Most California trout and salmon at risk of extinction

[Editor]

Source: San Diego Union Tribune

Three quarters of California’s trout and salmon are at risk of extinction over the next century because of climate change, drought and other threats, a report by UC Davis and CalTrout warned Wednesday.

The report reviewed all 31 species of the state’s native trout, salmon and steelhead — together known as salmonid fish — and concluded that 23 of those are likely to disappear within 100 years. Of those, 14 species could go extinct within 50 years, the report stated.

Among the most imperiled is the Southern Steelhead, an ocean-going trout native to Southern California waterways, including several creeks and rivers in San Diego and Orange Counties. Others include commercially important salmon runs in Central and Northern California.

The potential loss could damage the state’s salmon fisheries and $7 billion inland sportfishing sector, and also herald broader environmental crises, said Curtis Knight, executive director of CalTrout.

“If you love fish, you love to go fishing, that’s a concern,” he said, but added, “These are more than just resident fish. Their health indicates the health of our waters, which are important for all Californians.”

The report, entitled “State of the Salmonids II; Fish in Hot Water,” built on a similar study of the fish conducted in 2008. It found that after the five-year drought and recent warming trend, their condition has deteriorated. The authors hope the report can serve as a starting point for conservation efforts that could include dam removal, protecting key rivers, improving fish habitat, and restoring springs and meadows that serve as water sources.

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[littledavid123]

What warming trend, didn't the government say the temps haven't changed for a number of years?

Dave

 

[GrtLksMarlin]

What warming trend, didn't the government say the temps haven't changed for a number of years?

I'm also the most handsome man in the world, worshipped for my fashion sense of no sandals, just hunting boots and a speedo.
Naturally if I still had my hat (McNerney! ), then I would likely be deified :shades:

B.E.F.

 

[darkshadow]

Hey, some may argue that the warming trends that occurred after the Pleistocene era is what gave us fishermen the many of the trout species we have today in our lakes and rivers.

You know, 'cycles' and stuff.



Nature giveth, nature taketh away, or something.

 

[0bie]

And the fact it took these organisms 15,000 years to evolve and two centuries to go extinct underscores the fact we're witnessing something other than "natural."

 

[yikes]

What warming trend, didn't the government say the temps haven't changed for a number of years?

Dave

When you click on CalTrout's website and then click on "+What are the findings?", one of their findings was this:

"Finally, the climate change scoring in this report has built upon recent work and a better understanding of the specific impact climate change is likely to have on each species, which led to a score reduction of the climate change factor in nearly all cases."

In other words, though the trend (towards endangerment or extinction) is not good, the cause is less attributable to climate change than previously thought.

 

[bgarner]

I suspect that California's population (and subsequent water consumption) more than doubling in the past 50 years has more to do with it than climate change.

NOAA says that the drought wasn't caused by climate change, but rather was a cyclical drought. With such a cyclical drought hitting at a time when California's population is so large, the effects were exacerbated.

 

[audax]

The report went a bit too far to push the [human-caused] climate change agenda.

In addition to fishing for inland trout, I've been fishing the coastal rivers for many years where the bulk of the listed salmonids return to spawn. Dams, water diversions for agriculture, irresponsible government forestry practices, suction dredging, over-harvesting, and the sometimes lame policies of CDFW are among the real reasons for the declines that we've witnessed. Yet, these get sidelined as "other threats."

The Klamath was once well-known for its huge numbers of halfpounders and one-salt fish. What happened to those numbers? What about the Eel? What about the Russian? These rivers once hosted massive runs whose numbers dwindled years ago. How does the climate change argument account for those losses.

Yet, the bull trout is the only total loss (thankfully). And that wasn't a casualty of human caused climate change either.

I also think the report tried to sensationalize the level of potential loss by counting each run of salmonid in each system/watershed as a separate species.

 

[littledavid123]

I'm also the most handsome man in the world, worshipped for my fashion sense of no sandals, just hunting boots and a speedo.
Naturally if I still had my hat (McNerney! ), then I would likely be deified :shades:

B.E.F.

I too, have the physique of a Greek god although my wife says I have my gods confused and look more like budda! :shades:

Dave

 

[moucheur2003]

Not only California. Everywhere.

 

[james w 3 3]

Not only California. Everywhere.

Not just trout and salmon. A plethora of species.
"The Sixth Extinction" not a feel good read. :icon_frow

 

[0bie]

No one's arguing dams, diversions, and other habitat/landscape issues are important threats to salmonid recovery, and the Cal Trout website (the folks who wrote the paper) list a whole host of initiatives from dam removal to fishing access creation, private-public habitat restoration partnerships, eliminating barriers at road crossing culverts, and environmental flow, water quality, and biology studies they're directly involved with. Far from sidelining these "other threats," every indication is Cal Trout is seriously involved with addressing them.

But you can't dynamite your way to a colder stream and you can't fence your way into a predictable drought pattern. A trout can only retreat so far up a mountain before the mountain stops, and while climate change may not be the most immediate threat for some salmonid populations, it's the most ubiquitous threat among them- that's what Cal Trout is saying. Bull trout may not have been extirpated from California because of global warming, but there's no viable long-term plan to reintroduce them, either- in large part, because of global warming.

What is the Klamath without its unique salmonid populations? Or the Eel? Or the Russian? No one knows, it's never happened as long as we've walked the earth. Those systems evolved with salmonids, and we're only beginning to understand how nutrients adult salmon bring from the sea feed trees, bugs, and bears in the Pacific Northwest. It's easy to engage the public to protect pristine streams. Unique streams. By letting these salmonid populations blink out we turn these systems from the last bastion of an entire species (or stock) into just another stream that used to hold trout, devoid of its most iconic species, a little bit more like everywhere else. More pragmatically, protecting or boosting salmonid populations are the incentive for innumerable water quality and conservation projects. Eliminate trout, and you eliminate the incentive to keep livestock out of streams or reduce logging in the riparian zone- and that has consequences for all water users.

Past generations decimated salmonid populations, and that's bad- but to their credit, they had the forethought to stop themselves. Salmon runs were reduced from millions to hundreds, but we're the ones eliminating them wholesale. Any chance of restoring those runs requires protecting the last few fish instead of looking the other way. If we choose the latter, let's at acknowledge it's a decision future anglers can never undo. We've tied their hands without fully understanding the ecological, economic, and recreational consequences of our actions.

 

[Ard]

I won't touch the climate change issue but am fairly well acquainted with this topic. From California all the way up to South East AK. there are problems.

This book is not new but by reading it you can at least get caught up a little.



I met Bob Lacky a few years back at a salmon symposium where he was Key Note, his presentation was taken from the book so I got a copy of the book. If you look him up you'll see that he is pretty much a pure researcher, no agenda just findings. The book isn't about climate change.

 

[bgarner]

If you read the actual report that the news story is based on, nowhere are current salmonid population decreases blamed on climate change.

The report actually says climate change is "likely to" produce future reductions in populations.

That phrase, "likely to", is used over and over again in the report, and that may be accurate. But it doesn't say current and past reductions are due to climate change.

 

[Bigfly]

Normally the cycles take a few thousand years.....
When the last 300 have blown the doors off the warming curve..
But we don't want to consider another approach do we?
It's not surprising science doesn't appeal....when it explains what we don't want to hear..

Jim

 

[bgarner]

No they don't.

California drought: Past dry periods have lasted more than 200 years, scientists say – The Mercury News

If the Smithsonian is to be believed the dams, agriculture, and damage to the estuaries has hurt the salmon population in California so bad in the past 30 years that if they continue at this rate there won't be any fish left for climate change to hurt.

 

[yikes]

Bull trout may not have been extirpated from California because of global warming, but there's no viable long-term plan to reintroduce them, either- in large part, because of global warming.

0bie, I'm not sure I understand what you are saying above.

Are you saying that there are no plans to re-introduce bull trout because everyone has thrown up their hands and said to each other, "why bother to try, the warmer climate will kill them off anyway?" Or is it something else?

 

[0bie]

I'm saying reintroducing bulls to California is a band-aid solution if the state's streams are too warm to support them by the end of the century. Stream restoration alone can be a decades-long project, bull trout are long-lived and mature at 4-5 years- any population you create may only persist a few generations.

California's always been at the edge of bull trout's native distribution. Many managers are moving from reintroducing those populations to protecting core habitats- the last best places where these fish persist, in hopes they'll be most resistant to climate change. They've disappeared from California, but they can still find refuge in other streams throughout the west. Golden trout, Paiute Cutthroat, and several other unique salmonids don't have that luxury- some are restricted to only a few dozen miles of stream.

 

[Bigfly]

Back in the 80s I reported on "mega droughts".
Nobody wanted to hear it back then, and they like it even less now.
I think its denial, or wishful thinking that always prevails.
The evidence is considered soft science..... tree rings, meadow deposition rates, archeologists best surmising.
We have had several 200-300 year droughts in the last 10.000 years.....
Remember that higher temps, are not the same as lower rain totals.
The Anasazi culture may have collapsed due to our last multi-decade drought, not a rise in temp.
A big part of evolution is the time frame involved....short extreme climatic events don't allow creatures to adapt. It's the luck of the draw...and the luck applies to humans too.
I can foresee a Paiute trout breeding program.....they have had time to adapt to warmer climes...I have heard their upper range of tolerance is 70 deg.
I'm not convinced that humans will be able to adapt in time either......we tend to believe things will always stay the same....

Jim

 

[0bie]

Maybe some could adapt to warmer climates- certainly not all, probably not most. But everything we know about western salmonids suggests they don't perform well in the face of human disturbance on the landscape. Knowing that, it seems unlikely adding another disturbance to the landscape would have a neutral, much less positive, result.

And you're not just turning the heat up on trout. Warm-water tolerance only confers a survival advantage if your stream doesn't dry up halfway through the growing season. Adults may be able to persist in deeper pools, but if their redds are in a now-dry riffle, it doesn't bode well for the species. If climate change alters fire or flood frequency, ash and sediment may smother spawning sites. If it alters the abundance of bugs and the timing of their emergence, you may be looking at less food during key parts of the growing season, or not enough food to maintain the same population size due to increased energetic needs at warmer water temperatures. And warmer temperatures open the door for invasive species that can out-compete native salmonids.

Climate change alters the entire ecosystem these critters live in, it's not as easy as looking at a single species' adaptations and making a judgement on whether it'll persist. We're pinning our hopes on the idea these salmonid populations are resilient and adaptable, that they'll just be able to ride it out. It's important for us to acknowledge if that were the case, they wouldn't be in the trouble they're already in. Our assumption doesn't entirely match what we see in the real world.

If the past is any predictor of the future, these species are not going to cope with the additional threats we pile onto their populations. They can only persist under certain environmental conditions. They don't have a choice. We do.