WAY WAY TOO MUCH EMPHASIS ON TROUT. Much of this state isn't even fit for good trout fishing. Personally wherever trout cannot grow well, they shouldn't be. Some lakes they cannot reproduce in but they grow very well, such as Juniata. Here stocking should be done.
I don't mind some lakes being put and take. I know it's economically important and lots of people love put and take fishing. But NOT EVERY lake needs to be put and take. The DOW HAS to manage every lake for trout over here because they made a verbal agreement not to stock any warmwater gamefish. They think trout won't eat native fish and they are beyond stupid if they seriously believe that. Trout are larger, far more aggressive predators and will take far more and far bigger fish than either a bass or a walleye.
For them to try and kill pike for the sake of stocker trout that cannot grow is unallowable. They blame pike for poor trout fishing when in reality if you look at numbers it's because less trout are being stocked. Even at Spinney, where pike did cause some harm, the majority of the problems with fewer trout being caught was because of the fact that very few could be stocked at that time, so only spinney's self sustaining trout could really provide much fishing opportunity, and reproductive success for trout in spinney isn't high. So pike got all the blame, once again, when they were only a small portion of the problem. I want to see more fisheries managed for pike rather than trout. They claim every lake isn't meant for pike and they get TU and those who are ignorant to preach their lies again.
Colorado is warmer than most all other central states and has a longer growing season than all other central states in the west. It can grow big walleye and big bass. Our walleye are some of the biggest around, and our bass in some fisheries are bigger than any in the west except for texas, arizona, oklahoma, and california. In some fisheries bass are stunted because of the 15" minimum length limit.
You guys know how I feel about the CDOW, they are among the worst fisheries managers in the country, if not the worst, or a close second to washington. And those of you that don't live on the west slope don't know how bad they really are.
The stocking of catchable trout also ruins populations of other gamefish because trout prey upon and take up food and space from other gamefish. Nothing can wipe out bass faster than the overstocking of trout. Mack Mesa reservoir is an example of this, as is Rifle and Harvey Gap.
According to the DOW, trout don't eat other fish hardly at all and don't compete with other fish. So basically the CDOW claims that trout don't take up space and basically don't exist or eat.
Stocker trout are still predators, or else they wouldn't hit lures. Though they aren't the predators that pike, large walleye, large bass, or wild trout are, they still eat fish.
Stocking trout in highline, mack mesa, and harvey gap is not right. The morons even tried to stock connected lakes and rio blanco lake twice with trout. The trout swam off yet died the next day and were floating everywhere. Yet they didn't listen to anglers, so they stocked it again the next year and wasted so much time and money by again thinking anglers know nothing. One word for it all: IDIOCY.