Just curious...
"Stripers have done more harm to the delta ecosystem than just about any other introduced species."
Please gime us some facts... not theories. We've heard plenty of those from DFG.
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Just curious...
"Stripers have done more harm to the delta ecosystem than just about any other introduced species."
Please gime us some facts... not theories. We've heard plenty of those from DFG.
This was posted on another forum...
http://goldengatesalmonassociation.c...GGSA-Final.pdf
Tracy,.... I can't really cite a bunch of scientific facts on this topic. However, I don't think the statement is supportable without a comparable analysis of the relationship/role that each introduced species in the Delta has to each other and the ecosystem as a whole. That's probably not possible under current circumstances within this state. No money.
The DFG Invasive Species Program has a lot of info available but not all of it is at their fingertips. According to everything I've been reading, non-native, invasive species of all types are being introduced daily thru a variety of sources (foreign/domestic). We probably aren't even aware of all of them at any given time.
Forgive me for stating the obvious.... We do know that Stripers are top of the line predators, anadromous that they are fecund and resilient with big appetites. Plus, their taste in food has a wide range of other species, including some that're protected. They're a great gamefish and they probably exert some control over other predators. They taste good when cooked in your favorite recipe. They have great economic value to recreational fisherman and related economies.... :D
I was hoping Bob would take a crack a backing-up his own quote.
Tracy
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tracy Chimenti
We don't have anywhere near a complete picture of what the Delta ecosystem was like before Stripers were introduced so its impossible to answer your question without theorizing.
Safe to say they are very hungry fish, they exist in great numbers, and if they have not had a huge impact on the Delta ecosystem its probably the only time in recorded history that man has messed with nature to such a degree and not screwed it up.
"Harm" is a relative term. To a sports fisherman, Stripers are harmless if Salmon and Steelhead runs remain healthy...you said as much yourself on the other thread.
Suffice to say, Stripers have had more impact on the delta ecosystem than any other introduced species...wether that impact constitutes "harm" will ultimately be in the eye of the beholder.
No doubt they eat salmon and steelhead.
But the commercial and sport salmon interests have recently wrote a letter to the commission expressing their belief that the threat is negligable. They know where the principal threat exists and expressed in in their letter.
I say add on Bass Angler's Sportsmans' Society to the mix of stakeholders... if exotics are such a threat. Without stripers in the delta, largemouth bass are likely to increase exponentially and could create even greater harm to native fish.
Oh... that's a multi-billion-dollar industry with a massive, well engrained following... IN OTHER WORDS, UNTOUCHABLE!
Of course the primary threat to juvenile fish is pumping and a reverse flow in the delta that pushes the smolts towards the waiting Stripers. If you fish for Delta Stripers you know where they hang and wait for the food to come their way. That is not in dispute.
But the fact remains that if the pumps were turned off permanently and water flowed through the delta naturally east to west, the Stripers would still be eating juvenile salmon and steelhead, perhaps not to the same degree, but they'd still be eating.
All of this begs an even larger question. The construction of thousands of miles of delta levees and flood protection measures have boxed in the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers in a very unnatural way. Before we built the Delta that whole area spent almost half the year submerged in Sierra runoff, as did large parts of the central valley. These flooded areas were the nurseries for hundreds of millions of juvenile fish and we destroyed them. If we are talking about restoring native fish stocks and the original ecosystem of the delta, we should be talking about levee removal, not levee protection.
Just a thought.
Bob, I think the primary threat is the(1) pumps themselves, then the (2) combination of pumps and exotic game fish.
It's eery how much this system of dual conveyance will cost, especially when it doesn't work to rebuild salmon and steelhead, and so would begin the expensive mitigation options to limit saltwater intrusion that will only further alter the ecology of the system-- this aside from policies. Granted-- more water, possibly twice the flow eventually.
In the end, wouldn't it be just a simple if we reduced the massive ag export complex
(Westlands)? We would then have farmers on good dirt, and I'd have salmon, steelhead and stripers to fish for. Simple!
I know taking out the farms and returning the islands to marshes is high on the nature Conservancy's opinion, but I really think they realize they can't fight the big exporters. They might as well "give in" and optimize what's left. Their staff receives funding for such opinions.
One fact with regard to what Tracy's quoted above is that it as an absolutely false statement, periodQuote:
Originally Posted by Tracy Chimenti
A second fact is that with the listing of several runs of salmonids in 1991 or 92 DFG stopped all artificial "enhancement" of striped bass (no more planting of hatchery stripers) due to the concerns over listed species.
During the mid to late 1990s, DFG spent the better part of 5 years, in concert with the National Marine Fisheries Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and DFG salmon experts, developing an extensive, more than 200-page, Conservation Plan for the Department of Fish and Game's Striped Bass Management Program to satisfy incidental take (primarily predation by striped bass on listed species) requirements of Section 10 of the Federal Endangered Species Act. Analysis for this Conservation Plan indicated that predation by striped bass on listed species was not a significant source of their mortality. The DFG was then given a Sec.10 "incidental take permit" to resume stocking of hatchery fish which they did in 2000 and partially did in 2001. There were "population limit restrictions" built in to incidental the take permit.
When the 1998 striped bass abundance report came out in 2000, the estimated population of adult striped bass exceeded the terms of the permit. The Feds then pulled the permit but in the meantime, the Striped Bass Stamp Committee had authorized buying more fingerlings and DFG bought another million striper fingerlings prior to the Feds pulling of the Sec. 10 permit. Push came to shove and the Feds finally allowed an additional planting of 750,000 of the already purchased fingerlings in 2001. Permission was then granted to net pen raise the other 250,000 fingerlings in O'neil Forebay for later distribution in San Louis Reservoir, Millerton Lake and Lake Mendocino. None have been planted since.
Another fact, is that during the hearings on the Coalition for a Sustainable Delta's (CSD) lawsuit filed against DFG for not having a Sec. 10 "take" permit for the Fish and Game Code regulation of striped bass populations, Judge Wanger ruled against the CSD in his dismissal of their request for a Summary Judgment in their favor. The reason he ruled against them is that
they did not prove their case. The reason the couldn't prove their case is the exact same reason the Fed issued an incidental take permit the DFG to allow stocking to resume. There is no credible science that demonstrates that striped bass predation has any effect on population levels of listed species.
That's about all I have to say on the subject until after the F&G Commission hearing on the 2nd of Feb.
Mike
But Tracy even if you reduce the ag demand to a trickle, if you chop down all the nut trees and plow under all the cotton and rice, you'll still have 22 million people dependent on drinking water that flows through the very vulnerable delta. Forget ag for a moment and focus on people. If the delta fails you'll have a human disaster. For this reason alone, nothing to do with ag needs or demands, we need a safe water conveyance system around the delta.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tracy Chimenti
Mike,
An ecosystem is much bigger and more complex than the listed species list. If the jsry is still out on Striper impact on salmon or steelhead smolt, I have no issue with that and am happy to wait and see difinitive research.
But you can't argue that introducing millions of completely alien apex predators into an ecosystem does not have a huge harmful impact to that system. The Striper population consumes huge amounts of biomass, shrimp, fish, scud, and other species. They are voracious feeders and have altered the original delta ecosystem in ways we will never know or understand.
Just because there's no brightline connection between Stripers and predation on other sports fish does not mean that they aren't causing harm all over the food chain and to species we don't care much about. Like I said earlier, "harm" is in the eye of the beholder. If the fishing is good, fishermen see no harm caused.
Bob, here's a couple of thoughts...There are several geologists who will argue the conception of massive levee failures in the Delta, if as you posted in another place, it was the result of a " cataclysmic event" we would have far more to worry about than water.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bob Loblaw
The fact is, that the whole issue is not about water for people south of the Delta, it's about wrangling to privatize ownership of a public trust resource and selling water bought with subsidized rates at Market rates. If it were truly about water for people, I would agree with your premise that a Delta By-pass facility should be built and every fisheries biologist would also agree.
Again, if were truly about water for people then build the canal or tunnel as it might be but build it so that there could be NO MORE than 5000 cfs pumped through it. That would be plenty of water for the folks and enough for most agriculture (the real family farmers) What shows the "project" up as nothing more than a water grab by the Kern Water Bank for private gain is the blind insistence that it be built with 15,000 cfs capacity and then trust them to operate it in a fish friendly fashion.....Yeah! Like that would ever happen!
Mike
Mike,
I agree with you 100%. This is not just about water and never has been. Water and water rights in California are as valuable as gold bullion and if you have enough political clout you can raid the commons, sieze the water, move it to your dry patch of dirt and create gold bars out of dry dust.
Subsidies are at the core of the problem. If people had to pay fair market value for the water that the taxpayer stores and moves around at great expense, we'd see a whole new attitude to it as a resource.
We need to completely blow up the system of inherited waterr rights and water economics in California. Water that is collected in public watersheds behind taxpayer funded dams and moved around in public conveyance systems, is public property. It belongs to you and me not some Westlands farmer because he has a 130 year old deed that his great grand pappy won in a saloon poker game. If farmers want our water we ought to set the price or auction it. You'd see rice disappear overnight if a policy like that was instituted.
If you look back at one of my previous posts, I made the case that you are making right now. This should not be a debate about whether or not we need a peripheral conveyance, rather it should be about the capacity of that conveyance and whose hand controls the valve.
If we reduce consumer demand and reduce ag demand by regulating what farmers can grow and prohibit flood irrigation, those two steps alone would mean that the peripheral canal would be a small one...at least much smaller than the one currently proposed.
The best way to skin this cat is by reducing overall demand, not by fighting over how water is moved around the state.
I've been wondering about how the subject matter of our debate/discussion kept wandering around throughout three threads and always kinda drifted back to one or two points.... :confused: Then it dawned on me. "You don't need double talk, you need Bob Loblaw." :lol: (Google the name for the clarification/reference) Can you say distraction :?: :?:
Hey Mike--- That wasn't me that said the stripers are cuasing the problem. I'm on your side buddy. I love my stripers. I want more of them!
Bob-- Do we have 22-million down there now? If this is the case, that's 11-million a.feet. I think we have enough water if desal was included on a large scale. Build those facilities with the nuke plants to power them if necessary. Subisdize it. We can have great fisheries and a more natural environment.
Darian that's geat. I kept trying to remember why that name sounded so familiar.:lol:Quote:
Originally Posted by Darian
Ed
for not noticing that!
Tracy ...I wasn't quoting you...I was quoting your quote!Quote:
Originally Posted by Tracy Chimenti
Mike
Spoiled all the fun...:-({|=Quote:
Originally Posted by Darian
Mike