Council eyes Calif., Oregon, Wash. salmon changes
Samantha YoungCalifornia salmon fishermen may not get much, if any, time on the ocean this year, while their counterparts in Washington and Oregon would fare better because salmon are more abundant there, under recommendations expected Thursday.
The Pacific Fishery Management Council plans to issue three proposals outlining where commercial and recreational fishermen along the West Coast might be allowed to cast lines and nets, and how much salmon they can catch.
More chinook salmon are expected to return to California's rivers to spawn. But concern about the precipitous decline of salmon in the rivers flowing from California's Central Valley into San Francisco Bay over the last three years threatens to shut down the fishery along the state's coastline for a third straight year.
"There's an option to close everything," said Chuck Tracy, head of the salmon section for the Portland, Ore.-based management council. "The other two options involve some level of fishing."
The council will make a final decision about fishing guidelines during its April 14 meeting in Portland.
The issue is important from an economic standpoint because West Coast fishermen last year had their second worst year on record, largely because of the closure of the salmon season in California.
Even so, commercial and recreational salmon fishing contributed $17 million to the West Coast economy in 2009, according to the council. Congress has allocated $170 million in disaster relief the last two years to help fishing communities in California, Oregon and Washington hurt by the losses.
Limited fishing might be allowed off the California coast because federal biologists have predicted more salmon will return this fall to Central Valley streams.
The decision expected Thursday will affect the fall-run chinook salmon in California and salmon runs in Oregon and Washington. California's fall-run chinook are the most abundant of the salmon species that return to the Central Valley river systems, migrating upstream from July through December. The species accounts for much of the salmon caught off the Oregon and California coasts.
Early estimates indicate that more fall-run chinook could return this year to the Sacramento River and its tributaries, an estimated 245,000. That would be higher than the last three years and above federal conservation goals designed to protect the species.
Last year, just 39,500 returned, a record low.
California's commercial fishermen have been hit especially hard by the closed salmon seasons the last two years, relying on federal emergency aid to keep them afloat.
"It's been hard on our finances. It's been murder on our savings. It's been tough on my marriage and hard on the boat," said Duncan MacLean, a commercial fisherman based in Half Moon Bay.
Recreational salmon fishermen such as Ben Sleeter, who lives south of San Francisco in El Granada, also hopes the council will allow some fishing. While Sleeter was not happy to sit out the last two seasons, he said he supported the council's decision. Now that more fish are projected to return to the Sacramento and San Joaquin river systems, he thinks fishing should be restored.
"There is a harvestable surplus of fish," Sleeter said. "We have a very good process to manage these fish."
Complicating the council's task is skepticism that the salmon predictions for the Sacramento River are too optimistic.
The California Department of Fish and Game has suggested the council consider canceling the salmon season for a third year because salmon estimates have been off in recent years. Last year, for example, the council predicted 122,000 chinook would return to the river, when only a third of that number actually did.
Despite the problems in the fishery, members of the 14-member fishery council do not blame the salmon's decline entirely on overfishing.
Fishermen and federal wildlife officials also point to the massive state and federal pumps in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta that send water to Southern California, Bay area communities and Central Valley farms. Others cite changing ocean conditions, perhaps caused by global warming, as another possible factor.