The black hole of steelhead report card data

[Steve S]

I recently inquired with CADFW about access to steelhead report card data for the past 3 years. I was seeking daily or weekly data for a few coastal rivers in California for the past few years so that I could look at run timing and maybe compare it to historical flow data from the CDEC. Some data is available in CADFW legislative reports on the CADFW website, but these are often out of date and much of the data has already been transformed to illustrate a certain administrative point rather than being provided in a raw format.

Well apparently it is a major pain in the ass to query the data or to provide much resolution. I take this to mean that the database used to store the data is probably an in-house system and cumbersome to query and that the personnel available to maintain and search the database are limited, or perhaps even number as few as one.

Anyway here is what I received. The 2020 data was not available at the time of my query.
I'm grateful for what I received, but disappointed that the access to this information by the public, like so much information collected by CADFW, is so limited.