Cutthroat Trout / Subspecies / Great Basin
Alvord Cutthroat (Extinct)- The Alvord cutthroat trout, Oncorhynchus clarki alvordensis, was a subspecies of cutthroat trout. It was known only from Trout Creek in Oregon and Virgin Creek in Nevada, although it may have lived in several of the larger Alvord Basin streams during recent times. It was native to spring-fed creeks that ran down to Alvord Dry Lake in southeast Oregon, which was a large lake during the ice ages and an isolated drainage, part of the Great Basin today. This is one of the two cutthroat trout taxa considered extinct because all known populations are hybridized with rainbow trout which were introduced into streams in the Alvord basin in the 1920s, resulting in cutbows.
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Bonneville Cutthroat Trout - The Bonneville cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarki utah) is a subspecies of cutthroat trout native to tributaries of the Great Salt Lake, U.S.A. Most of the fish's current and historic range is in Utah, but they are also found in Idaho, Wyoming, and Nevada. Bonneville cutthroats are descended from Cutthroat Trout that once inhabited the Late Pleistocene-aged Lake Bonneville of Utah, eastern Nevada, and southern Idaho. Since the desiccation of Lake Bonneville into the Great Salt Lake, which is too salty for any life other than brine shrimp, Bonneville cutthroats have been isolated in smaller populations such as the headwaters of mountain creeks, streams, rivers, reservoirs, and lakes of the Bonneville drainage basin. This isolation has resulted in much phenotypic variation among populations.
Image credit: Joseph R. Tomelien
Humboldt Cutthroat Trout - The Humboldt cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarkii humboldtensis) is a subspecies of cutthroat trout, a North American fish in the family Salmonidae. It is one of the several subspecies of cutthroat trout. It was formally scientifically named in 2008 by Trotter and Behnke, who stated its distribution is in the basins of the upper Humboldt River of northern Nevada, the Upper Quinn River (Nevada and Oregon), as well as the Whitehorse (Coyote) basin (Oregon). The Nevada and Oregon Fish and Wildlife authorities still consider these populations belonging to the subspecies O. c. henshawi (the Lahontan cutthroat trout).
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Lahontan Cutthroat Trout - Lahontan cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarkii henshawi) is the largest subspecies of cutthroat trout, and the state fish of Nevada. It is one of three subspecies of cutthroat trout that are listed as federally threatened. The Lahontan cutthroat is native to the drainages of the Truckee River, Humboldt River, Carson River, Walker River, Quinn River and several smaller rivers in the Great Basin of North America.[2] These were tributaries of ancient Lake Lahontan during the ice ages until the lake shrank to remnants such as Pyramid Lake and Walker Lake about 7,000 years ago, although Lake Tahoe—from which the Truckee flows to Pyramid Lake—is still a large mountain lake.
Lahontan cutthroats evolved into a large (up to 1 m or 39 in) and moderately long-lived predator of chub, suckers, and other fish as long as 30 or 40 cm (16 in). The trout was able to remain a predator in the larger remnant lakes where prey fish continued to flourish, but upstream populations were forced to adapt to eating smaller fish and insects. Some experts consider O. c. henshawi in the upper Humboldt River and tributaries to be a separate subspecies, O. clarkii humboldtensis or the Humboldt cutthroat trout, adapted to living in small streams rather than large lakes.
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More on Lahontan Cutthroat by Native Trout Fly Fishing; by Western Native Trout Initiative
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To view the conservation efforts that brought this incredible trout back from the edge of extinction...click here...
Image credit: Joe Clark/Tahoe Quarterly
Lahontan Cutthroat Trout: A prehistoric legend returns (video)
Do you want to fish Pyramid Lake? see Pyramid Lake Fisheries by US Fish & Wildlife service
Whitehorse Basin cutthroat trout aka Willow-Whitehorse Basin Cutthroat refers to a population segment of the cutthroat trout complex (Oncorhynchus clarkii) from the streams of the Whitehorse Basin (or the Coyote Basin[1]), southeastern Oregon. It is alternatively considered as a part of the Lahontan cutthroat trout subspecies (Oncorhynchus clarkii henshawi),[2][3] or of the Humboldt cutthroat trout (O. c. humboldtensis) whose main range is in Nevada. Image credit: http://www.nativetroutflyfishing.com/
For more detailed information, click here...
Paiute cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarkii seleniris) is one of fourteen subspecies of cutthroat trout. Paiute Cutthroat are native only to Silver King Creek, a headwater tributary of the Carson River in the Sierra Nevada, in California. This subspecies is named after the indigenous Northern Paiute peoples. Paiute cutthroat trout are endemic to and protected within the Carson Ranger District of the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest. The Carson River lies within the Great Basin interior drainage system, within the historic range of Lahontan cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarki henshawi). Image credit: wildlife.ca.gov.
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Conservation story - this is a story about hard work and a lot of luck. To see this story, click here...
