Salmon is off the menu – Fishery council closes salmon fishing off California Coast this year

Commercial and recreational fishing for salmon will be banned this year in marine waters off California and most of Oregon due to historically low fall run Chinook salmon returns to the Sacramento and Klamath watersheds last year. On Thursday, the Pacific Fishery Management Council (PFMC) unanimously voted to recommend a full closure of the recreational and commercial fishing season, based on the low abundance estimates and low returns to the rivers.

By Dan Bacher

It is expected that the National Marine Fisheries Service will follow with regulatory action to enact the closure, effective in mid-May, according to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW). The federal government in March already closed the recreational and commercial salmon fishing openers that were slated from early April to May 15.

In a teleconference on May 17, the California Fish and Game Commission is then expected to follow suit in adopting a closure of inland recreational salmon fisheries on the Sacramento, Feather, American and Mokelumne rivers and the Klamath and Trinity rivers.

Commercial fishing for Chinook salmon on the Klamath River will be closed by the Yurok Tribe this year, while subsistence fishing for the Yurok, Hoopa Valley and Karuk tribes will be severely restricted because of the low numbers of fish.

While Governor Gavin Newsom and state officials blame the drought for the closure, anglers, commercial and recreational anglers and Tribal fishermen point to water policy that favors agribusiness water contractors over maintaining healthy salmon populations and ecosystems.

“This is a direct reflection on California’s water policy and an absolutely devastating blow for the thousands of families that rely on salmon to pay their rent and mortgages, and keep their life-sustaining businesses afloat,” said Scott Artis, executive director of Golden State Salmon Association (GSSA). “Families across the State are already struggling with inflation so it is imperative that lawmakers immediately come to the aid of affected communities with disaster relief.”

The CDFW claimed “prolonged and historic drought, severe wildfires and associated impacts to spawning and rearing habitat, harmful algal blooms, and ocean forage shifts have combined to result in some of the lowest stock abundance forecasts on record for Sacramento River Fall Chinook and Klamath River Fall Chinook.”

“The low ocean abundance forecasts, coupled with low 2022 returns, led the PFMC to recommend full closure of California’s commercial and recreational ocean salmon fisheries,” the CDFW stated.

“In part, the low returns and abundance forecasts are due to difficult environmental factors faced by these salmon on their initial journey out to the ocean three years ago. Following a drought sequence, the 2016-2017 Sacramento and San Joaquin numbers were less than 135,000 returning fall-run Chinook. Three years later, after rains, it was over 200,000. Similar rebounds happened after 2010 had above average rainfall. Salmon returns three years later more than doubled from around 163,000 to around 448,000. These patterns indicate that salmon returning three years from now will benefit from the ample precipitation California has experienced this year,” the CDFW continued.

California Department of Fish and Wildlife Director Charlton H. Bonham, claimed, “This decision, while difficult, is intended to allow salmon to recover in order to provide future fishing opportunities. Salmon are an iconic species in California. We treasure them for their intrinsic, cultural, recreational and commercial values. The state is committed to ensuring long-term survival of our salmon runs and supporting our struggling fishing communities. We are looking into all possible options to bring relief as soon as possible to fishing businesses to addresses costs incurred to maintain their commercial licenses and lost revenue when the season is entirely closed.”

John McManus, policy director for the Golden State Salmon Association, pointed out the economical hardship that the closure will bring up and down the coast.

“This is the time of year when we usually start bringing salmon to market or home to put on the family dinner table,” said John McManus, senior policy director for GSSA. “Instead, families up and down the coast, and some inland, are very worried about how they’re going to pay the bills this year in a disaster that could have, and should have, been avoided.”

This closure is the second time that salmon fishing has been closed in California – the first was in 2008-2009. The decision was made due to low numbers of adult and two-year-old jack salmon that have survived the hostile conditions they’ve encountered in Central Valley rivers in recent years, said McManus.

“All of these rivers are controlled by upstream dam operations,” said McManus. “Dam operation decisions favoring agriculture over salmon survival have resulted in very poor natural salmon reproduction in recent years because lethal hot water left after dam releases for agriculture have killed incubating salmon eggs. In addition, strong releases of water in the spring needed to wash baby salmon safely out of the Central Valley to the ocean have been diverted or withheld.”

“In February 2023, the PFMC estimated a total 169,800 Sacramento Basin fall run salmon in the ocean. Fishery managers typically allow fishing that will still deliver a minimum of 122,000 salmon to spawn in the Sacramento Basin, but in recent years they’ve increased that target number. In 2022, fishing was curtailed in an effort to see more than 180,000 fall run salmon return to spawn but less than 62,000 actually showed up,” he added.

Following the PFMC’s recommendation of a full closure, Governor Gavin Newsom announced his administration’s request for a Federal Fishery Disaster Declaration to support impacted communities. Read Gov. Newsom’s news release.

Unfortunately, the same time that Newsom is requesting federal fishery disaster relief, he is continuing to move forward with the Delta Tunnel, the most environmentally destructive public works project in California history, along with the environmentally devastating Big Ag-promoted voluntary agreements and Sites Reservoir. These three projects will only drive imperiled salmon fisheries closer and closer to extinction.

Currently, California’s salmon industry is valued at $1.4 billion in economic activity and 23,000 jobs annually in a normal season and contributes approximately $700 million to the economy and supports more than 10,000 jobs in Oregon. Industry workers benefiting from Central Valley salmon stretch from Santa Barbara to northern Oregon. This includes commercial fishermen and women, recreational fishermen and women (fresh and salt water), fish processors, marinas, coastal communities, equipment manufacturers, the hotel and food industry, tribes, and others.