Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science
Volume 36 Article 10
1982 Warmwater Fish Community of a Cool Tailwater in Arkansas Richard A. Frietsche U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service
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Recommended Citation Frietsche, Richard A. (1982) "Warmwater Fish Community of a Cool Tailwater in Arkansas," Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science: Vol. 36 , Article 10. Available at: http://scholarworks.uark.edu/jaas/vol36/iss1/10
This article is available for use under the Creative Commons license: Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0). Users are able to read, download, copy, print, distribute, search, link to the full texts of these articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UARK. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science by an authorized editor of ScholarWorks@UARK. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science, Vol. 36 [1982], Art. 10 THE WARMWATER FISH COMMUNITY OF A COOL TAILWATER IN ARKANSAS
RICHARD A. FRIETSCHE U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service National Reservoir Research Program Multi-Outlet Reservoir Studies P.O. Box 705, Ouachita Baptist University Arkadelphia, Arkansas 71923
ABSTRACT
Adiverse warmwater fish community has persisted in the Lake Greeson tailwater, despite hydropower releases of cold hypolimnetic water. Forty-eight species of fish were collected by electrofishing in the upper 16.1 km of the tailwater. Hydropower releases have reduced the abundance of some of the warmwater sport fish in the upper tailwater, and their populations are probably maintained in part by recruitment from downstream. Angling effort has been diverted from the warmwater sport fish popula- tions to a put-and-take trout fishery.
INTRODUCTION banks; fallen timber and boulders are concentrated in the upper end ofthe pool and the stream bed is mostly cobble and boulder. Station The Little Missouri River was impounded in1950 byNarrows Dam 3(16.1 km from the dam) is the upstream half ofa longpool with steep forflood control and hydropower production. The indigenous warm- banks of alluvial deposits reflecting Gulf Coastal Plain topography; water fish community ofthis river was disrupted when cold water was the stream bed is composed primarily ofsilt and there is extensive stream discharged from the hypolimnion of Lake Greeson during hydropower bank canopy with fallen timber in the pool. When tailwater flows are operations. The obvious disruption involved the warmwater fishery, unaffected by hydropower generation, the surface areas ofStations 1, and led to the description of the tailwater as "90miles of barren stream" 2, and 3 are 0.6, 1.1, and 1.7 ha, respectively. (Hulsey, 1959; Pfitzer, 1968). The Arkansas Game and Fish Commis- sion began stocking rainbow trout in 1955 to compensate for this disruption, and stocking currently occurs during winter on a put-and- MATERIALS ANDMETHODS take basis in the upper 10.5 km of the tailwater. The Lake Greeson tailwater was included in a study of reservoir Fish were collected at the three sampling stations byelectrofishing. encompassed several tailwaters Direct current voltage was regulated to conduct about 2.5 amps effects on tailwater environments that boat, in the Southeastern United States (Walburg et al., in press). This study between the electrodes mounted on the booms ofan electrofishing and the seconds of electroshocking monitored and provided the opportunity to describe the Lake Greeson tailwater fish were recorded. community and to examine its sport fishery. Riffles and areas adjacent to stream banks and emergent objects inthe pools were electrofished to the extent that water flows and depths would allow. Sampling was done only when water velocities and river eleva- STUDY SITE tions were little affected by hydropower releases. Fish were identified to species, and individual total lengths and weights recorded. The Narrows Dam, located at river km 169.8 ofthe LittleMissouri River, number of fish ofeach species and their total weight were assembled forms Lake Greeson, inPike County, Arkansas. The has an into one data set representing all the samples from one station. These reservoir station, area of2,940 hectares at power poolelevation, which is 167.1 m above data were divided by the hours ofelectroshocking at that pro- viding comparison sets. mean sea level. The dam is a concrete-gravity structure housing three a basis for with the other data Stations 1 and 1979, generating units, each with a flowcapacity of 30.7 raVs. The penstock 2 were each sampled four times between May and September and Station 3 sampled three times between July intakes are at an elevation of 146.4 m above mean sea level, and when was and September 1979. the lake is stratified they normally withdraw cold hypolimnetic water. Total electroshocking time was 4.7 hours. There are no provisions fora minimum flow release into the tailwater Allthe collections fora station were compiled into one data set for from Narrows Dam; leakage through the dam is estimated to be 0.3 species diversity analysis. Samples were standardized so that less em- mVs. Hydropower discharges seldom exceed 92 mVs, and discharge phasis was placed on the more abundant species. Kempton (1979) showed varies according to the amount ofelectricity that is required forpower that species diversity measurements in which species of medium peaking purposes. abundance are used to characterize the community pattern give the best Narrows Dam is near the interface ofthe Ouachita Region discrimination between sampling sites. The standardized sample size Mountain abundance, = and the GulfCoastal Plain. Three stations have been established inthe is the sum of r,where r, the standardized is given by r, tailwater study area. Station 1 is nearest to the dam (0.5 km N, (N-N,)/N fora sample of size Nconsisting ofS species with abun- downstream). Here the scouring effect of the hydropower discharge dance N,, i... S. Species diversity of these standardized samples was is evident inthe physical habitat; the end ofthe pool has a upstream measured by the Shannon H = £ (p,) (log; p,), where H is the bedrock bottom and there is no fallen timber in the pool, even though index there is tree canopy on the stream bank. Station 2 (10.5 km from the index ofspecies diversity, S is the number ofspecies, and p, is the pro- dam) is a long, relatively deep pool with extensive tree canopy on the portion ofthe total sample belonging to the ;'th species (Krebs, 1972).
28 Arkansas Academy of Science Proceedings, Vol. XXXVI,1982
Published by Arkansas Academy of Science, 1982 28 Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science, Vol. 36 [1982], Art. 10
Richard A. Frietsche
RESULTS ANDDISCUSSION rates are not included. Seasonal variation in abundance was greatest inthis species; catch rates were highest inthe spring and steadily declined tch rates (Table 1) were similar for the three stations in through the summer, particularly at Station 1. The preference for the son tailwater ifcommon carp (Cyphnus carpio) catch specific habitat of a station or stations by some of the species was reflected by the catch rates. Green sunfish (Lepomis eyanellus) were not collected at Station 3, indicating their preference for the rock and boulder substrates of stations Iand 2. The onlyorangespotted sunfish - 3, Table 1. Fish species collected in the Lake Greeson tailwater. Catch
Arkansas Academy of Science Proceedings, Vol. XXXVI,1982 29 http://scholarworks.uark.edu/jaas/vol36/iss1/10 29 Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science, Vol. 36 [1982], Art. 10 I The Warmwater Fish Community of a Cool Tailwater in Arkansas
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Table 3. Catch per hour of fish (numbers and weight) electroshocking for combined sampling stations at Lake Greeson and Gillham Lake Ithank Thomas M.Buchanan of Westark Community tailwaters. The data forthe Gillham Lake tailwater are from Walburg College for verifying the identification of Notropis et al. (Inpress). atherinoides and Etheostoma collettei. This study was supported in part by the U. S. Corps Tailwater and hours of electroshocking (in parentheses) of Engineers Waterways Experiment Station under interagency agreement WES-79-04. Greeson (4.7) Clllham (2.8) Spec No./hr kg/hr No. /hr kg/hr Ictalurus punctatus 0.2 0.48 3.6 2.02 LITERATURE CITED Pylodictis olivaris 0.2 0.16 1.1 0.39 BUCHANAN,T.M. Key to fishes Subtotal 0.4 0.64 4.7 2.41 1973. the ofArkansas. Ark.Game Fish Comm., Little Rock, Ark. 119p. Lepomis cyanellus 10.6 0.86 20.3 1.23 1.3 0.10 1.1 0.04 L. macrochiru 25.7 1.24 31.4 0.48 DEWEY, M.R., and T. E. MOEN. 1978. Fishes of the Caddo River, 59.0 1.33 93.3 1.49 Arkansas after impoundment ofDeGray Lake. Proc. Ark.Acad. 0.2 0.01 2.9 0.22 Sci. 32:39-42. Subtotal 96.8 3.54 149.0 3.46 HOLDEN, P. Ecology regulated stream MicropLc rus dolomieu 0 0 2.5 0.75 B. 1979. ofriverine fishes in 3.8 0.93 15.7 1.74 systems with emphasis on the Colorado River. Pages 57-74 in M. salmoid. 6.2 1.29 8.9 4.01 J. V. Ward and J. A.Stanford, editors. The ecology ofregulated Pomonis anWlaris 0.2 0.06 2.9 0.16 streams. P. nigromaculatus 3.0 0.56 2.1 0.25 Plenum Press, New York. Subtotal 13.2 8.84 32.1 6.91 HULSEY, A. H. 1959. An analysis of the fishery benefits to be derived from a warmwater tailwater vs. a cold-water tailwater. Total 110.4 7.02 165.6 11.56 Ark. Game Fish Comm. 4p.
KEMPTON, R. A. 1979. The structure of species abundance and measurement ofdiversity. Biometrics 35:307-321. Table 4. Catch per hour ofelectrofishing, by number, forthe Lepomis species ofdifferent lengthintervals from the Lake Greeson tailwater. KREBS, C. J. 1972. Ecology: the experimental analysis ofdistribution and abundance. Harper and Row, New York, 694p.
Length Interval (rm) PFITZER, D. W. 1968. Evaluation of tailwater fishery resources Station 39-63 64-69 90-114 resulting from high dams. Pages 477-488 in Reservoir Fishery 1 4.0 11.2 12.0 Resources Symposium. Southern Div., Am. Fish. Soc. 2 10.2 38.9 28.2 U. S. ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS. 1971. Final environmental 3 15.4 40.8 38.5 statement: Gillham Lake, Cossatot River, Arkansas. U. S. Army Engineer District, Tulsa, Okla. 201p.
WALBURG, C. H., J. F. NOVOTNY, K. E. JACOBS, and W. D. The flow variations associated with hydropower operations and the SWINK. Inpress. Effects of reservoir releases on water quali- release ofcold hypolimnetic water probably were the major factors in ty, macroinvertebrates, and fish in tailwaters. Technical Report the reduction of warmwater sport fish abundance in the Lake Greeson prepared by U. S. Department of the Interior, for the U. S. tailwater study area. These factors create marginal habitat in the ArmyEngineer Waterways Experiment Station, CE, Vicksburg, tailwater for warmwater sport fish and make conditions unsuitable for Miss. reproduction (Holden, 1979). Limited reproductive success is reflected in the low catch rate for sunfish 39 to 114 mm longat Station 1 (Table 4) and in the biomass catch-rate (kg/hr) comparison between the Lake Greeson and Gillham Lake tailwaters (Table 3). Fewer fish composed the Lake Greeson tailwater collections of Lepomis species, although the catch rates by weight were similar for both tailwaters; thus the sun- fish collected from the Lake Greeson tailwater were the larger, indicating their probable recruitment downstream from the tailwater study area. Adiverse warmwater fish community was present in the Lake Greeson tailwater, despite, hydropower releases of cold hypolimnetic water. These releases have reduced the abundance of warmwater sport fish in the tailwater study area, based on a comparison with a nearby warmwater tailwater. Creel surveys' indicated that fishing pressure was directed toward rainbow trout in the tailwater study area; without this fishery, the warmwater sport fish population might have been further reduced.
'Creel surveys were conducted by the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission in association with the National Reservoir Research Program, U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
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