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<p class=MsoNormal><b><font size=4 face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:14.0pt;font-weight:bold'>Delta diversion killing off tiny
fish, suit claims</span></font></b><br>
<br>
By Dana Nichols<br>
<st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Stockton</st1:place></st1:City> Record
Staff Writer<br>
Published Wednesday, February 16, 2005 <br>
<br>
<b><span style='font-weight:bold'>The giant pumps that send Delta water to Southern
California are killing off a tiny, translucent-blue fish that lives here, and
federal wildlife officials are letting it happen, according to a lawsuit filed
Tuesday by environmental groups. <br>
<br>
The <st1:country-region w:st="on">U.S.</st1:country-region> Fish and Wildlife
Service last year said increasing the amount of water sent south from the pumps
near <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Tracy</st1:place></st1:City>
would not hurt the Delta smelt. <br>
<br>
But the lawsuit filed Tuesday in <st1:country-region w:st="on">U.S.</st1:country-region>
District Court in <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Sacramento</st1:place></st1:City>
notes that smelt populations continue to hover at their lowest levels in nearly
four decades. The lawsuit seeks to have the Fish and Wildlife Service ruling --
and therefore the water exports it allowed -- overturned. <br>
<br>
Bill Jennings of DeltaKeeper, one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, blamed
pressure by <st1:place w:st="on">Southern California</st1:place> water
interests for influencing the Fish and Wildlife Service. <br>
<br>
"In the Delta, political science has resulted in the lowest levels of
Delta smelt in 38 years of record," <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jennings</st1:place></st1:City>
said. He noted that many other species of fish, including striped bass and
threadfin shad, are also at record-low levels. <br>
<br>
"By almost every yardstick of ecosystem health, we find a continuing
decline in Delta fisheries," <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jennings</st1:place></st1:City>
said. <br>
<br>
Fish and Wildlife Service officials responded to the lawsuit with a prepared
statement that defended the original ruling to allow extra water diversions
from the Delta. The statement said that the agency also reduced the number of
smelt that the export pumps near <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Tracy</st1:place></st1:City>
are allowed to kill. <br>
<br>
Fish and Wildlife Service spokesman Jim Nickles said officials would not answer
questions about the lawsuit. Also, he referred questions about declining fish
populations in the Delta to state biologists. <br>
<br>
Water exports from the Delta were boosted last year under a revised operating
plan for the federal Central Valley Project and the State Water Project, the
state's two major canal-and-pump systems that move Delta water to the southern <st1:PlaceName
w:st="on">San Joaquin</st1:PlaceName> <st1:PlaceType w:st="on">Valley</st1:PlaceType>
and <st1:place w:st="on">Southern California</st1:place>. <br>
<br>
Federal officials listed the smelt as a threatened species in 1993. The fish
were getting sucked into water pumps near <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Tracy</st1:place></st1:City>
and killed. <br>
<br>
The fish was also in trouble because reduced river flows and water exports had
shifted the line between fresh river water and salty Bay water. The smelt likes
to feed and breed in the mixing zone. Biologists said the fish did best when
the mixing zone was out toward <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:PlaceName w:st="on">Suisun</st1:PlaceName>
<st1:PlaceType w:st="on">Bay</st1:PlaceType></st1:place>, where tidal marshes
offered lots of spawning habitat and food. <br>
<br>
Water exports and reduced river flows shift that line upstream into narrower
channels. <br>
<br>
Environmentalists and biologists say the smelt population usually drops during
drought years and flood years. Droughts stop water flows the fish need, and
floods wash the smelt and their food out of the Delta and into <st1:place
w:st="on"><st1:PlaceName w:st="on">San Francisco</st1:PlaceName> <st1:PlaceType
w:st="on">Bay</st1:PlaceType></st1:place>. <br>
<br>
Yet the low populations the past two years have come during average water
years, at least in terms of rain and snow. Critics of the water exports say the
increased Delta pumping is to blame. <br>
<br>
"The Delta smelt remains at risk of extinction," said Bay Institute
senior scientist Tina Swanson. She also said that the Fish and Wildlife Service
has ignored available data on the smelt. <br>
<br>
Environmentalists worry about other fish species as well. State surveys last
summer found the lowest striped bass population in 45 years. <br>
<br>
Adding to concern is a simultaneous decline in the population of microscopic
animals called zooplankton that serve as food for fish, said Dan Odenweller of
Stockton, a retired fisheries biologist who has worked for both state and
federal agencies. <br>
<br>
Odenweller, who is now a volunteer for DeltaKeeper, said he sat in on a Feb. 7
meeting of state and federal biologists looking at the problem. Odenweller said
he believes politics is making it difficult for scientists to fairly evaluate
whether water exports are hurting the smelt. <br>
<br>
"There has been a reluctance to look at those factors," he said.
"People who bring the subject up get ostracized." <br>
<br>
But government biologists say that a number of factors could be causing the
fish population declines. <br>
<br>
"It is not clearly one thing or another, and most people I talk to have
not come to any conclusion about why these indices have been low the last
couple of years," said Patrick Coulston, supervising biologist at the
state Fish and Game's Central Valley Bay Delta branch office in Stockton. <br>
<br>
Mike Wintemute, a spokesman for the Fish and Game office in Sacramento, said
that it might be the timing of water pumping rather than the amount of pumped
water that is important. <br>
<br>
"It is hard to say whether this is another downward trend that is going to
trend upward over time and recover, or is this something we need to be
concerned or alarmed about," Wintemute said. "I think right now we
are in the concerned stage." <br>
<br>
Environmentalists say those concerns go beyond fish and show the failure to
restore the Delta and clean its waters. <br>
<br>
"People need clean water. Delta smelt need clean water," said <st1:PersonName
w:st="on">Steve Evans</st1:PersonName>, conservation director for Friends of
the River, one of the groups joining in the suit. "And we still don't have
clean water in the Delta."</span></b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><st1:PersonName w:st="on"><em><i><font size=3 color=gray
face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>Byron
Leydecker</span></font></i></em></st1:PersonName><em><i><font color=gray
face="Times New Roman"><span style='color:gray'>, </span></font></i></em><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><em><i><font size=3 color=gray face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>Chair, Friends of <st1:place w:st="on">Trinity
River</st1:place></span></font></i></em><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><em><i><font size=3 color=gray face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>Consultant, Californiua Trout, Inc.</span></font></i></em><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><st1:address w:st="on"><st1:Street w:st="on"><em><i><font
size=3 color=gray face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:12.0pt;
color:gray'>PO Box</span></font></i></em></st1:Street><em><i><font
color=gray face="Times New Roman"><span style='color:gray'> 2327</span></font></i></em></st1:address><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><st1:place w:st="on"><st1:City w:st="on"><em><i><font
size=3 color=gray face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:12.0pt;
color:gray'>Mill Valley</span></font></i></em></st1:City><em><i><font
color=gray face="Times New Roman"><span style='color:gray'>, <st1:State w:st="on">CA</st1:State>
<st1:PostalCode w:st="on">94942-2327</st1:PostalCode></span></font></i></em></st1:place><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><em><i><font size=3 color=gray face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>415 383 4810 ph</span></font></i></em><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><em><i><font size=3 color=gray face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>415 383 9562 fx</span></font></i></em><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><em><i><font size=3 color=gray face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>415 519 4810 ce</span></font></i></em><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><em><i><u><font size=3 color=blue face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:blue'><a href="mailto:bwl3@comcast.net">bwl3@comcast.net</a></span></font></u></i></em><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><em><i><font size=3 color=blue face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:blue'><a
href="mailto:bleydecker@stanfordalumni.org">bleydecker@stanfordalumni.org</a><u>
</u></span></font><font color=black><span style='color:black'>(secondary)</span></font></i></em><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><em><i><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt'><a href="http://www.fotr.org">http://www.fotr.org</a></span></font></i></em><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><em><i><font size=3 color=blue face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:blue'><a href="http://caltrout.org">http://caltrout.org</a></span></font></i></em><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'> </span><o:p></o:p></font></p>
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