Department of Water Resources
A daily compilation for DWR personnel of significant news articles and comment
March 17, 2008
1. Top Items
Salmon decline could lead to widespread ban - Associated Press
Chinook Salmon Vanish Without a Trace - New York Times
Fishing ban on horizon, groups say; Declining salmon population has anglers preparing for yearlong halt of season as best, perhaps only option - Contra Costa Times
Salmon may be off-limits; Salmon fishing off
Salmon fishermen face dire choices - Sacramento Bee
Salmon season: Brief or none; Most liberal of panel's 3 options allows fraction of normal catch - Santa Rosa Press Democrat
Salmon collapse leaves fishermen high and dry - San Mateo County Times
Prognosis negative for salmon fishing - Eureka Times Standard
River salmon fishers expect at least a partial season - Redding Record Searchlight
Salmon decline could lead to widespread ban
Associated Press – 3/15/08
By Samantha Young, staff writer
The Pacific Fishery Management Council was expected Friday to settle on three potential strategies to protect the dwindling salmon that remain alive in the ocean, including shutting down the season or severely limiting fishing.
The council is expected to chose a final fishing recommendation in April at its meeting in
"I think the likeliest outcome this year is no one will put a hook in the water," said
The
Fishermen say a closure would trigger economic hardship for them and related businesses in
"It's going to have a big effect on our coastal communities," said Zeke Grader, executive director of the San Francisco-based Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations.
A closure of fisheries in
In most years, about 90 percent of wild chinook or "king" salmon caught off the
Only about 90,000 adult salmon returned to the
Biologists are predicting that this year's salmon returns could be even lower because the number of returning young male fish, known as "jacks," hit an all-time low last year. Only about 2,000 of them were recorded, which is far below the 40,000 counted in a typical year.
Other West Coast rivers also have seen declines in their salmon runs, though not as steep as
Experts are unclear about what caused
Some marine scientists say the salmon declines can be attributed in part to unusual weather patterns that have disrupted the marine food chain in the ocean along the
Fishermen, environmental groups and Native Americans largely blame the salmon's troubles on poor water quality and water diversions in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. #
http://www.dailydemocrat.com//ci_8584844?IADID=Search-www.dailydemocrat.com-www.dailydemocrat.com
Chinook Salmon Vanish Without a Trace
New York Times – 3/17/08
By Felicity Barringer, staff writer
The Chinook salmon that swim upstream to spawn in the fall, the most robust run in the
Whatever the cause, there was widespread agreement among those attending a five-day meeting of the Pacific Fisheries Management Council here last week that the regional $150 million fishery, which usually opens for the four-month season on May 1, is almost certain to remain closed this year from northern Oregon to the Mexican border. A final decision on salmon fishing in the area is expected next month.
As a result, Chinook, or king salmon, the most prized species of Pacific wild salmon, will be hard to come by until the Alaskan season opens in July. Even then, wild Chinook are likely to be very expensive in markets and restaurants nationwide.
“It’s unprecedented that this fishery is in this kind of shape,” said Donald McIsaac, executive director of the council, which is organized under the auspices of the Commerce Department.
Fishermen think the
But federal and state fishery managers and biologists point to the highly unusual ocean conditions in 2005, which may have left the fingerling salmon with little or none of the rich nourishment provided by the normal upwelling currents near the shore.
The life cycle of these fall run Chinook salmon takes them from their birth and early weeks in cold river waters through a downstream migration that deposits them in the San Francisco Bay when they are a few inches long, and then as their bodies adapt to saltwater through a migration out into the ocean, where they live until they return to spawn, usually three years later.
One species of
But their meager numbers have held steady and appear to be unaffected by whatever ails the fall Chinook.
So what happened? As Dave Bitts, a fisherman based in
Fragmentary evidence about salmon mortality in the Sacramento River in recent years, as well as more robust but still inconclusive data about ocean conditions in 2005, indicates that the fall Chinook smolts, or baby fish, of 2005 may have lost out on both counts. But biologists, fishermen and fishery managers all emphasize that no one yet knows anything for sure.
Bill Petersen, an oceanographer with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s research center in
After studying changes in the once-predictable pattern of the Northern Pacific climate, Mr. Petersen found that in 2005 the currents that rise from the deeper ocean, bringing with them nutrients like phytoplankton and krill, were out of sync. “Upwelling usually starts in April and goes until September,” he said. “In 2005, it didn’t start until July.”
Mr. Petersen’s hypothesis about the salmon is that “the fish that went to sea in 2005 died a few weeks after getting to the ocean” because there was nothing to eat. A couple of years earlier, when the oceans were in a cold-weather cycle, the opposite happened — the upwelling was very rich. The smolts of that year were later part of the largest run of fall Chinook ever recorded.
But, Mr. Petersen added, many factors may have contributed to the loss of this season’s fish.
Bruce MacFarlane, another NOAA researcher who is based in Santa Cruz, has started a three-year experiment tagging young salmon — though not from the fall Chinook run — to determine how many of those released from the large Coleman hatchery, 335 miles from the Sacramento River’s mouth, make it to the Golden Gate Bridge. According to the first year’s data, only 4 of 200 reached the bridge.
Mr. MacFarlane said it was possible that a diversion dam on the upper part of the river, around
Farther downstream, he said, young salmon may fall prey to striped bass. There are also tens of thousands of pipes, large and small, attached to pumping stations that divert water.
Jeff McCracken, a spokesman for the federal Bureau of Reclamation, which is among the major managers of water in the
“We’ve got 90 percent of those diversions now screened,” Mr. McCracken said. He added that two upstream dams had been removed and that the removal of others was planned. At the diversion dam in Red Bluff, he said, “we’ve opened the gates eight months a year to allow unimpeded fish passage.”
Bureau of Reclamation records show that annual diversions of water in 2005 were about 8 percent above the 12-year average, while diversions in June, the month the young Chinook smolts would have headed downriver, were roughly on par with what they had been in the mid-1990s.
Peter Dygert, a NOAA representative on the fisheries council, said, “My opinion is that we won’t have a definitive answer that clearly indicates this or that is the cause of the decline.” #
Fishing ban on horizon, groups say; Declining salmon population has anglers preparing for yearlong halt of season as best, perhaps only option
Contra Costa Times – 3/15/08
By Mike Taugher, staff writer
A final decision on salmon fishing will be made early next month, but with near-record low returns last year and early indications that 2008 will be much worse, many anglers said Friday that a yearlong fishing closure is the best and perhaps only option.
"I see no choice. We had to stop the salmon season. I congratulate them," said Dick Pool, a
"2008 and 2009 are toast as far as we're concerned," Pool added. "If we can do something now, maybe we can have a season in 2010."
Wrapping up a weeklong meeting on salmon and other ocean fisheries, the Pacific Fishery Management Council late Friday finalized three options to consider at its April meeting in Seattle.
Those options in rough terms include no commercial or recreational fishing off the California coast, catch-and-release fishing to provide information for an ongoing genetic study or allowing a one-month, 3,000 fish season for commercial anglers and three, three-day seasons for recreational anglers.
The options for
"What we need to look at is why it collapsed," said council chairman Donald Hansen. "This is a major disaster."
After a series of years in which salmon fishing off the
In 2006, commercial salmon fishing off the coast was sharply curtailed, but that was to protect
But last year the
Based on the record-low number of 2-year-old "jacks" that returned last year, biologists estimate that fewer than 60,000 fish will return this year. That is less than half of the lower end of a regulatory target of 122,000, which means the only way to open fishing in areas that could affect the
Even allowing fishing for the genetic study will require a declaration, and officials said that might be hard to justify.
"This will be the first total closure since commercial salmon fishing started in
For consumers, Grader said wild salmon will likely be available from
Earlier this week, the council closed early-opening spring seasons in
In Moss Landing, south of
"The closure couldn't come at a worse time," she said. "They're already being really, really squeezed. This is probably going to put the nail in the coffin."
Up in
"There's going to be a lot of guys that just won't make it," said Ben Platt, a commercial fisher. "I'm still wondering if I'm going to be able to scrape enough out of the ocean to pay some bills or if I should go get a job until the next season."
The California Fish and Game Commission is expected to set river fishing seasons later this spring.
Jerry Karnow Jr. of the California Fish and Game Wardens Association said a complete fishing closure will make it harder to catch poachers if there are no legal anglers on the water to alert law enforcement to poaching.
Early attention to the collapse has been focused on cyclical ocean conditions. Specifically, a warm phase in the northern Pacific altered a current that flows from the north along the coast. That shift delayed the onset of upwelling, where water from the surface is dragged away from the
Because salmon runs as far north as
But the head of the fishery management council, Don McIsaac, has argued that ocean conditions cannot tell the whole story because the problem is especially bad in the
McIsaac's staff drew up a list of 46 possible factors that could be contributing to the decline, including increased predation on salmon from sea lions, water pollution and disease.
On that list also is environmental degradation in the Delta, where several other fish species have been in steep decline for several years.
Many anglers and environmentalists are convinced the twin crises are connected and that a recent string of spectacular years in the ocean masked inland problems.
"We're saying this has got to be addressed -- or we're going to be looking at permanent closures of salmon fishing," said Grader of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations.
Public hearings are scheduled March 31 and April 1 in
The council is expected to decide during its meeting April 6-11 in
Salmon may be off-limits; Salmon fishing off
By Eric Bailey, staff writer
A ban would cut deeply into a $150-million industry already suffering hard times, hitting not just commercial fishing but also the state's recreational angling industry.
The move by the Pacific Fishery Management Council came amid historically low returns of chinook salmon to the
Fewer than 60,000 chinook, known in fish markets and on menus of swank restaurants as king salmon, are expected to spawn this fall in the river, less than half what regulators say is needed to justify a nominal fishing season and just a fraction of the 800,000 that arrived from the sea during the bumper crop of 2002.
Federal scientists blame the anemic returns on a variety of factors, but have focused on poor ocean conditions, potentially linked to global warming, that have caused the chinook's food sources to plummet.
But anglers also blame troubles in the environmentally fragile Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, where fish populations have plummeted because of pollution, predators and increased water exports to the south.
"There's no smoking gun here, but there's a lot of spent shell casings and people who created problems in the delta," said Duncan MacLean, a Half Moon Bay commercial fisherman. "What started out as trouble for little fish like the delta smelt has blossomed into a problem for salmon and the whole state."
The fisheries council voted unanimously to accept three options and to make a final recommendation to federal regulators next month when it meets in
If enacted by the National Marine Fishery Service, the seasonal closure would mark the first time salmon fishing has been banned off
"It's going to have a big effect on coastal communities," said Grader.
In 2006, north coast cities and salmon fishermen struggled after regulators slashed the season to about one-tenth of normal because of low returns on the
That cutback ultimately prompted Congress to authorize $60 million in disaster assistance to the industry.
Last year was expected to be far better, but the catch turned out to be about as poor as 2006. The first signs of trouble appeared on the
"The status of
Said Dick Pool, president of a large fishing tackle company and leader of the advocacy group Water for Fish: "2008 and 2009 are toast as fishing seasons."
Federal lawmakers, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the governors of
A ban would also put most rivers and other streams in
"There will be a huge economic impact, and it will be felt more broadly on the coast than in 2006," said Rod McInnis, southwest regional administrator for the National Marine Fisheries Service. "This is unprecedented. The
A quarter-century ago, more than 8,000 fishing vessels operated off
Although most fishermen concede that a year without salmon appears likely, the causes and remedies for the West's fish woes are less clear.
National Marine Fisheries scientists say the salmon slump stretches up and down the coast, leading them to suspect the trouble lurks in ocean currents. They say a shift in winds over the Pacific compromised the upwelling of nutrients that fuel the aquatic food web. Chinook and other salmon populations sagged as a result.
Commercial anglers, Indian tribes and environmentalists contend that the flagging health of the delta has contributed to the decline of
Bill Jennings of the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance blamed "an epidemic of pollution" in the delta from urban runoff, sewage discharge, farm waste and toxic industrial waste.
He said state and federal wildlife agencies have been "AWOL from the process" and have failed to keep a lid on water quality problems.
But most of the criticism has centered on water exports to farms and cities to the south. Recent years have been among the biggest on record for pumping water out of the delta and into the state's giant aqueducts that deliver water to
But recently, pumping from the delta has been cut to a fifth of its normal level, in response to a federal court order protecting the endangered delta smelt.
Although ocean conditions can't easily be managed, the fate of the delta "is something we have control over," said Grader, of the fishermen's association. He said there is a clear connection between big pumping years and a subsequent hit on salmon populations.
"If it continues," he said, "we're going to be looking at permanent closures of our salmon fisheries." #
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-salmon15mar15,1,212718.story
Salmon fishermen face dire choices
By Matt Weiser, staff writer
Under one of three preliminary options adopted Friday by fisheries managers meeting in
With about 565 salmon boats working in
The other two options are worse in both states. One closes commercial fishing entirely. The other creates a government-subsidized program that allows fishermen to catch salmon for a genetic study, but the fish would have to be released alive.
Zeke Grader of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations said some fishermen could survive by catching other species, such as crab. Others won't survive.
"It's going to have a big effect on our coastal communities," he said. "Our economies in places like
The Pacific Fisheries Management Council will choose one of the three options to set rules for the 2008 salmon season when it meets next month in
Recreational fishing would be closed in both states under two options. The third would allow anglers to catch salmon in the ocean on just nine days. In the
The drastic options are needed because the fall chinook run in the
The Sacramento River fall chinook is the most important salmon run on the West Coast, supporting 90 percent of the ocean fishery off
Most of the season starts May 1, but on Wednesday officials closed seven early opening seasons as a precaution.
The 2008 salmon run is projected to be abysmal, with just 58,200 chinook spawners expected. This doesn't come close to the minimum conservation goal of 122,000 fish, essentially forcing the council to close the fishery.
To allow any fishing, even for genetic studies, the council must obtain an emergency order from U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, who oversees the National Marine Fisheries Service.
Frank Lockhart, assistant regional administrator for the service, said getting that order will be hard because the
Last year was terrible, he said, but "this year could be worse."
Salmon fishing has never been closed entirely on the coast.
"It's very discouraging," said Kathy Fosmark, a commercial fisherman in Moss Landing and a council member. "You can rebuild a run of fish, but you can't really restore a culture."
The governors of
Government biologists blame poor ocean conditions for the decline. But other theories abound, including poor habitat and excessive water diversions in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Poaching is another concern. Thursday night, state game wardens cited a poacher on the
It happens nightly on
"There are thousands of salmon fry taken every season for use as bait," Stiehr said. "... The activity seems to be increasing."#
http://www.sacbee.com/101/story/787874.html
Salmon season: Brief or none; Most liberal of panel's 3 options allows fraction of normal catch
Santa Rosa Press Democrat – 3/15/08
By Robert Digitale, staff writer
SACRAMENTO -- California sport and commercial fishermen this year will suffer through the most restricted salmon season in history and could face a fishing ban altogether.
The Pacific Fishery Management Council on Friday proposed three options for the coming season, any of which would be the most stringent in four decades of federal fisheries oversight.
Two options would allow no sport or commercial fishing this year off
The third option severely restricts fishing, allowing commercial fishermen to catch a mere 9,000 chinook salmon this year off
The average catch is closer to a half-million salmon.
Ocean sports fishermen at best would be allowed to fish from
In contrast, last year most of the state's fishing grounds were open to sport fishermen from April 7 to Nov. 11. Off
The fishery council will convene again next month in
One of the fishing ban alternatives would allow a research study that seeks to use genetics technology and Global Positioning System units to pinpoint where fish from specific West Coast rivers are found off the
Federal regulators insisted the tough rules are needed to deal with the collapse of the salmon population in the
It remains uncertain whether the fishermen will get to drop a line in the water this year.
"I don't think there'll be any fishing at all," Don Hansen, the fishery council chairman, said after Friday's meeting in
"When they get down to the serious part of looking at the options, it'll be a very, very minute fishery, if at all."
In a marked contrast to earlier fishing disasters, not a single commercial or sport fishermen urged the council Friday to recommend a more liberal fishing season. Some said it was because fishermen believe the federal estimates truly reflect the low numbers of
"These guys weren't making up these numbers," said Zeke Grader, executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations.
Even without a fishing season, state and federal scientists predict only 58,000 adult sal-mon would return to the
With so few fish expected, the Commerce Department would need to issue an emergency rule to allow any fishing.
"Having an emergency rule is a big deal to the federal government, so you have to have a strong rationale," said Frank Lockhart of the National Marine Fisheries Service.
Such a rule was approved in 2006 for the
Given such prospects, fishermen are calling for federal disaster relief aid and urging state and federal officials to act to restore healthy salmon runs to the
The decline of that river's salmon was "death by a thousand cuts," said Bill Jennings, executive director of the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance based in
Federal scientists have said poor ocean conditions appear largely responsible for the sal-mon's decline, both on the
But fishing and environmental leaders are looking inland, too. On Friday, they said
"Whatever the ocean conditions out there, we're not getting them out to the ocean and we're not getting them back,"
Even though the council action is nearly a month away, the federal fisheries service already has announced it will prevent ocean sport fishing opening as planned next month in federal waters off Southern and Central California, along with the fishing grounds near Bodega Bay.
And fishing off
http://www1.pressdemocrat.com/article/20080315/NEWS/803150392/1033/NEWS&template=kart
Salmon collapse leaves fishermen high and dry
By Julia Scott, staff writer
PILLAR POINT HARBOR — Fishermen were an endangered species at this marina north of Half Moon Bay on Sunday, sitting at home to ponder what the collapse of the Sacramento River salmon fishery would mean for their livelihoods — and the future of their careers on the water.
Reports of near-historic lows of adult chinook salmon returning to the Sacramento River to spawn came as little surprise to commercial fishermen after several years of salmon declines in the
"We sort of knew things were going poorly, but we didn't know how poorly," said Jim Anderson, chairman of the California Salmon Council and a fisherman out of
Meetings held by the Pacific Fishery Management Council last week ended Friday with the unanimous adoption of three options for sport and commercial fishing off the
The other options are severely limiting fishing or hiring fishermen to catch and release salmon for scientific projects. Both those options would require the federal government to grant an emergency rule because the salmon numbers are so low.
Perhaps, surprisingly, commercial fisherman Duncan MacLean says, any option is better than going fishing — even though he himself counts on the salmon season for 75 percent of his net income each year.
"Getting aid right now is more of an issue than trying to preserve the season," said MacLean, who is part of a group that advises the Pacific Fishery Management Council. "We haven't seen any small fish in the ocean in the past three years, so it's kind of a no-brainer. What sense is there to go fishing if every fish you catch is critical to spawning populations for the future?"
The closest the council has come to halting all salmon fishing was 2006, when a decline in Northern California's
MacLean, along with every other salmon fisherman in
Only about 90,000 adult salmon returned to the
Biologists predict this year's salmon returns could be even lower because the number of returning young male fish, known as "jacks," hit an all-time low last year. Only about 2,000 of them were recorded, which is far below the 40,000 counted in a typical year.
MacLean and other fishermen say they expect to lose just as much money next year as long as the federal government — specifically, the Department of the Interior — refuses to change the way it manages the river system along the West Coast. They blame the salmon's troubles on poor water quality and water diversions in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, including the construction of dams to irrigate the cotton and potato crops of local farmers.
"If they keep doing what they're doing, there won't be any other fish in the river system at all," MacLean said. "The salmon problem is moving its way up the food chain, and if people don't pay attention to it, it's going to be a disaster for everything else."
Marine scientists blame an unusual weather pattern that triggered a collapse of the marine food web in 2005, the year most of this year's returning adults were entering the ocean as juveniles.
Fishermen are now at a loss to answer questions of how to cope for the rest of the year. Dungeness crab season, which got off to a poor start with the Cosco Busan oil spill, ends in June, but has already proved disappointing. Albacore tuna is available near
"It's kind of like going to
The salmon collapse could not have come at a worse time for California fishermen, whose average age is 60, according to the California Salmon Council — too soon to retire and too late to look for another career.
"I don't think anybody's even started looking at how they're going to prepare for the future,"
"A lot of them were anticipating having some kind of a season for years to come and putting a little aside for retirement. But that doesn't look too viable now," he said.
The Associated Press contributed to this story. #
http://www.insidebayarea.com/sanmateocountytimes/ci_8600902
Prognosis negative for salmon fishing
Eureka Times Standard – 3/15/08
By John Driscoll, staff writer
Federal fisheries managers erased nearly all chances for a salmon season along the
By Friday afternoon, it appeared that allowing any sport or commercial fishing south of central
The Pacific Fishery Management Council hashed out three options at the meeting that will be vetted by its technical team and considered for adoption in April.
The most liberal would allow small commercial quota fisheries, including one in the
”It does look really bad, the worst I've ever seen,” said Jimmy Smith, a
”We need to do everything we can to find out if there were problems in freshwater that caused this collapse of stocks in the Sacramento River,” said Eureka commercial fisherman Dave Bitts.
He said fishermen will be seeking disaster relief, and cited an effort by Rep. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena, and California Sen. Dianne Feinstein to get that under way.
The U.S. Commerce Department reportedly told a House committee that it will have a declaration regarding the disaster by May. That would open the door for Congress to provide millions in aid, which may be more needed than in 2006, when severe cutbacks to fishing were put in place. #
http://www.times-standard.com//ci_8583114?IADID=Search-www.times-standard.com-www.times-standard.com
River salmon fishers expect at least a partial season
Redding Record Searchlight – 3/15/08
By Thom Gabrukiewicz, staff writer
The Pacific Fisheries Management Council (PFMC) ended its latest round of talks Friday by weighing three options for ocean anglers, including completely shuttering the season or severely limiting fishing. The council is expected to choose its final ocean recommendation when members meet April 6-12 in
"I think the likeliest outcome this year is no one will put a hook in the (ocean)," said
River anglers, meanwhile, said they still anticipate fishing for fall-run chinook salmon, considered one of the healthiest runs on the West Coast until the collapse this year.
"It's not over yet,"
While the PFMC sets the ocean season, the state's inland salmon season is decided by the California Fish and Game Commission, with input from the National Marine Fisheries Council and the PFMC. The commission sets its regulations every three years and is midway through its cycle.
Each year, supplements to the sportfishing regulations are released in May and June to specifically address changes to the ocean and inland salmon regulations, according to the Fish and Game Commission Web site.
The season is set in a way that shelters protected spring-run and winter-run fish that also enter the
Fall-run salmon season on the
"Once the PFMC sets its option, we will report to the commission and it will adopt what to do in the Central Valley," said Randy Benthin, a Department of Fish and Game senior fisheries biologist in
North state guides who attended the PFMC meetings said river anglers could see one of three options that were discussed Tuesday being adopted by the Commission. Those options include a zero-limit, catch-and-release season; an allotment season of the fish coming back to spawn, which would be about one-third of last year's take; or a shortened season -- say September and October -- where there would be the traditional two-fish-a-day limit and two in possession.
"My guess, we'll probably see a two-month season," said Robert Weese, a guide from Red Bluff who attended the PFMC meetings. "They'd take two-thirds of the season away from us, but we'd still be fishing during the peak times."
Only about 90,000 adult salmon returned to the
Biologists are predicting that this year's salmon returns could be even lower because the number of returning young males, known as "jacks," hit an all-time low last year. About 2,000 of them were recorded, which is far below the 40,000 counted in a typical year.
Experts are unclear about what caused the collapse. Some marine scientists have said the salmon declines can be attributed in part to unusual weather patterns that have disrupted the marine food chain in the ocean along the Pacific coast.
But anglers, environmental groups and American Indians put the blame on poor water quality and water diversions in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
"It's way beyond the fish," Mlcoch said. "It's politics."
Specifically, they say, the massive pumping of water to the
"Times will be hard, and if it goes like this and we see a shortened season, fine," Weese said. "But then the government needs to look into it -- all of it -- and fix the problem." #
http://www.redding.com/news/2008/mar/15/river-salmon-fishers-expect/
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