Long before Red River was a ski town or Questa was a mining town, a small, brilliantly colored trout was already living in the cold headwaters of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. The Rio Grande cutthroat trout, with brass-colored sides, a green and bronze back, and red, orange, or pink coloring on its throat, is the southernmost subspecies of cutthroat trout and is designated as New Mexico's state fish, according to the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish. Cutthroat trout were also the first New World trout encountered by Europeans, when Francisco de Coronado recorded seeing trout in the Pecos River in 1541, fish that were most likely Rio Grande cutthroats.
Click to see more photos of the Rio Grande cutthroat trout — its colors, its headwater streams, and its return to northern New Mexico waters »
For generations, that native trout was part of everyday life in the valley below Red River. Trout Unlimited, in its account of work at Questa, notes that Rio Grande cutthroat trout have fed families for generations in Questa, and local voices in that account describe the fish as pieces of history. Historically, the fish occupied streams throughout the Rio Grande, Canadian, and Pecos river basins. Today, the Department of Game and Fish says they occupy only about 12 percent of their historic distribution, after widespread habitat loss and interactions with nonnative trout species, though more than 120 conservation populations remain, over 80 of them in New Mexico.
The Red River itself tells part of that story. Trout Unlimited describes the river at Questa as a workhorse for several decades, impacted by mine operations and flood control channelization. In 2011, Nick Streit, president of the Taos Enchanted Circle Chapter of Trout Unlimited and owner of the Taos Fly Shop, approached fellow Trout Unlimited leaders about restoring a section of the Red River in Questa and recreating some of its storied past as a fishery. By the end of 2014, Questa had two miles of newly restored Red River, built from 80,000 dollars from the Questa Economic Development Fund and 5,000 dollars from each of two Trout Unlimited chapters, leveraged by the Department of Game and Fish into a 900,000 dollar project.
That Questa work is part of a larger homecoming. The Department of Game and Fish calls the Rio Costilla Project, begun in 2002 north of Questa, one of the largest native fish restoration projects undertaken in United States history, restoring cutthroat trout to approximately 120 miles of stream, 15 lakes, and one 300-acre reservoir. In 2008 the fish was petitioned for listing under the Endangered Species Act, but in 2024 that listing was deemed unwarranted. Trout Unlimited adds that over the past decade almost one million dollars in state, local, and Trout Unlimited funding has been secured to better the Red River at Questa, recover cutthroat populations, and enhance the town's outdoor recreation economy.
In northern New Mexico, Trout Unlimited heard the word querencia defined as a sanctuary and a place of strength, and most simply as a love of place. That is a fitting way to understand this fish. The cutthroat is not just a catch for a visiting angler casting below Red River or at Questa. It is a living link to the families who depended on these waters long before the mine, and, as one Questa voice put it in the Trout Unlimited account, a piece of history that was born before the mine and will survive it. When you see that orange slash flash in a clear pool today, you are seeing Red River heritage still swimming.