It’s good news for coastal steelhead populations, which are under siege, often due to illegal water diversions which leave their spawning grounds dried up.

From the Weekly Calistogan:

Malan alleges there are 286 illegal water diversions, mostly from vineyard development, in the Napa River watershed.

Because so many people steal water from creeks — either they don’t get permits or they violate the conditions of their permits, which constitutes a trespass against the people of the state — many of the Napa River tributaries go dead during the summer from too many diversions, said Malan. Steelhead and numerous other aquatic animals die a slow death as pools become warm and lack oxygen and eventually dry up.

“People who steal water from creeks deprive the down stream ecosystem and people of their public trust right to fish, swim and recreate,” she said. “This is an issue that has been going on for years and the major media just doesn’t get it because it’s wineries, not just cities, that are the major takers.”

…

“This new Superior Court ruling on Monday says that anyone who diverts water must provide enough flow for downstream fish and if they don’t they can be sued by anyone,” said Malan.

Prior to the ruling the people were told by the State Water Resource Control Board (SWRCB) that is was the sole agency with jurisdiction to enforce water law. In truth, anyone wanting to sue anyone diverting had to file a complaint with the SWRCB and it would decide whether to sue.

Impacts On Northern California Salmon & Steelhead Streams?

While this case focuses on diversions in the wine country, you have to wonder how this ruling might affect flow issues in Northern California’s Scott and Shasta Rivers, both of which see damned little water in the summer and fall.

Frankly, it’s a mess up here; Fish & Game has long been vilified for avoiding its enforcement responsibilities, yet instead of phasing in a solution, has suddenly mandated a fairly draconian program.

Now, even the ranchers who want to do the right thing are staring straight down the twin barrels of expensive environmental studies.

The pushback has been enormous, and we’re left to wonder why Fish & Game let this one go for so long.

After all, the salmon up here are truly teetering on the brink – and drying up the rivers (as almost happened last year) is the equivalent of a good shove.

In truth, the political pressure on the issue in Siskiyou County is immense – and it’s not supportive of salmon or steelhead restoration.

Talking to North County political types is one long, head-banging lesson in idealogical thinking: “The salmon are gone anyway,” is a statement you’ll hear over and over.

Not yet, but if that thinking remains in place, soon.

See you in court, Tom Chandler.

The story – originally broken by North State water activist Felice Pace on his Klamblog site – made it clear that flows had fallen so low, that salmon and steelhead populations simply weren’t going to survive.

Pace noted that the federal government has an adjudicated water right that it seemed unwilling to exercise, and that unlimited groundwater pumping was a big part of the problem.

Now the story’s made it to the pages of the San Francisco Chronicle, which offers up a fairly grim prognosis:

“Large areas of the (Scott) River have gone completely dry, stranding endangered coho salmon as well as chinook and steelhead in shallow, disconnected pools of water,” said Greg King, president of the nonprofit Siskiyou Land Conservancy, which has fought to protect the salmon runs in the Klamath River system.

“This could be the year that causes the coho to go extinct if they can’t get upstream in the Scott and Shasta.”

You can read the entire article here: Key salmon spawning rivers all but dry.

This whole mess isn’t simply the result of a three-year drought; excessive surface water diversions are a long-time problem, and the overharvesting of groundwater is a major factor in low stream flows.

Farmers and ranchers – trying to increase their harvest of often-marginal crops like alfalfa – have been increasingly turning to unregulated groundwater pumping to do so.

Low Flows Not the Whole Problem

The loss of some of the Klamath Basin’s best salmon and steelhead spawning habitat is only part of the problem.

The Scott and Shasta contribute badly needed cold water to the Klamath River, which suffers from high water temperatures and poor water quality – due in large part to the four Klamath River dams.

Remarkably, the Siskiyou County Board of Supervisors are fighting hard to retain the Klamath River dams and resisting any attempt to leave water in the rivers, in many cases suggesting the dams are actually helping salmon populations – despite the fact that the waters flow pea-soup green below the lowest dams in summer (the result of a toxic algae bloom).

In fact, a commonly heard refrain in Northern Siskiyou County is that “the salmon are gone anyway,” so no measures need to be taken.

In a political environment like that, it’s hard to imagine we’ll be reading too much good news about salmon and steelhead anytime soon.

See you on the non-existent Scott and Shasta Rivers, Tom Chandler.

And while the idea is an interesting one, actual implementation faces a lot of hurdles – not the least of which is the 602′ high Shasta Dam. In fact, transporting fish over the dam and then back down (of the two, back down might be harder) could relegate this project to has-been status – except that the fisheries people don’t see many alternatives.

Underground Fave water journalist Matt Weiser wrote this article about the project, where he notes the issues, but also pens several telling passages (both key passages bolded below):

Restoring fisheries above Folsom, Shasta dams faces high hurdles | Sacramento Bee

The Sacramento was the only river in western North America with four salmon runs. They numbered in the millions – so numerous that American Indians and settlers could catch a salmon dinner with their bare hands. Now one run is gone, and two are endangered. The fourth could join them soon.

Restoring a fragment of that spectacle to the Central Valley is the goal of rules proposed by the National Marine Fisheries Service. The service wants, among other things, restoration of winter- and spring-run salmon above Shasta Dam on the Sacramento River, and steelhead above Folsom Dam on the American River.

Combined, the fish transit order is considered the biggest of its kind in U.S. history.

…

“It’s pretty substantial, the amount of work that’s required,” said Mike Chotkowski, regional environmental officer at the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, which operates the dams. “We still haven’t even determined whether it’s feasible.”

The fisheries service says that without restoring access upstream, it’s likely the three fish species will go extinct. Climate change means it will be harder to maintain cold-water habitat below the dams, so they must have access to better habitat.

“The fish are at that jeopardy point where it’s important for us to take immediate steps,” said Howard Brown, Sacramento River basin chief for the fisheries service.

Wow. Frankly, this is an idea I hadn’t even heard proposed before, and now some consider it essential. Is it a desperate throw of the dice, or simply a recognition that the hatchery mitigation model has totally let us down, and that habitat destruction in the central valley is largely irreversible?

Some have already suggested it’s far most cost-effective to simply restore small creeks below the dams:

Rabe said 600 small creeks between Modesto and Redding also could be restored – at far less cost than fixing the big dams.

“Don’t
waste time and money on the dams. Spend it on the creeks,” he said.
“That would open literally thousands of miles of spawning, which would
make a huge, huge difference.”

Still – as we learned from the destruction-by-irrigator of Singlebarbed’s home waters – most of the Central Valley’s waterways are tied up by the West’s arcane water laws, and restoring cool, clean, sustainable flows to them might be even more involved than figuring out how to move fish around big dams.

In other words, it appears we’ve pumped all our easy options into oblivion, and all that’s left are the hard choices that nobody wants to make (so they probably won’t get made). 

See you on the dam, Tom Chandler.

salmon restoration, california salmon, california water wars, sacramento river salmon, shasta dam, matt weiser, upper sacramento river

(Dancing salmon featured at Oregon capital Washing DC when legislation was introduced by Save Our Wild Salmon)

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