Clarification, Natural Resource Use Advisory Committee, fish

October 10, 2007

CLARIFICATION:  In a previous column I made mention of the Watershed Wide 1602 permit and the Programmatic Incidental Take Permits for coho. I wanted to clarify that I fully support these options negotiated by our Resource Conservation Districts. The RCDs have done an excellent job of crafting these options for our landowners as an alternative to time consuming and expensive individual permit processes or the regulatory risk of not obtaining a permit.

I do not, however, support the Fish and Game’s separate move to fund Cal-Trout and a contractor to conduct instream flow studies on the Shasta and Scott Rivers with apparent plans to use Section 5937 of the Fish and Game code to demand more water in the future  for fish habitat.

NATURAL RESOURCE USE ADVISORY COMMITTEE: Siskiyou County is currently working on an ordinance to establish a Natural Resource Use Advisory Committee. The purpose of the committee is to review proposed federal and state actions, (such as federal land management, state resource use regulation,) and make recommendations  on proposal comments to the Board of Supervisors. This will be part of the “coordination” role that County government has with the federal and state government. These Committee members will be appointed from candidates representing mining and dredging, range management, forestry, agriculture, natural resources, fish an wildlife, recreation, tourism or water. Those wishing to serve should send a letter of interest to the Board of Supervisors at P.O. Box 750 , Yreka , CA 96097 . http://www.co.siskiyou.ca.us/

FISH DISEASE:  Many people are under the impression that poor habitat conditions caused by agriculture, logging and mining are the main reasons for declines in salmon and steelhead populations. It has long been known that predation plays a substantial part in thinning fish populations. (Estimated at as much as 98 percent by the Klamath River Fisheries Restoration Task Force.) We also know that scientists are researching the large part that ocean conditions (El Nino and La Nina) play in the food source for salmonids for a large portion of their life.

Locally on the Klamath River , disease plays an enormous role in juvenile fish survival.  Ceratomyxa Shasta and Parvicapsula Minibicornis are pathogens that are hosted by a worm. The pathogens infect juvenile fish, which can be fatal. Results of this year’s study indicate that C. Shasta was detected in 18 percent of juvenile Klamath Chinook salmon and P. minibicornis was detected in 72 percent.  In the study, C. Shasta infected 37 percent of juvenile coho and P. minibicornis infected 72 percent. In the screw trapping inventories of outmigrating salmon, the highest visible signs of infection in juvenile fish seemed to occur at Bogus Creek. http://www.fws.gov/arcata/fisheries/projectUpdates/FishHealthMonitoring/
Klamath%20Pathogen%20Monitoring%20Update%2009-24-2007.pdf

Although the pathogens are present throughout the Klamath mainstem, hot spots of concentrated infection appear to be the Williamson River in Oregon and around Beaver Creek below Iron Gate dam. Adult salmon appear also to be infected. A sampling of 2006-07 returning Iron Gate hatchery fish indicated that 100 percent of fall Chinook were infected with P. minibicornis and 85 percent with C. Shasta. 55 percent of adult coho had P. minibicornis and 95 percent had C. Shasta. In the 2005-06 sampling year, 100 percent of steelhead trout adults were infected with P. minibicornis and 50 percent with C. Shasta. (No sampling of steelhead was done in 06-07.) 

The Scott River and Shasta River don’t seem to be infected with the pathogens. Scientists have speculated that infected adult fish carcasses deposited as returning fish back up and wait to enter the hatchery could be the reason that the area between Iron Gate and Beaver Creek is so infected.

This does not mean that it is not important to improve fish habitat in the tributaries. But, until the mystery of the source of infection and its cure is figured out, it appears that the juveniles produced in the Shasta and Scott Rivers face a gauntlet of fatal infection on their way to the ocean and back as adults.

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Source:  http://users.sisqtel.net/armstrng/opinion100507.htm