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I've been Salmon fishing in California since I can remember. There are few things I love more than being on the water going for Kings as the sun comes up. I'm

I've been Salmon fishing in California since I can remember. There are few things I love more than being on the water going for Kings as the sun comes up. I'm really bummed we won't have a season, but having more fish in the future is worth the short term cost.

bradleyjg 4y ago
It can’t hurt, but I don’t think something like this is really going to fix the problem. Dams, water levels abs temperatures, ocean trawling, acidification … there’s lots and lots of stress on salmon population aside from anglers.
- mikeg8 4y ago
  Fixing a multifaceted problem requires multifaceted solutions. It can definitely help.
  - NegativeLatency 4y ago
    The publicity from the cancelation seems like a really valuable aspect too
    - kposehn 4y ago
      Absolutely. We definitely need to put a spotlight on this and other dwindling fish stocks. Even though there are other populations to draw from, once they're gone they are very, very hard to get back.
- NegativeLatency 4y ago
  Car tire debris: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/dec/03/coho-salmon-pollution-car-tires-die-off https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/dec/03/coho-sal...
  - nradov 4y ago
    Local divers have been removing some tires but they can only get a tiny fraction of what has been dumped. https://www.leeoceans.org/initiatives/ptlobos-tire-removal https://www.leeoceans.org/initiatives/ptlobos-tire-removal
- hadlock 4y ago
  There was a bombshell report about an immediate moratorium on crab fishing in Alaska, that came out of nowhere, seemingly. About a month later there was a (very, very quiet) report justifying the moratorium. The short version is that effectively scientists had been asking for reduction in fishing in the area for decades and finally the remaining stock in the area was so low it was critically endangering the ecosystem there. So they finally put in a hard stop after years of kicking the can down the road. I suspect we'll see additional cessation of fishing in other areas as it further unravels that we've been chronically overfishing for decades. Britain after WW2 overharvested mackerel from their seas for so long that they had to put permanent fishing quotas and even today the mackerel have not fully recovered from overfishing over half a century ago. Anglers have an enormous impact on fish and wildlife stocks.
  - qqtt 4y ago
    See also cod fishing in Newfoundland: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cod_fishing_in_Newfoundland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cod_fishing_in_Newfoundland Cod stocks collapsed in the early 1990s, with a moratorium on fishing enacted in 1993. It took until 2011 for signs to show that the ecosystem was recovering.
    - BrianHenryIE 4y ago
      The Atlantic (2016) is a good documentary on natural resources in Ireland and Newfoundland: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtRHSWGYNFc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtRHSWGYNFc https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5744820/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5744820/
    - steve_adams_86 4y ago
      My understanding is that the cod are not expected to recover to numbers previously seen at all, though. The smaller number present today seem likely to comprise a permanently smaller proportion of the new habitat that has formed in their absence. I looked into this many years ago so perhaps that has changed. I hope so. Otherwise it means the Canadian Atlantic was irreparably altered by modern fishing in the blink of an eye, and the rest of the world is working hard at doing the same thing right now.
- kposehn 4y ago
  It won't fix it for sure, but it will help. Reducing the pressure on the population can go a long way to improving future prospects.
- mbgerring 4y ago
  Luckily, the dams start coming down this year. https://www.opb.org/article/2022/11/18/klamath-river-dam-removal-southern-oregon-dams-northern-california-drought https://www.opb.org/article/2022/11/18/klamath-river-dam-rem...
- ROTMetro 4y ago
  To add to the doom and gloom. https://www.science.org/content/article/common-tire-chemical-implicated-mysterious-deaths-risk-salmon https://www.science.org/content/article/common-tire-chemical...
eweise 4y ago
Bummed as well. Just got into fishing a few years ago. Was going to get a fishing kayak this spring for catching salmon off the coast but now I guess I'll wait.
- kposehn 4y ago
  Might be worth going for halibut this year. If the coastal waters are still super cold it should keep the SF bay quite active for the season, so you could always try hitting the sand flats off South SF. I haven't done it myself but others had great luck last year.
  - eweise 4y ago
    Good idea. That's actually what I've mainly been fishing for around Tiburon. I've had pretty good luck there.
ryandrake 4y ago
The article doesn't seem to mention whether they are only canceling the season for big time commercial fishing or for all fishing altogether. I suspect it's the latter. Too bad that the government can't seem to grasp the concepts of scale and profit motive. The wildlife populations are getting wrecked from large scale fishing operations mass-scraping the sea clean, not from Joe Sixpack dipping their rod in the ocean on the weekend and hoping to come home with one or two fish.
- kposehn 4y ago
  Sport Fishing can put a huge amount of pressure on stocks too. During the salmon season there are hundred of boats off Stinson Beach (NW of the golden gate) fishing, same for Pacifica and Half Moon Bay. For every commercial boat there are many, many smaller boats. It all adds up.
- bcbrown 4y ago
  The ratio of commercial:recreational quoatas depend on the numeric value for the season, but at lower quotas the ratio skews heavily recreational. So when the run is substantial, commercial fisheries can fish, but when the run is marginal, more of the quota is recreational: Allowable non-treaty ocean harvest (thousands of fish) Coho: C R 0–300 25 75 >300 60 40 Chinook: 0–100 50 50 >100–150 60 40 >150 70 30 Source: Page 10 of https://media.fisheries.noaa.gov/2022-10/2022-Fed-Reg-Booklet10062022.pdf https://media.fisheries.noaa.gov/2022-10/2022-Fed-Reg-Bookle...
Melatonic 4y ago
I have heard from people who do love fishing that getting a decently cheap flight to Alaska is totally worth it specifically for Salmon
- kposehn 4y ago
  I've gone there several times but stopped when things got too crowded. They've also seen a significant decline in stocks I believe, especially along the inside passage.
  - Melatonic 4y ago
    Seems like you could just go farther in or somewhere else no? Alaska is an absolutely MASSIVE state
50 4y ago
Do you happen to know if there are any places in California to go fly fishing, if any? My curiosity deriving from David James Duncan's The River Why and Norman Maclean's A River Runs Through It.
- kposehn 4y ago
  There are a ton of excellent places. You can go for steelhead in the Klamath and Trinity rivers, lots of trout in the Sierra Nevada mountains (I'm partial to the Truckee River watershed), and if you want to try something really different go for striped bass on a fly in some of the Central Valley Foothills reservoirs in late-August or September. I've even gone surf-fishing on fly for Skates and sharks in San Diego at the beach. There's a lot of different fly fishing experiences in California from traditional trout to really unique stuff. Please do try some out!

bradleyjg 4y ago

It can’t hurt, but I don’t think something like this is really going to fix the problem. Dams, water levels abs temperatures, ocean trawling, acidification … there’s lots and lots of stress on salmon population aside from anglers.

mikeg8 4y ago
Fixing a multifaceted problem requires multifaceted solutions. It can definitely help.
- NegativeLatency 4y ago
  The publicity from the cancelation seems like a really valuable aspect too
  - kposehn 4y ago
    Absolutely. We definitely need to put a spotlight on this and other dwindling fish stocks. Even though there are other populations to draw from, once they're gone they are very, very hard to get back.
NegativeLatency 4y ago
Car tire debris: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/dec/03/coho-salmon-pollution-car-tires-die-off https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/dec/03/coho-sal...
- nradov 4y ago
  Local divers have been removing some tires but they can only get a tiny fraction of what has been dumped. https://www.leeoceans.org/initiatives/ptlobos-tire-removal https://www.leeoceans.org/initiatives/ptlobos-tire-removal
hadlock 4y ago
There was a bombshell report about an immediate moratorium on crab fishing in Alaska, that came out of nowhere, seemingly. About a month later there was a (very, very quiet) report justifying the moratorium. The short version is that effectively scientists had been asking for reduction in fishing in the area for decades and finally the remaining stock in the area was so low it was critically endangering the ecosystem there. So they finally put in a hard stop after years of kicking the can down the road. I suspect we'll see additional cessation of fishing in other areas as it further unravels that we've been chronically overfishing for decades. Britain after WW2 overharvested mackerel from their seas for so long that they had to put permanent fishing quotas and even today the mackerel have not fully recovered from overfishing over half a century ago. Anglers have an enormous impact on fish and wildlife stocks.
- qqtt 4y ago
  See also cod fishing in Newfoundland: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cod_fishing_in_Newfoundland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cod_fishing_in_Newfoundland Cod stocks collapsed in the early 1990s, with a moratorium on fishing enacted in 1993. It took until 2011 for signs to show that the ecosystem was recovering.
  - BrianHenryIE 4y ago
    The Atlantic (2016) is a good documentary on natural resources in Ireland and Newfoundland: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtRHSWGYNFc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtRHSWGYNFc https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5744820/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5744820/
  - steve_adams_86 4y ago
    My understanding is that the cod are not expected to recover to numbers previously seen at all, though. The smaller number present today seem likely to comprise a permanently smaller proportion of the new habitat that has formed in their absence. I looked into this many years ago so perhaps that has changed. I hope so. Otherwise it means the Canadian Atlantic was irreparably altered by modern fishing in the blink of an eye, and the rest of the world is working hard at doing the same thing right now.
kposehn 4y ago
It won't fix it for sure, but it will help. Reducing the pressure on the population can go a long way to improving future prospects.
mbgerring 4y ago
Luckily, the dams start coming down this year. https://www.opb.org/article/2022/11/18/klamath-river-dam-removal-southern-oregon-dams-northern-california-drought https://www.opb.org/article/2022/11/18/klamath-river-dam-rem...
ROTMetro 4y ago
To add to the doom and gloom. https://www.science.org/content/article/common-tire-chemical-implicated-mysterious-deaths-risk-salmon https://www.science.org/content/article/common-tire-chemical...

eweise 4y ago

Bummed as well. Just got into fishing a few years ago. Was going to get a fishing kayak this spring for catching salmon off the coast but now I guess I'll wait.

kposehn 4y ago
Might be worth going for halibut this year. If the coastal waters are still super cold it should keep the SF bay quite active for the season, so you could always try hitting the sand flats off South SF. I haven't done it myself but others had great luck last year.
- eweise 4y ago
  Good idea. That's actually what I've mainly been fishing for around Tiburon. I've had pretty good luck there.

ryandrake 4y ago

The article doesn't seem to mention whether they are only canceling the season for big time commercial fishing or for all fishing altogether. I suspect it's the latter. Too bad that the government can't seem to grasp the concepts of scale and profit motive. The wildlife populations are getting wrecked from large scale fishing operations mass-scraping the sea clean, not from Joe Sixpack dipping their rod in the ocean on the weekend and hoping to come home with one or two fish.

kposehn 4y ago
Sport Fishing can put a huge amount of pressure on stocks too. During the salmon season there are hundred of boats off Stinson Beach (NW of the golden gate) fishing, same for Pacifica and Half Moon Bay. For every commercial boat there are many, many smaller boats. It all adds up.
bcbrown 4y ago
The ratio of commercial:recreational quoatas depend on the numeric value for the season, but at lower quotas the ratio skews heavily recreational. So when the run is substantial, commercial fisheries can fish, but when the run is marginal, more of the quota is recreational: Allowable non-treaty ocean harvest (thousands of fish) Coho: C R 0–300 25 75 >300 60 40 Chinook: 0–100 50 50 >100–150 60 40 >150 70 30 Source: Page 10 of https://media.fisheries.noaa.gov/2022-10/2022-Fed-Reg-Booklet10062022.pdf https://media.fisheries.noaa.gov/2022-10/2022-Fed-Reg-Bookle...

Melatonic 4y ago

I have heard from people who do love fishing that getting a decently cheap flight to Alaska is totally worth it specifically for Salmon

kposehn 4y ago
I've gone there several times but stopped when things got too crowded. They've also seen a significant decline in stocks I believe, especially along the inside passage.
- Melatonic 4y ago
  Seems like you could just go farther in or somewhere else no? Alaska is an absolutely MASSIVE state

50 4y ago

Do you happen to know if there are any places in California to go fly fishing, if any? My curiosity deriving from David James Duncan's The River Why and Norman Maclean's A River Runs Through It.

kposehn 4y ago
There are a ton of excellent places. You can go for steelhead in the Klamath and Trinity rivers, lots of trout in the Sierra Nevada mountains (I'm partial to the Truckee River watershed), and if you want to try something really different go for striped bass on a fly in some of the Central Valley Foothills reservoirs in late-August or September. I've even gone surf-fishing on fly for Skates and sharks in San Diego at the beach. There's a lot of different fly fishing experiences in California from traditional trout to really unique stuff. Please do try some out!