of the Thunder Bay River — seven tributary streams and four lakes.
“In a sense, the research area is like a large outdoor laboratory,” Nuhfer said. “Experimental designs for on-site studies incorporate treatment-and-control methodologies, high replication, large sample sizes, and collection of data for long periods of time so that natural variation in fish populations can be distinguished from variation due to experimental factors.”
Current research at Hunt Creek is focusing on several different issues, including the effects of summer withdrawals of water from trout streams; long-term suppression of brook trout reproductive success by sand bed load; the effects of severe water withdrawal on the population and habitat of brook trout; patterns in community structure, life histories, and ecological distributions of fishes in Michigan rivers; and effects, if any, of competition between steelhead and naturalized populations of brook and brown trout.
Some results are surfacing.
“When young-of-the-year steelhead are introduced (through fish ladders) there is less survival of brown trout (of the same age class) to the next year,” Nuhfer said.
While findings like this can be somewhat predictable, interpreting those results can lead to different conclusions, depending on your perspective.
“There is potential, if you put steelhead in the right places, to get pretty good natural reproduction,” Nuhfer said. “On the other hand, people opposed to fish passages see them as detrimental to native populations.”
There also are long-term studies taking place.
During the past 30 years, some studies at Hunt Creek have focused on measuring effects of environmental degradation on trout populations. During the 1970s and ‘80s, research found that relatively small increases in sand erosion into streams severely degrades habitat quality and can reduce trout populations to as little as 25 percent of their normal abundance level.
Research has shown that sand traps can have a substantial effect on improving trout habitat in streams plagued by erosion. The DNR, the U.S. Forest Service, and dozens of private groups are “currently maintaining hundreds of sand traps on streams throughout the state to restore and enhance fish habitat,” Nuhfer said. “This research has also heightened awareness of the need to better control erosion into streams from common sources such as roads and pipelines.”
The staff at Hunt Creek consists of Nuhfer, research biologist Todd Wills, and fisheries technician Thomas Adams. There is a vacant position for another fisheries tech, and the facility usually receives the support of three seasonal workers.
“Our office is not open to the public, although we do participate in a variety of outreach activities,” Nuhfer said. Research, technical, and status of the fishery reports compiled at Hunt Creek are posted on the DNR web site. Go to www.michigan.gov/dnr. Then look for the “Fishing” link, then the “Research” link to get the Fisheries Division Library.
