California’s Heritage Trout Program is growing a new strain of fly fisher — the “master angler.” “Over 300 anglers have successfully completed the California Heritage Trout Challenge,” said Jeff Weaver, who heads the program for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (DFW), “of which a dozen of those have achieved the ‘Master Angler’ recognition, meaning they have caught all 11 recognized forms of native trout in California.”
To qualify for the challenge, anglers must catch six different forms of the native trout in their historic ranges. The native species list includes three types of cutthroat trout (coastal, Lahontan and Paiute) and eight types of rainbow trout (coastal, Eagle Lake, Kern River, California golden, Little Kern golden, McCloud River redband, Goose Lake redband, and Warner Lakes redband).
After completing the challenge, the fly fisher receives a 16-by-20-inch certificate that includes full-color drawings of the trout types caught by the person. The drawings were created by well-known artist Joe Tomelleri. Master anglers get more trout on their certificate and of course more bragging rights.
Never a shy lot, anglers have posted their challenge accomplishments on Facebook and other social media vehicles, sometimes giving a blow-by-blow account of tramping up and down the state, as in a post called “Chasing My Heritage Trout.” Some assume naming rights, as in “Frank’s Heritage Trout Challenge.” Others brag about their low certificate number.
DFW officials say that since it was created nearly twenty years ago, the program has been accomplishing its goals of increasing awareness of California’s trout and their native waters. “The Challenge was designed to promote the ecological and aesthetic values of native trout and their habitats,” said Weaver, one of the program’s biggest boosters, “encouraging anglers to learn more about the state’s natural heritage and building public support for native trout restoration efforts.”
He added: “This program has very much lived up to my expectations and beyond. I’ve been an integral part of the program’s development over the past 10 years, so many of my own personal standards, interests, and areas of expertise are woven into the fabric of the program as it currently exists.”
He added, “I remember many years ago — 1996–97 — seeing ‘Help Restore Pine Creek’ signs in front of the Spaulding General Store in the Eagle Lake Basin in Lassen County while on annual fall fishing trips to Eagle Lake. The thought that it would be something really special and rewarding to be centrally involved in that kind of an effort to reinstate a wild spawning component to an iconic, but otherwise hatchery-dependent native trout form has stuck with me over time.”
The heritage trout awareness effort is part of the DFW’s broader Wild Trout Program, which was created in 1971 and represented a major shift from a fishery management approach that had been dependent on hatchery-raised fish since the 1800s, when some species to be stocked were shipped by rail across the country in milk cans.
“The California Fish and Game Commission created a policy to guide the management and regulation of wild-trout resources and to designate certain waters to be managed exclusively for wild, naturally self-reproducing trout,” said Weaver. “Designated Wild Trout Waters are those that support a self-sustaining trout fishery (either native or nonnative forms), are aesthetically pleasing and environmentally productive, provide adequate catch rates in terms of the numbers or size of the trout, and are open to public angling. Wild Trout Waters may not be stocked with catchable-sized hatchery trout. Heritage and Wild Trout Waters are a special subset of Wild Trout Waters that highlight wild populations of California’s native trout within their historic drainages.” For more information on the Heritage and Wild Trout Program, go to https://www.wildlife.ca.gov/Conservation/Inland-Fisheries/Wild-Trout.
Matilija Dam Removal Grant
It takes two things to remove even small stream-blocking dams — time and money. For 20 years, a coalition has been working on plans to remove the outmoded Matilija Dam on the Ventura River and thus open a longer stretch of the river to steelhead. The 24-member coalition includes groups such as California Trout, American Rivers, the Surfrider Foundation, Patagonia, Friends of the Ventura River, and local, state, and federal agencies. The effort got a boost when the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation’s Open Rivers Fund awarded a $175,000 grant for the group to develop a plan to raise the rest of the funds for the dam removal project. Located near Ojai, in Ventura County, the 198-foot-high, 520-foot-long concrete dam was built in 1947 for $4 million. It originally had a capacity to hold 7,018 acre-feet of water, but is currently 90 percent silted. A number of years ago, someone anonymously painted on the dam a picture of a giant pair of scissors and dotted lines on where to cut to remove the dam.
Congress approved the dam’s removal in 2007, but have yet to provide funding for the demolition, which is estimated to cost $140 million.
For more, visit www.matilijadam.org.
Major Putah Creek Fish Runs
“Give them water and habitat, and they will come.” That’s what the ecstatic fishery biologists are saying about the big runs of chinook salmon swimming through Putah Creek in Yolo County, following the return of water flows and restoration of the creek. Aquatic biologist Ken Davis, who monitors the annual salmon runs and spearheads restoration projects in the creek for the Lower Putah Creek Coordinating Committee, reports that in 2016, he counted some two thousand salmon in a one-mile stretch of the creek from where it flows under Interstate 505 to the city of Winters. He adds that’s a huge increase in the number of the late-fall-run salmon.
“We counted eight hundred last year,” said Davis, who also said that two hundred were counted in 2014 and eight hundred in 2013. “The numbers do seem to bounce around a bit.”
Unlike other years, salmon this year were in the 30-to-35-pound range. “I’ve not seen anything like that size salmon before,” said Davis.
According to Davis, he and his crews are using a shore-based digging machine to scarify 13 sections of creek bottom. The machine breaks up the rocks into cobble for use by spawning fish.
Putah is an 85-mile-long creek that flows from the base of Cobb Mountain in Lake County, through Lake Berryessa and Winters before emptying into the Yolo Bypass about a quarter mile west of the Sacramento Deep Water Ship Channel, which connects to the Sacramento River. The stretch of the creek below the Monticello Dam that creates Berryessa is a special-regulation water that is open to fishing year round. Anglers must use artificial lures with barbless hooks and practice catch-and-release fishing. Putah’s distinctive green color motivated John Fogerty to write the Creedence Clearwater Revival song “Green River.”
The creek has been the subject of lengthy litigation over water flows and is currently the site of a number of gravel reintroduction and streamside habitat improvement projects.
Have steelhead joined the salmon in the creek? “We haven’t seen any steelhead,” said Davis, adding that they are likely to return. “It has to happen, because it has in the past. It’s just that nobody’s seen them.”
Restoring a Russian River Tributary
Members of the Dry Creek Rancheria have applied for $3.5 million in public funds to restore a mile-and-a-half long stretch of an unnamed creek that flows into the Russian River. The creek is near their River Rock Casino at Geyserville. The application for state funds is the latest effort by the Dry Creek Band of the Pomo Indians to continue their ongoing work to restore habitat for salmon and steelhead trout on tribal property. According to David Delira, the tribe’s public-works manager, the creek improvements will complement restoration work done by the Sonoma County Water Agency. Total cost of the project is estimated at $5.2 million and is expected to take two years to complete.
No Cash for Fishing Licenses
Starting in 2017, anglers will no longer be able to buy their fishing licenses with cash. “This no-cash policy will improve customer and employee safety,” said the Department of Fish and Wildlife in announcing the policy change. “Accepting cash payments is costly in both the staff time it takes to process and in armored car services.”
The change applies to making payments at the DFW’s Licensing Branch or regional license counters, where anglers can use checks, money orders, or any debit/credit card with a Visa or Mastercard logo to pay for a license.
The 2017 calendar-year sport fishing license costs $47.01, an increase from $43.50 in 2016. As of October 31, 2016, the DFW sold about 1 million resident sport fishing licenses, generating $44.3 million in revenue. During that same period, the department received $64.1 million from the sale of all its other fishing licenses and report cards. For comparison, during that same 2016 period, the department sold 60,899 hunting licenses, generating $1.6 million in income. The department’s annual budget is $586.4 million.
Fly Fishing in Orinda
While that may be a nice attention grabber as a headline, fly fishing in Orinda is not going to happen soon. But it could happen someday, because a mess of debris has just been removed from a sluice gate in the East Bay Municipal Utility District’s 12-foot-high dam on San Pablo Creek. The gate is part of a structure that was built in the 1960s to keep clean water flowing into San Pablo Reservoir.
For years, the all-volunteer Friends of Orinda Creek has been advocating to clear the structure and allow fish passage. “Over one hundred rainbow trout 10 to 14 inches long have been seen near the Orinda filter plant,” said Brian Waters, a board member of the group. It’s the first time trout have been upstream in the creek in 20 years. The local press has reported that in the late 1800s, people would fish for salmon, steelhead, or other trout where the creek runs through downtown Orinda.
