Education

Trout Unlimited actively works to conserve, protect and restore North America's coldwater fisheries and their watersheds.

The broad spectrum of species that fall within TU's mission often causes people to ask: "If you're doing so much work on Atlantic salmon, or Pacific steelhead, or Arctic grayling, or some other fish not called 'trout,' why do you call yourself 'Trout Unlimited?'"

The short answer is that TU's exponential growth since its 1959 founding has expanded its conservation efforts to include far more coldwater species than even its founders could have imagined. The longer answer is that a family of fishes - known collectively as salmonids - share a set of unique characteristics and habitat requirements that place them under the umbrella of TU's conservation efforts in North America.

Conserving wild trout and salmon begins with conserving the watersheds that gave us our native coldwater fish stocks, and today support a bounty of native and wild fish. All North American fishes known as "trout," "salmon," "char," "steelhead," "grayling," or "whitefish," along with some other common names, fall into this group.

sal - mon` - id: Any fish of the family Salmonidae (trout, salmon, char, whitefish, and grayling). Known to inhabit coldwater ecosystems and to have low tolerance for habitat degradation.

Probably the single-most distinguishing feature that separates the salmonid from other fishes is its need for cold, clean water and healthy ecosystems to survive. Although their evolution dates back tens of millions of years, most salmonids living in North America today moved into their historical range as they followed melting ice inland thousands of years ago. Because of their history, trout and salmon have little or no tolerance for higher water temperatures, pollution, increased dissolved gases, and other problems often associated with humankind's encroachment.

Trout Unlimited's Education Programs

»General "Trout 101" information

»Youth Education Programs

» Trout in the Classroom