For over 12 years Dolores River Anglers/Trout Unlimited has systematically studied, analyzed, and actively contributed to the management of the Upper Dolores River and its watershed. Clearly, our forests are changing: what they were historically is not what they are now; what they are now is not what they will likely be at the end of the century. Understanding the drivers of that change is the basis for effectively adapting management practices as change emerges.

How can we characterize the current state of and fundamental trendlines occuring in the Upper Dolores watershed?

What challenges are emerging that we'll likely see more of well into the future?

What tools in the toolbox are emerging as most relevant to meeting those challenges?

Having been raised roaming the southern Appalachians of upper East Tennessee and Western North Carolina with his twin brother, Duncan early on acquired a keen affection for mountain environments, especially mountain streams and trout habitat. A fulfilling career in public sector executive management, followed by "best practice" based national and international management consulting, took him deep into the challenges of integrating strategic planning and effective operational and financial analytics with business process alignment.

Retirement returned him to the mountains, this time to the Southern Rockies. As his experience has grown in the San Juans (especially the Upper Dolores), so have his interests in discerning and characterizing effective strategies for adapting to and sustaining a healthy watershed in the face of change, particularly as pertains to trout, which over geologic time have established home in the cold, pristine mountain waters of southwestern Colorado.

Duncan's career experience is supported by an educational background in economics/business management; he has a master's in public administration and another in urban and regional planning. He is currently very active in Trout Unlimited, the Upper Dolores Stream Protection Working Group, and the Dolores Watershed Forest Restoration Collaborative. Since 2010. he and his wife have lived across the valley from Mesa Verde National Park.