The Northern California Fly Fishing Board

http://www...tml?rss=sac&psp=news

Just saw this little story, thought I'd pass it along.

B-

Wow!!
What an a__hole. Here's a guy blessed to have steelhead literally run through his own backyard and he's killing them.

If this Luke fella is who I think it is, it's not such a huge suprise. He is a former member of the Golden Gate Angling & Casting Club and you're right an a__hole. I had to boot him out of a couple of casting tournaments for his behaviour. Hope he gets the book and some serious time in the slammer!!

Bjorn:

There's more than meets the eye here:

After many years of surveying south bay fisheries the FFF and Flycasters, San Jose located a high dam on the important Little Arthur Creek tributary of the Pajaro River in Gilroy that predated the 1924 California Water Code. There were no minimum flow requirements and the dam was silted in completely blocking steelhead migration. Under the leadership of the late great Fred Houwink in the 1980’s we found that the very cooperative ranch owner, Edward Pickells, had attempted to build fishways in the canyon only to have them destroyed twice by flood-stage flows. Mr. Pickells had a flash board portal in the dam that he opened in winter to flush out accumulated rubbish.

My involvement with the FFF turned me on to the potential of the Alaska Steep-Pass Fish Ladder. DF&G engineers and biologists visited the site and were also enthusiastic. Fred and our member-contractor Jerry Hensley used the data, surveyed the site, and then designed a four-section, forty foot long ladder system. With agency participation and agreement, a formal proposal was later made to the CDF&G for Bosco-Keene funds that resulted in a grant of $31,500 for the project.

Then project was complex with a number of vendors, our contractor, and club volunteer labor. 500 tons of rip-rap rock were purchased and placed in the canyon to form a 40 foot ramp up to the portal of the dam. 10 foot above streambed. Flycaster’s work teams muscled the rip-rap into a trough for the fishway sections that were fabricated in Gilroy. Each section had a two-foot wide bottom and side sections with complex interior welded baffle plates. Dozens of angle-iron straps braced the open top and hundreds of 1/2x1 inch bolts held them all together. The bulldozer and shovel crane used to handle the rip-rap were inadequate to handle the fishway and a 45-ton crane was brought in to lift the fishway and reach out 75 feet to lower it into the rip-rap trough. A two-foot high concrete weir was built across the end of the ledge with openings for the fishway and a rubbish exhaust port. The last construction phase of the project pumped 32 cubic yards of concrete to consolidate the rip-rap and tie it all together with reinforcing bars set in holes drilled in the sheer canyon wall. CDF&G monitored all phases of construction and we passed every inspection with flying colors.

The bottom line is that this very successful project was able to open 15 miles of good steelhead habitat.

Unfortunately, the ranch was later sold and the current landowner has been less than enthusiastic about even allowing access. Our original project design included a subsequent modification that would replace the flash board dam with a large gate valve to eliminate the need the remove and replace the large timers. We had obtained participation from the Santa Clara County Flood Control and Water District to compete this last phase of the project but have been stymied by the lack of cooperation by the landowner. Bjorn Stromness has filled us in on the publically announced some of ongoing actions against this person that has a number of additional aspects and allegations. We are still very hopeful for an eventually positive conclusion

Thanks Marty, that sure is a bit more of the story. Good luck on pushing things forward!

B-

Here's what I don't understand: a-hole or not, the guy was apparently a fly guy and yet he was blocking the steelies' access to the creek? Makes no sense.