The California Fish and Game Commission deferred a decision to impose an emergency sturgeon spawning area closure during its meeting on February 2, citing the need to get more feedback from anglers.

The closure would run from March 1 through June 30 on the Sacramento River above Highway 12 and San Joaquin River above Interstate 5. Anglers could continue to catch and release sturgeon, but would be subject to a zero bag limit.

Both Fish and Game Commission members and the many anglers that testified at the meeting said that more public input was needed before the Commission could make a decision. After the meeting, the department set up two public meetings on February 8 and February 16 to solicit feedback on sturgeon protections.

Several Commission members, including Robert Hattoy, Richard Rogers and Cindy Gustafson, questioned the Department of Fish and Game representatives why they hadn’t provided them with written information on the dire strait of the sturgeon fishery – and the Department’s proposed closure - before the meeting.

“This is the first time I received any information on this issue,” said a very angry Rogers. “By coming up to us like you have today, you take from us our analytical ability to do more of our own research on the issue. We are bereft of information other than the information you have provided.”

“This news is shocking to me,” said Hattoy. “When we knew when we had a downward spiral for sturgeon, there should have had plans in place; it’s like keeping on driving when your right rear wheel has come off. We want to save the resource, but we want to do it in the correct manner.”

John Carlson, the incoming executive director of the Commission, apologized to the Department and Commission for not forwarding the Department’s information about the sturgeon decline to Commission members in a timely manner.

The DFG staff and Commission members decided to convene meetings of anglers and other stakeholders and Department staff to come up with alternatives to the closure proposed by DFG staff.

In his oral presentation to the Commission, Larry Week, Branch Chief of the DFG’s Native Anadromous Fish and Watershed Branch, outlined the dire situation the sturgeon appear to be in – and the need for regulatory action

After conducting the trammel net survey in September and October 2005, the DFG was shocked over the low numbers of sturgeon it found in San Pablo Bay. Biologists estimated that only 10,00 adult sturgeon in the slot limit were left in the system.

The DFG does its tag recapture surveys 2 years on/2 years off, according to Week. “In our surveys in 2001 and 2002, we realized the numbers were declining, but it wasn’t until 2005 that the red flag went up,” explained Week.

Added Marty Gingras, DFG fishery biologist, “in 1999 we predicted a substantial decline, but we thought that decline would be mitigated by the recruitment of young fish into the fishery with the high flows of 1993.”

Gingras estimated that the number of legal-sized sturgeon declined from 144,000 in 1998, to 70,000 in 2001-2002 to the current figure of 10,000 fish.

“This is order of magnitude of decline, a pretty dramatic decline and is 50 year low,” said Week. Since the female/male ratio of adult sturgeon is 50/50, he concluded only 5,000 female spawners are left.

The DFG proposed the closure since it was very concerned about protecting the remaining spawners, projecting that only 2,000 spawners would be going up the river to spawn this year. Sturgeon don’t spawn annually, but spawn approximately every 2 to 5 years once they become sexually mature.

With a harvest rate of 7 to 10 percent of the adult population, Gingras felt a closure of the spawning areas on the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers was required to protect the remaining fish. “By instituting a zero limit, fishing could continue but anglers couldn’t keep the fish,” said Week. “We need every spawning female that we have left.”

Week also proposed a statewide zero limit on green sturgeon because of their declining numbers. The federal government has proposed listing the green sturgeon as “endangered” under the Endangered Species Act.

Besides the emergency closure, the DFG’s proposal to restore sturgeon includes improving migration of sturgeon to spawning grounds, developing collaborative proposals to change fishing regulations for implementation in 2007 and enhanced monitoring of sturgeon populations

However, during the public testimony after Week and Marty Gingras, DFG fishery biologist spoke, anglers blasted the effectiveness of the zero limit regulation on a specific stretch of river, along with the data the proposed closure was based on.

“If the white sturgeon is in such an emergency situation, then why doesn’t DFG close the fishery not just in the rivers, but in San Francisco Bay and the Delta all of the way out to the Golden Gate?” said Dennis Byrd of Chico.

Bob Boucke, owner of Johnson’s Bait and Tackle in Yuba City, said he and other anglers weren’t comfortable with the surveys the DFG was doing. “There are more than 10,000 fish in the system or 2,000 going up the rivers,” he stated. “"We are very concerned about the sturgeon and we want the population to increase, but we want to do it in a fair manner.”

Like Byrd and others who testified, he recommended against an emergency closure. However, if a closure was necessary, he recommended closing the fishery all of the way to the Golden Gate Bridge. He emphasized that the threat to the sturgeon fishery wasn’t posed by legal anglers, but by the poachers who take the fish for the highly lucrative illegal caviar market.

“I would like to see better studies before closures go into effect, since this will have a big financial impact upon bait shops like mine and other businesses,” he said.

Boucke made two suggestions for regulation changes (1) bring the maximum size limit of legal fish down to 60 inches like is done in Oregon and (2) implement a punch card system that would limit the numbers of fish that could be caught by an angler in a year. “Most anglers are happy to keep 1 to 2 fish in a season,” he noted.

Steve Talmadge of Flash Fishing also questioned the data the DFG was using. “I talked to Rich Tipton, Barry Canevaro and other skippers who fish the Delta and Suisun Bay and they all agree that it’s hard to believe that only 10,000 adult fish are left,” said Talmadge. “Barry and others have been commenting on how many shaker sturgeon they’ve seen lately.”

Talmadge suggested that the sturgeon hadn’t moved into the area of San Pablo Bay at the time the DFG did the survey, therefore accounting for the small numbers of sturgeon in the 2005 survey. He also favors a sturgeon report card that limits each angler to five fish per year.

Mike Andrews, captain of the Predator out of Loch Lomond Marina, said he believed the DFG’s fish surveys to be inaccurate since they only surveyed a small section of San Pablo Bay. “As drought and water exports have changed water flows in the Delta, the sturgeon keep moving searching for near-perfect water conditions,” said Andrews. “My opinion is that the population the DFG is trying to survey in San Pablo Bay has moved up into Suisun Bay.”

Bob Strickland, president of United Anglers of California, suggested implementing a sturgeon punch card and starting a sturgeon hatchery program to supplement the numbers of naturally occurring fish.

Jim Martin, West Coast Director of the Recreational Fishing Alliance, supported a narrower slot limit and a punch card for sturgeon.

A meeting for the public to give input on sturgeon protections will take place on Thursday, Feb. 16, JFK Library-Joseph Room, 505 Santa Clara St., Vallejo, 4 to 7 p.m. For more information, contact: Steve Martarano, Office of Communications, (916) 654-5866, or Dennis Lee, Supervising Biologist, Fisheries Branch (916) 358-2833

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