Project Titles:

• New Raceways and Settling Ponds (FFS #R6PG)
• Install New Weatherport Cover Over New Raceways (FFS #R6RA)

State: Colorado

Project Description: The Recovery Act funding will enable the Hotchkiss National Fish Hatchery to build eight new fish raceways and to convert existing ponds into effluent ponds, which will filter water re-entering the area’s supply. The Recovery Act will also provide for a weatherport to cover the raceways, shielding the raceways from the elements and potential predators. The area around the raceways will be surfaced with new asphalt to accommodate service vehicles for transporting fish.

Hotchkiss National Fish Hatchery is located about 20 miles east of Delta, Colorado, near the town of Hotchkiss. The hatchery consists of a hatchery building with a small visitor center and tank room, residences, 32 outdoor concrete raceways, 24 nursery tanks, and 6 earthen ponds. The Service established it in 1967 as part of the Colorado River Storage Project Act. The hatchery sits on 58 acres of a forested region near the North Fork of the Gunnison River. The hatchery’s cold, clean water supply comes from the adjacent Tommy Dowell Spring.

The hatchery raises rainbow trout for stocking in northern New Mexico and western Colorado. The new raceways will improve the fish production to accommodate the Colorado River Storage Project and the Animas-La Plata Project. The converted ponds will contain new linings to mitigate phosphate and nitrogen releases into the Gunnison River to ensure EPA compliance. The lining should also prevent disease and water loss. The new raceways and their weatherports should also mitigate fish loss due to predators.

Originally posted 09/14/2009
Updated 09/16/2009