Blue Mesa Reservoir is an artificial reservoir located on the upper reaches of the Gunnison River in Gunnison County, Colorado. The largest lake located entirely within the state, Blue Mesa Reservoir was created by the construction of Blue Mesa Dam, a 390-foot tall earthen fill dam constructed on the Gunnison by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation in 1966 for the generation of hydroelectric power. Managed as part of the Curecanti National Recreation Area, a unit of the National Park Service, Blue Mesa Reservoir is the largest lake trout and Kokanee salmon fishery in Colorado. History In 1956, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation was given the responsibility, under the Colorado River Storage Project Act, to begin planning and construction of the Colorado River Storage Project (CRSP), a series of projects in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming that would make possible comprehensive development of the waters of the Colorado River and its major tributaries. One of the initial projects of the CRSP, the Curecanti Unit, focused on the upper reaches of the Gunnison River, the fifth-largest tributary of the Colorado River. The centerpiece of the plans for the Gunnison was the construction of four dams on a of the river east of the National Park Service's Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, projects that would not only help control the amount of water flowing into the Colorado, but would also create new opportunities for flood control, water storage, and the generation of hydroelectric power. The first of these dams was Blue Mesa Dam, which was begun in 1962 approximately west of Gunnison, and west of Sapinero. Finished four years later, the dam created Blue Mesa Reservoir, which became the primary water storage reservoir for the Curecanti Unit (later renamed the Wayne N. Aspinall Unit). Climate According to the Köppen Climate Classification system, Blue Mesa Reservoir has a warm-summer humid continental climate, abbreviated "Dfb" on climate maps. The hottest temperature recorded in was on July 22, 2005, while the coldest temperature recorded was on January 7, 1971. Location and access Blue Mesa Dam is located on the Gunnison river approximately 30 miles west of the city of Gunnison, near the intersection of U.S. 50 with Colorado Highway 92, which travels along the top of the dam. The reservoir extends east 20 miles and is composed of three main basins, the Iola, the Cebolla and the Sapinero, from east to west. U.S.