A (slightly edited) email that just landed in my work inbox from John McManus, the president of the Golden Gate Salmon Association:
Dear Reporter:
If you’re covering the news from the California Dept. of Fish and Wildlife documenting the lethal effects of the drought on federally protected winter-run salmon, consider this from CDFW’s updated winter-run data file (which you can download from: https://www.calfish.org/ProgramsData/ConservationandManagement/CentralValleyMonitoring/CDFWUpperSacRiverBasinSalmonidMonitoring.aspx)
7-6-21: Continued hot weather above 100 degrees for periods in late May, early June and past two weeks continuously will lead to depletion of cold water pool in Shasta Lake sooner than modeled earlier in season. This hot weather is leading to more demand downstream for water (flows from Keswick Dam from 8,500 to 9,250 cubic feet per second on July 4th). Previously modeled season long cold water availability scenarios used steady flows in the 7500 cfs range from Keswick. Those earlier scenarios had very high expected juvenile mortality due to warm water later in August-October that would be lethal to incubating eggs and alevins in the gravel. This persistent heat dome over the West Coast will likely result in earlier loss of ability to provide cool water and subsequently it is possible that nearly all in-river juveniles will not survive this season. Counts of carcasses continue to indicate a large run of winter-run this year. Unspawned fresh females for the season are 71 with an overall percentage of 12.3% of all fresh females this season were unspawned.
If you are looking for a quote for a story, consider this one from me:
“Californians should be alerted that the extinction of a native salmon run is underway right now as a result of government inaction to stop it. State and federal water managers have apparently decided it’s politically inconvenient to reroute short water supplies to prevent extinction if it means a few less acres of crops. We’re losing winter run salmon right now and the fall run salmon that supply the sport and commercial fisheries will be decimated too. Californians who care about the environment need to hold government officials accountable for allowing the loss of the state’s natural resources on their watch.”