From the Thursday, November 18, 2004 issue of the Hungry Horse News . . .
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is heading up an investigation into why bull trout populations are not recovering in Coal Creek, a tributary of the North Fork. Bull trout are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
Unlike in other North Fork tributaries, the number of bull trout spawning beds in Coal Creek-redds-has not recovered from a region-wide collapse in bull trout populations. The collapse was blamed on the introduction of mysis shrimp in the Flathead River system by the state between 1965 and 1975.
The number of redds in Coal Creek dropped from 34 in 1980, when fisheries biologists began counting, to zero in 2001 and three in 2004. By comparison, the 2004 numbers for Big, Whale and Trail creeks are 11, 41 and 34.
Read the entire article . . .