Yellowstone Closes Buffalo Creek to Remove Invasive Rainbow Trout

Yellowstone is making a hard fisheries-management call on Buffalo Creek, and the reason is simple: native cutthroat need protection from invasive fish before the damage spreads farther.

Buffalo Creek, a tributary of Slough Creek in the park’s northern reaches, is closed from Aug. 31 through Sept. 6 while biologists treat the stream with rotenone to remove invasive rainbow trout. The closure runs from the northern park boundary downstream to the confluence with Slough Creek. The park expects the creek to reopen Sept. 7.

The issue is not just competition. Rainbow trout can hybridize with native Yellowstone cutthroat trout, threatening the long-term genetic integrity of cutthroat in the Lamar River watershed. Buffalo Creek has been serving as a source of invasive fish moving into Slough Creek, Soda Butte Creek and the Lamar River.

Park officials say the treatment will not affect the potability of water at Slough Creek Campground. Biologists also plan to electrofish Buffalo Creek before treatment and move any native cutthroat they find outside the treatment area.

Nobody who cares about fish should cheer invasive trout taking over native water. Sometimes conservation is clean and easy to sell. Sometimes it means closing a creek for a week and using a tool like rotenone to defend a native fish that belongs there. That is management, not neglect.