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<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>Fishermen
brace for new ban on ocean salmon<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=byline1><span style='font-size:8.0pt'><a
href="mailto:pfimrite@sfchronicle.com"><span style='color:#015660;text-decoration:
none'>Peter Fimrite, Chronicle Staff Writer</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=date1><span style='font-size:8.0pt'>Wednesday, March 4, 2009<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.5pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
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<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><strong>(03-03) 17:05 PST SANTA ROSA</strong>
-- <b>The bad news about fishing was couched in numbers and graphs, study
results and scientific jargon, but there was no mistaking the message:
Californians won't be eating much local salmon this year.</b> <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><a
href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/c/a/2009/03/04/BAEN168F0I.DTL&o=0&type=news"><span
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</span><span style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<ul type=disc>
<li class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;display:none'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif";display:none'><a
href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/03/04/BACJ1695GG.DTL"><span
style='color:#015660;text-decoration:none'>Water employee arrested in
cat-abuse attempt</span></a> 03.04.09 <o:p></o:p></span></li>
</ul>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>That was the gist of a day-long meeting in
Santa Rosa Tuesday at which state Department of Fish and Game biologists told
fishermen, conservationists and others that surveys and studies show the
state's salmon fishery in near-complete ruin.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>Biologists estimated only 66,000 adult
salmon returned to the Sacramento River to spawn last fall - only the second
time in 16 years that the number of fall-run chinook failed to meet the
Pacific Fishery Management Council's goal of 122,000 to 180,000 adult fish.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>In 2007, a similar count was so dismal that
federal regulators banned ocean fishing in California and most of Oregon last
spring and summer, the first total closure in California history. Experts are
predicting barely enough spawning fish next fall to meet the 122,000 goal -
and that's only if ocean fishing is banned this year.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>It is crushing news for a fishing industry
that was in trouble even before the nation went into recession.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>Fort Bragg fisherman Bill Forkner argued
Tuesday that salmon hatcheries were supposed to ensure that fishing would
continue in exchange for the dams that state and federal governments put up
on the Sacramento and San Joaquin river systems. <o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>"Fishermen are ecologists. We want
things right, and we don't want to catch the last fish," said Forkner,
54. "But we also want a chance to make a living at what we've done all
our lives. They knew the wild fish wouldn't survive when they put up the
dams, but they promised us that we would have something to fish."<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>Chinook that spawn in the fall,
traditionally the largest salmon run of the year, are the same ones that are
fished out of the ocean during the spring and summer.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>The fabled fall run has been in steady
decline since 2005, according to data released Tuesday, despite the addition
of hundreds of millions of hatchery-raised chinook, including 32 million last
year.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>There are no reliable studies showing how
many of the surviving fish in the ocean and rivers are from hatcheries. But a
study last year of fish caught by sport fishermen found that 71 percent of
them were raised in hatcheries. Regardless of the influence of hatcheries,
very few chinook of any kind are surviving.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>State and federal scientists believe that
warmer ocean conditions have reduced the food supply for the fish. Record
exports of water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta coincided with
major declines in chinook, a factor that environmentalists and fishing
representatives believe is the major culprit.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>Studies are being done on stream flow, water
oxygen levels, temperature, gravel, toxic substances, food, predation and
chemical contamination in an attempt to isolate problems in the Sacramento
River system.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>The answers can't come soon enough for those
whose livelihoods depend on it.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>"It is taking them a real long time to
figure out what the problems are," said Don Platt, a 49-year-old
fisherman from Fort Bragg. "In the meantime, we're not fishing and a
whole lot of fishermen are going out of business."<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p style='line-height:21.0pt'><b>The Pacific Fishery Management Council will
discuss another possible salmon fishing ban during its annual meeting that
begins Sunday in Seattle. The National Marine Fisheries Service is expected
to make a final decision on fishing quotas by May 1, when California's salmon
fishing season normally begins.</b><span style='font-size:9.5pt'> <o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>Byron
Leydecker, JcT</span></i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>Chair, Friends
of Trinity River</span></i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>PO Box 2327</span></i><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>Mill Valley, CA
94942-2327</span></i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>415 383 4810
land</span></i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>415 519 4810
cell</span></i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'><a
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style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'><a
href="mailto:bleydecker@stanfordalumni.org"><span style='color:blue'>bleydecker@stanfordalumni.org</span></a>
</span></i></b><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>(secondary)</span></i><b><span
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