Highway 20 access on the lower Yuba river.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

"All,

Sending this information out as a frustrated angler. Our access to the Lower Yuba River in Smartsville, CA is again being challenged by an additional gate on the north bank of the Hwy-20 Bridge. Sending this to you all as general information. Hopefully it can find a way into the hands of someone who can help, or at a minimum explain to the public what has happened.

From what I can tell from the public records, the road where the gate was placed is a public road and owned by Yuba County. No record is returned on the county record search page, which is typically an indication of County/Gov't Ownership. However, it appears in February 2024, APN-006-180-062-00 was purchased. This parcel cuts off access to the high water mark between the river and the aforementioned county road. I do not have access to ArcGIS to present a better map, so please see the attached links for reference.

Simply yelling into the void as the Lower Yuba is becoming accessible only to those with private property access and/or a membership to the private fly fishing club. This gate coupled with the County's closure of Hammonton Road is a definite blow to the walk and wade angler for this section of great water.

Tyler Thomas"

[Rossflyguy]

Only takes a few to ruin it for everyone else.

[mogaru]

sometimes the answer is ........who benefits from all these closures?. There Truckee river was first and now the Yuba. Pretty soon the rivers will be divided in "beats" and we will be paying for the right to fish that section of the river.

[yubaman]

On the positive side, there is an organized group by the name of Truckee River Public Water that has been formed, and is a 501c3 group. They are happily accepting donations to fund the cause. Thus far, they have succeeded in establishing a dialogue, as well as public meetings with all appropriate stakeholders. They have been successful in having Nevada County, stake off the actual public area of the river and roadway around Hirshdale. The landowner has been forced to remove several boulders he had placed in areas which were actually on public land! Much more work is now being done in defining the real, actual mean high watermark, etc.. Guide Matt Kole's has bee very visible and involved with this group.

The individual who has bought the land around Hirshdale is Randall Mezger. Much of what he has done is within his legal right as landowner. Some is not, and he has been very aggressive in enforcing what he sees as his legal right. Randall is a contractor and Truckee resident. If you do not believe in his stance, maybe you never hire him for any work!

[yubaman]

Mogaru,

And to your point about fishing beats, as I understand it on the Yuba, there are now 3 fishing “clubs” up there where you pay to play for fishing above the HWY 20 bridge. So to your point, that is very much what is happening up there. There has been a ton of conversation and speculation about what has happened with the gate that has been installed on Parks Bar Road,blocking the former fishing access site. The unfortunate reality is probably until an individual ponies up some $ to employ a real estate attorney to clarify the legality of what has occurred up there, nothing changes IMHO.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

On the Lower Yuba River during the drought of the 1970s, Joe Paterson (Cortland Rep) and Wally Westlake (Pro baseball)

discovered good insect hatches during the low flows of winter and early spring with wild trout and wild steelhead feeding on top.


Joe Patterson told us, at my fly shop, about their discovery of this fishery. Normal winters and springs on the Yuba were higher when

all this was going on. This was about 50 years ago and we all started fishing there with little or no knowledge. We could drive into the

Yuba Gold Fields for $2.00, park and hike upstream towards the Hwy 20 bridge. Al Perryman and Ed Letrell had been going up there

and catching trout and winter steelhead on large dry flies that imitated the Skwala stone flies.

_______________________________________

You can imagine how easy it was, 50 years ago, to get into fly fishing. Back then, we almost always caught fish.

_______________________________________

Some good fly fishers of the 'Great Generation' founded the 'California Fly Fishers Unlimited' in the 1960s, which was an important part

of getting fly fishing going, in and around Sacramento, California. They influenced us younger 'Baby Boomers' and even took us

fishing on monthly, weekend, club outings.


.

[amoeba]

"All,

Sending this information out as a frustrated angler. Our access to the Lower Yuba River in Smartsville, CA is again being challenged by an additional gate on the north bank of the Hwy-20 Bridge. Sending this to you all as general information. Hopefully it can find a way into the hands of someone who can help, or at a minimum explain to the public what has happened.

From what I can tell from the public records, the road where the gate was placed is a public road and owned by Yuba County. No record is returned on the county record search page, which is typically an indication of County/Gov't Ownership. However, it appears in February 2024, APN-006-180-062-00 was purchased. This parcel cuts off access to the high water mark between the river and the aforementioned county road. I do not have access to ArcGIS to present a better map, so please see the attached links for reference.

Simply yelling into the void as the Lower Yuba is becoming accessible only to those with private property access and/or a membership to the private fly fishing club. This gate coupled with the County's closure of Hammonton Road is a definite blow to the walk and wade angler for this section of great water.

Tyler Thomas
916.813.1908"

That is illegal. Walk around it. The sheriff will not enforce it and the State and County will cite whoever put it up and require it be taken down. Please report this to Sheriff and CDFW. If that is the road I think it is, and done by same owner of Nordic, he risks revocation of his permit (streamed alteration agreement).

[amoeba]

I just filed a complaint to the County including a link to this thread so my expectation is whoever did this will have to open it (as in immediately), remove the sign, and eventually take the gate out at their expense. Again (this has been done at least once before). The County and CDFW dealt with it and they were not pleased.

[amoeba]

Nordic Industries, if they did this, get's nearly all of their business from providing materials and services to the State and Federal governments various projects, including the American, Sacramento, and Napa Rivers recently. Their permits include those issued by CDFW. I have no idea what they could have been thinking if it was them who put it up, but they must have been involved because their vehicles travel through there continuously. This needs to be corrected at once.

[amoeba]

sometimes the answer is ........who benefits from all these closures?. There Truckee river was first and now the Yuba. Pretty soon the rivers will be divided in "beats" and we will be paying for the right to fish that section of the river.

Hopefully, fishermen in this case; and not whoever put this gate up.