Local and landscape effects of introduced trout on amphibians in historically fishless watersheds

Introduced trout have often been implicated in the decline of high-mountain amphibian populations, but few studies have attempted to understand whethe r fish stocking also influences the distribution and abundance of amphibian s throughout entire mountain basins, including the remaining fishless lakes . We examined this relationship using the relative abundance of long-toed s alamanders (Ambystoma macrodactylum) and Columbia spotted frogs (Rana lutei ventris) in fish-containing and fishless lentic sites in basins with varyin g levels of historic fish stocking. All lentic waters were surveyed for fis h and amphibians in 11 high-elevation basins in the Frank Church-River of N o Return Wilderness, Idaho, between 1994 and 1999. We found introduced trou t (Oncorhynchus clarki, O. mykiss, O. m. aguabonita) in 43 of the 101 sites , representing 90% of the total surface area of lentic water bodies availab le. At the scale of individual water bodies, after accounting for differenc es in habitat characteristics between fish-containing and fishless sites, t he abundance of amphibians at all life stages was significantly lower in la kes with fish. At the basin scale, densities of overwintering life stages o f amphibians were lower in the fishless sites of basins where more habitat was occupied by trout. Our results suggest that many of the remaining fishl ess habitats are too shallow to provide suitable breeding or overwintering sites for these amphibians and that current trout distributions may eventua lly result in the extirpation of amphibian populations from entire landscap es, including sites that remain in a fishless condition.