Combining Statewide Surveys and Classification to Support Management of Streams

Abstract

Data from agency‐based inventory programs could be very useful for local fishery management if appropriately summarized and served, but data are often accessible to few. Fundamental management questions at regional and local scales center around resource status and trends, highlighting the need for decision support tools operating at multiple scales. As stream classifications are developed for regions, survey programs become standardized, and innovations for serving spatially and temporally extensive data publicly become common, opportunities arise for developing locally relevant management decision support tools. We describe simple public‐facing tools that use information from a statewide stream inventory program to increase understanding of local and regional trends in important fish populations, describe benchmark conditions for all stream types at various spatial scales, and provide empirical support for local and broader scale management of stream fishes and habitat. We provide examples demonstrating their utility to encourage development of similar tools elsewhere.