Posts tagged: siskiyou county

Scott, Shasta Rivers All But Dry, Finally Receiving National Attention

September 13, 2009, by Tom Chandler 8 comments

Recently, we reported on the destructively low flows plauging the Scott and Shasta Rivers.

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.

Why Exactly Are the Scott & Shasta Rivers Being Dewatered – And Why Isn’t CA Fish & Game Doing Anything About It??

August 17, 2009, by Tom Chandler 6 comments

In 1980, a water adjudication on the Scott River awarded the US Forest Service minimum flows to protect salmon and steelhead. In August, those flows are supposed to be 40cfs, but – as Felice Pace at the Klamblog discovered via an unnamed whistleblower – the Scott River is way, way below those minimum flows.

In fact, both the Scott and Shasta Rivers are almost wholly dewatered – and this despite the fact they’re populated by endangered Coho salmon.

Making matters worse is California Fish & Game’s willingness to look the other way as Siskiyou County ranchers and agriculture hammer salmon populations – even after those same populations were listed and (supposedly) received federal protection.

It’s one more example of Siskiyou County’s crazy inbred politics, where extreme ideology serves as a substitute for facts, science and (dare we say it) reality.

This lengthy excerpt is from Pace’s Klamblog post on the Scott & Shasta’s flows, though the whole post is worthwhile reading for any taxpayer who wonders what current stupidity is going to require salvaging in the near future – at the cost his or her tax dollars:

The Shasta and Scott are spawning grounds for most of the Fall Chinook produced in the Upper Klamath River watershed; the Scott has the most Coho. If spawners do not reach their natal streams, Klamath River salmon production will be low and the impact on tribal, commercial and sport fishing – and related economic activity – will be great.

Here is flow data for the Shasta from the US Geological Service ~

* Early on October 11th Shasta River flow declined to nearly 6 cubic feel per second. The flow then became too low to measure for several hours. http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/uv?site_no=11517500

* The minimum daily flow recorded during the 2008 water year was 14 cfs.

* The lowest minimum mean flow during August for the period of record (1934-2008) was 8.35 in 1939.

From this data we conclude ~

THE SHASTA RIVER CURRENTLY IS EXPERIENCING THE LOWEST RECORDED FLOW DURING AUGUST SINCE FLOW RECORDING BEGAN IN 1934!

Precipitation at Yreka in the Shasta River Valley during 2008 was 77% of long-term mean annual precipitation. This is a dry year but not a drought.

The flow situation in the Scott is just as bad or worse ~

* On August 14th flow at the Scott River gauge operated by the USGS was less than 2 cubic feet per second (cfs).

* The lowest mean flow for the period of record during August was 5.52 cfs in 2002. The lowest daily mean flow in August was 3.4 cfs also in 2001.

From this information KlamBlog concludes ~

THE SCOTT RIVER CURRENTLY IS EXPERIENCING THE LOWEST RECORDED FLOW DURING AUGUST SINCE FLOW RECORDING BEGAN!

The rest of Pace’s article makes for interesting reading – especially when he notes that Fish & Game and other agencies are spending $500,000 to fund “improvements” for diversions (screening a diversion), but nothing is being done about flows.

That sounds about right given the backwards politics of the area. You don’t have to scientist to know that salmon and steelhead need something to survive, and it’s wet.

All the “diversion improvements” in the world – which could easily be construed as another giveaway to ag interests – won’t matter one bit if the water’s gone.

It’s the Barbarian Hordes Against Us, And They Might Be Winning ($35)

March 27, 2009, by Tom Chandler 6 comments

CalTrout remains an Underground Fave, in part because their local office (here in Mount Shasta) continues to fight the good fight on a lot of fronts – including the Klamath, McCloud River Dam Relicensing, multinational predator Nestle in McCloud and a host of others.

Given the stone-age perspective of Siskiyou County’s Board of Supervisors, it’s clear we need the help.

At a recent meeting, Supervisor Jim Cook astonishingly said “This is the first time I’ve seen anything that CalTRout has been involved with that wasn’t a piece of crap,” while Wise Use Cartoon Character (from way back) Supervisor Marcia Armstrong asserted that “fishing is no longer a vital activity in the county.”

Cook even suggested the Shasta River (major spawning tributary of the Klamath) simply wasn’t a good salmon river when he said “…the stream channel is not what you normally see in salmon areas.”

Jim “I’m not a biologist, but I’ll pretend” Cook is completely wrong, of course – every biologist who knows the Shasta River practically wets their pants explaining why it’s perhaps the most productive trib on the whole Klamath River.

Good call, Jim.

As you can see, the mess up here is considerable. At times it’s even despressing, especially given that the quotes you read above are not fictional – and that the people issuing them are using public funds to foul our own own nest.

It’s galling to think my property tax dollars are fighting salmon recovery on the Klamath – and this despite the economic boon a healthy fishery would bring to this county, which is suffering an 18% unemployment rate.

After all, we put a little water back in the Trinity and now the flood of steelhead fishermen means you can’t park your car there most weekends.

And the Lower Sac sees somewhere between 4000-6000 boat trips annually – the cumulative economic affect of which is considerable.

Meanwhile, the salmon on the Klamath are dieing in droves, and scientists aren’t even sure why, though it’s pretty clear the Klamath’s atrocious water quality is playing a role.

My close friends know the Klamath River/Nestle/Shasta Dam stuff alternately works me up and knocks me back – a fact exacerbated by this reality: there’s only a few of us, and a lot of them, and the “bad guys” all seem to be getting paid.

It’s as if the barbarian hordes were fulltime professionals, while the guys charged with defending Rome buckled on the old broadsword only after working a hard shift in the catacombs.

With that as a backdrop, you’d think CalTrout wouldn’t want to bite off any more regional office goodness, but they’re slow learners (thank goodness), and they just announced the opening of a field office in the Tahoe area.

That’s good because – when it comes to fishery issues – nothing really beats a “boots on the ground” presence (though we wonder why Tahoe gets a babe for a regional rep, while here in Shasta we’re stuck with some skinny guy).

I imagine the recession is playing havoc with CalTrout’s budgets, and while I’m all for the Undergrounders becoming members of the organization (it’s $35 for chrissakes), it would be a lot better if some undeserving AIG bonus baby threw a couple hundred thousand at the organization instead.

Of course, that’s about as likely as an Undergrounder throwing away a Victoria’s Secret catalog without a peek, so in truth, I guess I am suggesting the Undergrounders throw down for a yearly CalTrout membership (nothing’s changed from the previous sentence: it’s still $35 for chrissakes).

Somebody’s got to beat back the Barbarian Hordes, and while it doesn’t have to be CalTrout ($35), there’s probably somebody in your neck of the woods beating back the barbarians, so consider joining them.

Clearly, this is all getting to me, so after I write this, I’m going to get up, walk out of my dungeon office, and shoot a few paper targets (which is calming and a little zen – nobody hits the 10 ring in a frazzled state of mind).

The Upper Sacramento’s falling slowly, so even though it’s probably not fishing great, I expect I’ll find out for myself this weekend.

See you fighting the barbarians, Tom Chandler.

siskiyou county, salmon, klamath river, caltrout