Description: <DIV STYLE="text-align:Left;"><DIV><DIV><P STYLE="margin:0 0 0 0;"><SPAN>Westslope Cutthroat trout have shown severe declines from historical abundances and existing populations of pure Westslope Cutthroat trout are now small and fragmented. Westslope Cutthroat trout are ranked as Threatened under the provincial Wildlife Act, and as Threatened by the national Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC). The 2017 Alberta Fish Sustainability Index (FSI) assessment (excluding National Parks) reaffirmed these conservation designations, with all populations being classified as high risk. Reducing angling related mortality, more effective management of invasive trout and land use issues in key watersheds will be important in conserving and recovering Alberta's native Cutthroat trout.</SPAN></P><P STYLE="margin:0 0 0 0;"><SPAN>Historically, of the 104 watersheds within their native Alberta range, Westslope Cutthroat trout were believed to be abundant in 71 watersheds. Numerous watersheds on the fringe of core Westslope Cutthroat trout range held fish, but likely at lower densities as naturally warmer waters likely limited populations to low densities. As of 2017, Westslope Cutthroat trout (non-hybridized with Rainbow trout or other introduced trout) are only found in 31 watersheds and were all assessed as either low or very low abundance of adult fish (see, the Current Adult Density Fish Sustainability (FSI) Rankings for Westslope Cutthroat Trout PDF found above). A total of 128 HUC 10 watersheds represent waterbodies containing genetically pure, undefined pure, near-pure, undefined near-pure, hybrid, and undefined hybrid trout. Healthy populations remain in isolated creeks but no longer exist within an entire watershed. However, with the refinement of genetic methods and as new results become available, Alberta biologists suspect the number of remaining pure populations may be even lower.</SPAN></P><P STYLE="margin:0 0 0 0;"><SPAN>The Hydrologic Unit Code (HUC) Watersheds of Alberta represents a collection of four nested hierarchically structured drainage basin feature classes that have been created using the Hydrologic Unit Code system of classification developed by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) with accommodation to reflect the pre-existing Canadian classification system. The pour points associated with the delineation of these watersheds have also been included as a point feature class. The HUC Watersheds of Alberta consist of successively smaller hydrologic units that nest within larger hydrologic units, resulting in a hierarchal grouping of alphanumerically coded watersheds feature classes. These nesting watersheds feature classes were created using ArcHydro Tools v.2 (Alberta Environment and Parks) and are subject to periodic review and update. There are currently individual feature classes for HUC 2 (coarsest level), HUC 4, HUC 6, HUC 8 and HUC 10 (finest level). </SPAN></P><P STYLE="margin:0 0 0 0;"><SPAN>This dataset is produced for the Government of Alberta and is available to the general public. Please consult the Distribution Information of this metadata for the appropriate contact to acquire this dataset. </SPAN></P></DIV></DIV></DIV>
Copyright Text: Alberta Environment and Parks, Government of Alberta
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