It was to promote ongoing programs, whether or not they served the long-term best interests of sportsmen. In 1970, when I signed on as an "information and education" officer with the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Game, I assumed that my job would be to inform and educate. Despite West Virginia's 500 miles of native brook trout streams, the "golden rainbow" is depicted on the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources logo.Īrtificially concocted hybrids like tiger trout and genetically altered fish like golden rainbows attest to what's lacking in the general public and fishing public: respect for fish as wildlife and what George Bird Grinnell, editor of the old sporting weekly Forest & Stream, called "a refined taste in natural objects." By 1963 they had enough of these garish fish to start widespread stocking. So enamored were fish managers with her banana-hued flanks they reared her in a separate tank, fertilized her eggs with milt from normal males, then selected and cultured increasingly off-colored fry. In 1955 a pigment-impoverished female rainbow trout turned up in a West Virginia state hatchery. Google "tiger trout," ignoring everything by me, and you'll find only effusions about their alleged "beauty."Ĭonsider also "golden rainbows" (aka palomino trout), all the rage across North America. They're created in hatcheries by crossing not just species but genera - brown trout from Europe with brook trout from North America. If that sounds harsh, consider stocked "tiger trout," wildly popular with anglers throughout the U.S. Their function in the natural world is mainly perceived as rod benders and table fare. Fish are furless, featherless, cold, slimy, silent and, for most people, unseen.
For most Americans, including the majority of anglers, fisheries managers, and environmental groups, fish don't count as wildlife.
0 kommentar(er)
