Project Overview
Our goal was to evaluate the Rosgen Salmonid Index (RSI) for use in Catskill streams. Five stream reaches were selected for sampling, 2 degraded sites, 2 reference sites, and a restored site. We measured each reach longitudinally, created cross section profiles, sampled invertebrates, conducted pebble counts, and estimated a number of physical habitat variables. We found that the two reference sites scored the highest in the overall index, while the restored site scored the lowest. We found that there was no correlation between the abundance of invertebrates and the sub-index for invertebrate habitat quality, but found a significant relationship with entrenchment ratio. Because the RSI matched our expectation that visually stable stream reaches scored higher, we concluded that Rosgen’s salmonid index will be a helpful tool for assessing trout habitat in Catskill streams. We recommend that improvements could be made to the index by transition several of the physical habitat observations to quantitative metrics.
Objectives
Dataset Availability
Downloadable: 1 dataset
See the full list of available dataTags
Status - Completed
Start date: 2020-05-15
End date: 2020-12-12
Study Area
