Wilson E. Sisty was appointed the first Fisheries Commissioner of Colorado in 1876; the first Biennial Report of the Fish Commissioner was produced in 1877. Aquatics research has formally been part of the agency since 1945. In 1950 Congress passed legislation popularly known as the Dingel-Johnson Act which was modeled after the 1937 Federal Aid to Wildlife Restoration Act (popularly known as Pittman-Robertson). Appropriations from this act were substantial, greatly increasing the resources for freshwater fisheries research. Federal Aid progress reports summarize this research.
Aquatic research at Colorado Parks and Wildlife is disseminated through journals and reports, video and audio, news releases, the CPW website, brochures, fact sheets, etc.
The CPW Research Library organizes and makes available much of the aquatics research at CPW. The library's databases and e-journals support agency research. For more information on library resources see Aquatics Research @ CPW Library.