AEP Grant Helps Restore Brook Trout in Virginia's Little Tumbling Creek

May 18, 2012 12:00 PM ET

A grant from the AEP Foundation is one reason that Southern Appalachian brook trout is once again swimming in Virginia's Little Tumbling Creek.  The upper four miles of the creek lost its brook trout population more than 20 years ago due to naturally occurring and man-made acid deposits in the stream.

This past winter, AEP subsidiary Appalachian Power built a new road to service transmission lines, which gave the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries (VDGIF) the perfect opportunity to restore the brook trout to its native habitat.

The partnership of VDGIF, the American Electric Power Foundation, the Virginia Council of Trout Unlimited and James Madison University, is working to create the first restored the brook trout stream in Virginia.  Click here to read more about the Little Tumbling Creek partnership.

AEP - American Electric Power

AEP ranks among the nation's largest generators of electricity, owning nearly 38,000 megawatts of generating capacity in the U.S.  AEP also owns the nation's largest electricity transmission system, a nearly 39,000-mile network that includes more 765 kilovolt extra-high voltage transmission lines than all other U.S. transmission systems combined.

AEP's utility units operate as AEP Ohio, AEP Texas, Appalachian Power (in Virginia, West Virginia), AEP Appalachian Power (in Tennessee), Indiana Michigan Power, Kentucky Power, Public Service of Oklahoma, and Southwestern Electric Power Company (in Arkansas, Louisiana and east Texas).