Experts Divided On Flathead Fishery Is Sustained Effort To Save Bull Trout Worth It?

Montanans must wage a long, expensive war against lake trout if they want to save bull trout in Flathead Lake, an international panel of fisheries experts has concluded. But they are divided on whether the effort is worth it.

To bring back native bull trout, efforts would have to include commercial fishing and gill-netting, and the efforts would have to continue indefinitely.

But the panel is split on whether such action is worth the effort and expense.

Michael Healey, a researcher from British Columbia, suggested it may be too late for the Flathead Lake bull trout, and the effort would drain money from bull trout conservation efforts elsewhere.

“There are some huge uncertainties. … In the grand scheme of things, there is a low probability of success,” Healey said. The best option is “to accept what we’ve got and do the best we can to manage it as a lake trout fishery.”

But other members of the panel vehemently disagreed.

“It is possible to stuff the genie back in the bottle,” Wisconsin biologist Jim Selgeby said.

The Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks and the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes sponsored the roundtable. A dozen researchers and managers from nine states and provinces reviewed scientific information about Flathead Lake for two days and made their recommendations Wednesday.

Since the 1980s, the Flathead kokanee population has disappeared. Bull trout and cutthroat trout numbers also have plummeted.

The panel agreed that exotic lake trout are winning the battle for the top of the Flathead Lake food chain. Bull trout are losing.

The panel said state managers have a choice: Drive down the lake trout population to give bull trout a break, or resign themselves to dwindling bull trout numbers and let lake trout rule Flathead.

One nagging question is the willingness of Flathead Lake fisherman to sacrifice the lake trout fishery, which has replaced kokanee as the anglers’ favorite. That fishery supports several guide businesses and thousands of recreational boats.

And the panelists noted that there is no guarantee lake trout controls would work.