What happened to our Stripers in the Delta? or on the West Coast?

Here is a post from Dan Blanton's Forum by Captain Mike Costello who is the Number One fly fishing Striper guide in our Delta:



Re: My striper perspective
[Bulletin Board]
Posted by Captain Mike Costello on 2021-12-01 21:51:30 in reply to My striper perspective posted by Frank S on 2021-12-01 09:43:58

"Over 26 years ago I was introduced to this incredible fishery, and during that time I have witnessed so many changes, from declining adult striper populations, a reduction in size, and a complete collapse of the bait population, specifically the Threadfin Shad. That being said, I still guide on this amazing watershed over 225 days a year, chasing stripers throughout the entire ecosystem and I am still fortunate to experience some amazing success.

Big number days of quality fish is still an everyday possibility and trophy fish can still be found cruising the depths of the California Delta. The big changes I have noticed is the lack of fish that populate the numerous HPS spots all of us fly anglers use to frequent. The behavior I have witnessed with the Delta stripers of today is they are constantly on the move searching for food, optimizing their feeding window in correlation with tidal flows. The days of finding a huge school in the back of a dead end slough and fishing for them for a month is probably a thing of the past but shoals and weed edges adjacent to deep water is still very productive. One of the biggest changes effecting the Delta is the lack of the smaller pelagic baitfish. My personal belief is the excessive weed eradication that went in to warp speed after 2011, with spraying and pellets being deployed almost year around cannot be healthy for the watershed. The food source for Delta stripers has transformed from schools of Threadfin Shad to the abundance of crayfish that thrive in the rock levees and weed beds throughout the miles of waterways.

I still believe this fishery can provide fly anglers with some incredible angling opportunities, rivaling anywhere in the world. In the 2020 calendar year, my clients broke our all time record for stripers over 18 inches, landing 3501 hard tugging fish, and just this year we landed our fifth striper on a fly over 40lbs, when client Anthony Iaccarino tamed a beautiful 42lb specimen. Yes Delta striper fishing has gone through some changes the past three decades but it still remains my favorite place to fish day in and day out! Fish Hard!"

In the last 20 years we lost the food fish from the Delta and Bays from the spraying to control the vegetation.............Threadfin Shad,

Asian Pond Smelt, Anchovies, Sardines, Herring, Split tails and ???? Mike says that the crayfish population is still good. He says the big

schools of baitfish do not exist anymore so the Stripers are always on the move looking for a meal.


The Stripers use to feed on small salmon and small Steelhead in the Valley rivers but those numbers are down too.

March can be a good month in the Delta for Stripers.

There used to be a big Striper population off the beaches in the ocean too. My buddy who just turned 83 has told me stories of huge schools of large stripers roaming the beaches. He had some pictures of some monsters too! I guess the loss of the herring population had something to do with that. I remember when there would just be clouds of milt from the herring spawn in the bay. I also remember being in the ocean outside the gate and seeing huge schools of mackerel don't see that much anymore either.