CNHP Releases STReaMS, An Endangered Fish Database

CNHP has completed the first release of STReaMS, an online database for managing endangered fish PIT tag tracking and location data in the Upper Colorado River Basin. STReaMS, which stands for Species Tagging, Research and Monitoring Systems, is a database that currently includes over 1 million sightings of 900,000 individual fish from more than 150 studies completed by the Upper Colorado and San Juan River Endangered Fish recovery programs.

Roundtail chub, pictured above, were once common throughout the entire Colorado River Basin. Today, they occupy only 55% of their historic range. The STReaMS database contains data on capture locations and movement patterns that help inform management of this species, now proposed as Threatened by the Endangered Species Act in the Lower Colorado River Basin.

The recovery programs are a consortium of partners from agencies, industry, and non-profits, all dedicated to restoring natural and self-sustaining populations of Endangered fishes while balancing the water needs of growing western communities. With almost 30 years of data and active partners in five states, the programs recognized the need to efficiently manage copious amounts of data. Thus the idea for a centralized, online database was born. With CNHP's October 2015 release of the database, recovery program personnel will be able to access:

• Capture, stocking, and remote detection data collected from both programs since 1981
• Filters that allow researchers to browse and download data by a variety of criteria
• Cross-basin and cross-study downloads for examining fish movement between basins
• Forms for editing existing data, and adding new data one record at a time
• Organization based security to prevent data corruption 

Public access to the website will be available in October 2017. In the meantime, learn more about the San Juan Basin recovery program, their mission, and the fish they are dedicated to protecting by clicking here. For more on the Upper Colorado River Basin program, click here.