On Tuesday, fishing regulators asked to close the commercial fishing of Salmon along the Coast of California for a third consecutive year unprecedented in an effort to help the decreasing population of Chinook Salmon to recover.
The Pacific Fisheries Management Council, an agency established by Congress that manages ocean fishing along the west coast, voted from 13 to 1 to highlight all commercial salmon fishing in California, a decision that is expected that the National Marine Fishing Service adopts in May.
As part of the vote, Hero in a meeting in San José, the Council asked to allow a limited recreational salmon fishing for the first time since 2022. The oceanic recreational fishing season will be limited to several light days and in the days, and autumn, and autumn, and autumn, and fall and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall. Autumn, and fall, and fall, and autumn, and autumn, and fall, and fall, and fall, fall, and autumn, and fall, fall, and fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, fall.
The suspension of fishing during the last two years has brought important income losses for those in the fishing industry, but some of the boat jumpers agree that the closure is needed to extend.
“We need to do everything possible to save the species,” said Kevin Butler, a commercial fisherman in Santa Cruz.
The commercial fisherman of Santa Cruz, Kevin Butler, continued fishing for Halibut and Lingcod, winning much less than capturing the salmon.
(Nic Coury / for times)
The fishing season generally extends from May to October, and in recent years the state’s commercial salmon fishing fleet has numbered around 460 vessels. But many owners of boats and crew members have recently resorted to other works to reach the end of the month. Some have put their ships for sale.
Butler said that the salmon previously represented about three quarters of his income. He has continued fishing for Halibut and Lingcod, winning much less.
“Each fisherman has sacrificed everything for two years,” Butler said. He said that for his account and for others, not being able to catch Salmon has meant “crazy financial difficulties, stressing his family’s relationships, everything.”
“If most of your income disappeared, what would you do? Are you going to look for a new race? Well, that is a difficult for fishermen. We have fish our whole life,” he said. “This is a life, this is a love.”
Althehe Severe Droought From 2020-22 Contribute to the decline, Those Who in Fisshing Also Blame California’s Water Managers and Police For The Low Salmon Numbers, Saying Too Much Water Has Been Pumicient To Farms Or Cities Rivers Or Cities, Depriving It Rivers, Depriving it Rivers Rivers or Cities, Rivers or Cities, Rivers, Rivers Rivers Or Cities, Rivers, Rivers Rivers Or Cities Rivers or Cities, Rivers or Cities, Rivers or Cities, Rivers or Rivers Cities or Cities, Rivers or Cities. Survive.
“It’s a problem of bad water management,” Butler said. Hey blamed the administration of Governor Gavin Newsom, saying that the State has prioritized water supplies for the agricultural industry of $ 59 billion to the detriment of salmon.
The fishing boats leave the port of Santa Cruz.
(Nic Coury / for times)
The biologist says that salmon populations have rejected a combination of factors that include dams, which have blocked spawning areas, loss of vital habitats of the flood plain and global warming, which are intense droughts and cause warmer temperatures.
Duration Severe drought 2020-22, the water flowing from the dams sometimes is heated so much that it was Lethal for salmon eggs. And because the salmon generally feeds on the ocean for approximately three years and then returns to its native streams, the decrease in the number of surviving youth fish lasted the drought left a reduced population of adult fish.
The state policy of pumping strongly from Rivers is “to kill entire salmon races, and is hitting workers’ men and women trying to make a living with fishing,” said Scott Artis, executive director of Golden State Salmon Fishings. “This season of commercial recreational fishing and closed chips is a human tragedy, as well as an economic and environmental disaster.”
He said that his group is asking that “a little cold water is left in our rivers for the baby’s salmon so that they can survive and return as adults.”
State officials said that, in addition to global and drought warming, salmon populations have been fighting because forest fires, bad conditions in rivers, algae flowers and problems of Thiamine deficiency In salmon linked to changes in its ocean diet.
“Salmon populations are still recovering from severe drought and other climatic challenges and have not yet benefited from our consecutive years of winters and other actions of actions to increase,” said Charlton “Chuck” Bonham, director of Calife. “After years of complete closure for salmon fishing, the limited recreational salmon fishing opportunity brings hope. However, we know that this news brings little relief for California commercial salmon fisheries.”
The coastal salmon fish was banned for two consecutive years once before, in 2008 and 2009. This is the first time that the shopping season was Canon for three years in a row.
He Pacific Fisheries Management Council He cited the last State estimates Showing the number of remos of the Fall of the Sacramento River river is still very low, with an estimate of 166,000 fish in the ocean this year of a pre -season estimate of 214000 last year, and similar to the estimate of 2023 of 169.
These figures represent a fall in the much greater number of salmon, in some years more than 1 million fish, which were on the Pacific coast of California in the early 2000s.
“It is another unequivocal sign that salmon is decreasing in California, along with many of the other native fish,” said Andrew Rypel, director of the Fishing School of the University of Auburn and former director of the UC Davis Center for Sciences of the Basin. “It is really very sad. I think it is an indicator of how we have achieved the resource about time and that we are failing in salmon.”
The closure of the fishing has affected not only the commercial fishing fleet but also to the charter fishing ships that could not fish for salmon in 2023 and 2024. According to the decision of the council, recreational fishermen will be allowed Limited oceanic fishing under installments administered by the State In two windows in summer and autumn, the first of which will open from June 7 to 8 and allows up to 7000 salmon to be Caht.
State regulators also establish rules for interior recreational fishing in the rivers, and the California Fishing and Hunting Commission will decide this year’s season at meetings of this month and May.
Before the closure, Jared Davis used to earn a large part of his income leading sport fishing outside Sausalito in his 56 -foot salt lady. Latin, has resorted to other types of cruises, leading whale observation tours and holding burials of ashes at sea.
“It hurts that salmon fishing has closed. It definitely hurts,” Davis said. “I just made my taxes and my Deckhand did more than about these last two years.”
He said he supports planned regulations, which he sees as a conservative approach to help the population recover.
The fishing industry depends on Chinook, which migrates upstream to generate from July to December.
Other salmon races have Suffered more serious decreases. Spring Chinok are listed as threatened under the law of endangered species, and Winter Chinook They are in danger.
The pattern that has emerged in successive Drooughs is a long -term decrease, “staircase”, in which salmon and other species suffer a fall during the dry years and then they are going more humid, Dangjers Dangbes Don said that Don.
Because the fish have a three -year life cycle, the population should improve a little next year about the impulse that received the historical winter of 2023, Rypel said, but in the long term, the fish are still still.
The changes that would help salmon include having larger flows in the rivers in the right times to support fish and open more flood plain habitats to support their recovery, Rypel said.
For decades, the hatcheries administered by the Government in the Central Valley have raised and released millions of salmon every year to help increase their numbers.
State officials say that Newsom administrations Act the efforts to help Salmon populations recover include Marea Habitats RestorationModernize the infrastructure, eliminate the barriers that hinder fish migration and reintroduce salmon in the traditional spawning areas upstream of the dams.
The crab pots sit in the port of Santa Cruz.
(Nic Coury / for times)
Despite these efforts, the situation facing California salmon is still so serious, Rypel said, that agencies should take risks to prevent fish from suffering even greater decreases.
“It’s a great emergency,” he said. “We need to try great things at this time, great experiments.”
Rypel said he feels for people whose livelihoods have turned to fishing closures.
“It is always a California lifestyle, and it is in danger,” he said.
