Restoring the Rio Grande

Rio Grande:Lifeline for over 500 vertebrate species

• 95 mammals • 345 birds• 95 amphibians

and reptiles • 44 native fish

Photo: Ken Stinnett

Elephant Butte Dam 1916

The status of native fish in the Rio Grande in southern New Mexico and west Texas:

Gone (16):• shovelnose

sturgeon • American

eel • Mexican

tetra • speckled

chub • flathead

chub • Rio Grande

chub • Rio Grande silvery minnow• Rio Grande

shiner • Rio Grande bluntnose shiner• phantom

shiner

• roundnose

Present (8):• gizzard shad • red shiner • river carpsucker • bluegill • mosquitofish • flathead catfish • smallmouth buffalo?• headwater catfish?

Rio Grande Campaign

Goal: to restore the Rio Grande in southern New Mexico and west Texas to a functioning ecosystem which supports native plants and animals

Shovelnose sturgeon beaverRio Grande leopard frog

Yellow-billed cuckoo

Picacho Wetlands

Before Now

La Mancha Project Design

• Two connected ponds on 3 acres of privately owned land

• Inlet and outlet channels connecting to river at high flows

• Appropriate native plantings in floodway and around ponds

• Trail, signs and bench

A Living River

Photo: Ken Stinnett