State biologists, working group attack problems at Newton Lakes

Posted 9/24/20

Stress levels over East and West Newton lakes have fallen with each inch that the water has receded. Fingers are crossed the soggy conditions continue to improve.

“It’s way down. …

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State biologists, working group attack problems at Newton Lakes

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Stress levels over East and West Newton lakes have fallen with each inch that the water has receded. Fingers are crossed the soggy conditions continue to improve.

“It’s way down. It’s dropping like a rock,” said Sam Hochhalter, Cody Region fisheries supervisor for the Wyoming Game and Fish Department.

“We’ll see what winter gives us in terms of snowpack and precipitation, but my hunch is that the lakes are gonna continue to be on a trajectory of getting back to normal elevations over the coming years,” he said Wednesday.

It was high water that brought recent attention to the lakes east of Cody — enough that a Newton Lakes Working Group was formed by members of the East Yellowstone chapter of Trout Unlimited and Cody Anglers Group. One by one issues have been addressed. First, it was communication, according to the working group chairman Larry Timchak.

“The working group has really improved the communication and coordination between anglers and in Wyoming Game and Fish,” Timchak said. “The Game and Fish folks have been very responsive, trying to address the kind of urgent needs out there with the high water, which is somewhat abated over the last month or two as water levels drop, but, it’s helped to help us focus and organize on what the priorities are.”

Timchak is also the vice president of the local Trout Unlimited chapter, as well as acting treasurer. The group opened up its purse strings this summer and forked out half of the $15,000 needed to build a new parking lot to improve access to the lakes; the flooded lake had swallowed the previous lot and structures, making trophy fishing in East Newton a real chore. The Park County Parks and Recreation Board put up the other half for the new lot.

West Newton is a “put and take” lake, allowing those fishing there to harvest fish for the frying pan. East Newton is a “catch and release” trophy fishery, especially popular with fly fishermen seeking the opportunity to pull in a monster.

Other issues at the lakes are also being attacked, including the invasive goldfish at West Newton.

“We removed over 250 adult goldfish. Unfortunately, they spawned again and there’s a bunch of juveniles in the lake,” Hochhalter said. “We’ll see what overwinter survival is for those young of the year goldfish, but we definitely ramped up our suppression efforts this year, and pulled a lot out.”

The vast majority of the goldfish were adults that weighed up to 2 pounds. The fish were illegally dumped in the lake, causing a situation that may eventually require the Game and Fish to kill all the fish in the lake and then restock it; the lake is stocked with Yellowstone cutthroat trout. A larger concern was that goldfish would move to East Newton, but work was done over the spring and summer to ensure the species couldn’t travel between the lakes while the water was high.

The parking lot is currently under construction and will be followed by the installation of a buck and rail fence.

“We’re going to get out there and get as many volunteers out as we can,” said working group member Robert Crooks. “We don’t have a date on it yet, but it’s going to be labor intensive.”

Slowing some progress, aquatic invasive species expert Alex LeCheminant — who’d done most of the work locating the spawning beds for the goldfish in West Newton — left the Game and Fish for a fisheries gig in Idaho. The department is currently looking for a replacement, Hochhalter said.

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