What In The World Is A Chub?

Photo credit: The Oregonian 

Well, the Oregon chub are the biggest group of underdogs you’ve ever heard of!

They are the first fish in history to successfully leave the endangered species list!

Oregon chub are small green and silver minnows that inhabit the Willamette Valley in Oregon.

Their species was almost driven to extinction in the later half of the last century due to habitat loss. Dams and dikes were built that altered the flow of the valley’s river and non-native bass and bluegill populations were introduced to the area. Combined, these two changes landed the chub in serious trouble.

They were listed endangered in 1993 with less that 1,000 living in all of the Willamette Basin.

Don’t worry though, they made quite a comeback.

The trajectory of Oregon chub is staggering, considering where we’ve seen this species come from,” – Brian Bangs, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s chub specialist

Photo credit: The Oregonian

Thanks to habitat restoration projects, the construction of spill over dams and the introduction of chubs to new waterways, their population is now thriving with more than 140,000 chub inhabiting 80 different locations in Willamette Valley.

What a conservational success! Kudos, chub!

For more information on the Oregon chub survival story, please visit The Oregonian.