New ADK Brook Trout plan updates baitfish regs, climate change impacts
For the first time in nearly 50 years, New York State has updated its management plan for brook trout in Adirondack Ponds. The species is highly sought after by anglers, but it’s also highly susceptible to ecological impacts such as acid rain and now climate change. Emily Russell spoke with DEC fisheries biologist Rob Fiorentino about some of the key changes in the updated management plan.
Emily RussellNew ADK Brook Trout plan updates baitfish regs, climate change impacts
Native Adirondack brook trout. Photo: Wild Center, Creative Commons, some rights reserved
EMILY RUSSELL: Why has it taken nearly 50 years for the state to update its management plan for brook trout and the Adirondacks?
ROB FIORENTINO: It’s not easy to create a plan, a good plan, and I think we have created a good plan. The last plan had a lot to do with the impacts of acid precipitation and some other issues. Around 2010, we started to see some significant improvements in water where the pH was rising, getting more towards neutral or seven. Other parameters were getting back into ranges where fish and brook trout could survive and not only survive but actually spawn successfully. That was the key.
Because of that and because of those changes and the recognition of some new pressures like climate change, it was time to create a new plan to address those current and new impacts. Also we’re trying to be good stewards.
RUSSELL: One big change in the plan has to do with the use of live baitfish. It seems like there was a lot of confusion and misunderstandings by anglers and bait shops about where it was allowed and wasn’t allowed, and the impact of live baitfish. So can you of explain why the use of live baitfish poses such a risk to brook trout and how this plan changes those regulations?
FIORENTINO: Sure. So if you look at our current baitfish prohibition regulation, it takes up a number of pages in our regs guide, and it can be very confusing. We’re managing by land mass. We would recognize a wilderness unit and then we would recognize ponds within towns within counties. I think it takes up four pages within the guide and it’s just a wall of text about where you can’t use baitfish.
That’s not user-friendly nor is it very intuitive, and if you add up all those ponds, it’s thousands of waters. We really wanted to try to simplify that for the anglers, for us, and also for law enforcement, because at the end of the day, what we come up with as managers has to be enforceable or else it’s just not a good regulation and it’s going to cause problems for the public.
If we flip it on its head and say, “Okay, here’s where you can use bait,” it becomes much more understandable, tangible, and user-friendly for all the above. And our feeling is that, through coordinating and communicating with the bait shops, it’s not going to be a significant impact on their business. But what baitfish can do is forever alter the fish community in a body of water if they’re introduced illegally.
Lower Sargent Pond in Hamilton County restoration project for naturally reproducing native strain brook trout fish. Photo: NYSDEC
RUSSELL: How is climate change impacting brook trout and how does this plan address those impacts and future threats?
FIORENTINO: So, the waters can heat up to a point where they’re not quite as sustainable for brook trout, which are a cold species. They have to live in cold, clean water. So, when you heat up the surface and occasionally at some of these waters, there’s just not a lot of oxygen in the middle of summer at the bottom, you can end up squeezing that area where they can survive down pretty significantly.
So, as climate change occurs, and the average annual temperatures increase, as we’re seeing some rain events that are a little bit outside of the historic norms when they’re occurring and the volumes that they’re occurring at, that can all lead to potentially more stress on brook trout. So we wanted to get a plan drafted that would address that and we’re trying to then be able to collect some information on those specific impacts so that we’re aware of what waters might be more susceptible to this.
RUSSELL: Are you an angler?
FIORENTINO: Yeah.
RUSSELL: Particularly for brook trout in the Adirondacks- why are they such a special species and so fun to search out?
FIORENTINO: I think a lot of the allure for anglers is that you could be on a pond where there might not be another angler. You might be competing with some loons and you might see wildlife on the shore and you find yourself transported back to that point in time when the Adirondacks were set aside for a specific reason.
Going after brook trout in a remote water is definitely something that a lot of people enjoy and it’s just unique, and it’s special, and brook trout are just beautiful. You know, in my mind they’re one of the most beautiful fish, so it’s really easy to work with them.
Brook trout. Photo by Eileen Randall
RUSSELL: Ten, twenty years down the line, what do you hope this management plan accomplishes? Both for the brook trout population in Adirondack ponds and for anglers?
FIORENTINO: I really hope that anglers will see that we’re trying to do a good job managing this resource for them. We’re trying to be a lot more transparent about where these resources are and what they are and how to get there. There will be a mapping program set up here soon, within the next year or so, I hope, that will show anglers exactly where these ponds are and the trail systems to get to them. So that right there is a significant increase.
Another thing that the plan does is it sets up a path for new biologist to learn from and to be able to continue the restoration efforts and to continue managing these resources in a significant way. So my hope is that, well after I’m gone, these recreational opportunities are persisting, they’re more healthy, and we get more waters where we have natural reproduction. That’s ultimately one of our biggest goals- to document and establish more brooktrout populations that we don’t have to stock.