The Northern California Fly Fishing Board

Tried to post this as a reply on the McCloud thread, couldn't read Bjorn's post because of the board bug, couldn't reply to PGW. I have been on this board long enough to know how Dale and Paul feel about CalTrout and whitewater and unwanted solicitations. It's just sad, though, when an issue like this is dismissed out of hand without any consideration of participation. If you go to http://www.calsport.org/index.htm and look at the organizations that are working together on this, to try and protect one of the great fishing resources in not just the state but the world, it seems plain dumb to piss on the effort. In the last year Nestle tried to ram a water bottling facility down the throat of California, and it was through the work of these organizations that this has been stopped. Worth applauding? Hell yeah. Did any of you take the time to look at the report CalTrout just put together, through the work of Peter Moyle, et al? That's a phenomenal achievement, and complaining that CalTrout and its peers need money to support work of this kind is honestly just a bunch of bull. Here's a link to the report in pdf
http://cal...s-Native-Fish-Crisis.pdf

and the supporting research

http://cal...-Crisis-Final-Report.pdf

If you want to use the resource, participate in the conversation. Support the organizations doing the work. Otherwise when the resource is gone you'd better just keep your mouth shut. You haven't earned the right to complain.

Andrew,
Unfortunately Cal Trout has a track record of giving in to the the white water interests. They, (CT, FOR, AWA,to mention a few) screwed up the North Feather, they have started to ruin the Pit,and now they want the McCloud. I'm sorry but I see our fisheries as something to be protected not something to be compromised for the sake of kissing the butts of the whiter water river rapers. We tired to work with Cal Trout on the North Feather and it was clear from the start that they were going to vote for ww flows. They made excuse after excuse, even in the face of overwelling evidense that the ww flows were extremely bad for the fishery.If you don't believe me check out the Garcia Report. Sometimes the rank and file needs to hold the leaders feet to the fire when they are not working for our interests. You might atcually be listened to a Cal Trout. They certianly did not give a damn what the local fishermen here in Butte County thought about anything to do with the North Feather. As a matter of fact they declared the North Feather a destroyed fishery with zero base line data to back them up. It was one of the most irresponsible debacles in Cal Trout's history! I've said before and will say again. They sold us out!

I will be more then happy to give you a tour of the fishery and personally show you the damage that has been caused by ww flows. Unfortunately you will have to take my word for it when I point out a number the missing bug species. They are dead and gone at this point!

TD

I agree with you Dale.

As a long-time supporter of Cal Trout (since 1974), I stopped donating to them, removed their patch from my fishing vest, and covered their bumper sticker on my auto when they signed on for out of season pulse flows on the N.F. of the Feather.

Since then, Cal Trout has sent several request for donations to me each year by snail mail and by e-mail. Now I know the Cal trout does some good work, so I've replied to their requests by mail, by e-mail, and even by telephone asking for an apology for their action re: N.F. Feather. A simple apology would bring me back into the fold, so to speak. Heck, we all make mistakes.

To make a long-winded rant short, either they're too ashamed to apologize to me or they believe they were right, but it's too much of a burden to explain to me how they were right. Or maybe it's even something I haven't thought of like they don't want my money. In any event, no apology has been garnered to me yet or to anyone else that I know of. So, for now, my money goes to TU and to the Nature Conservancy and to the River Exchange and to a few other fishing and enviromental interests.

Screw 'em.

OT,

My experience with Cal Trout is similar to yours.

In spite of that organization's lack of involvement in interventions during FERC relicensing in the 80's when the Northern California Council of Fly Fishing Clubs (before being NCCFFF) and CSPA were supporting Bob Biaochi's activity of filing interventions on each license and fighting against the original peripheral canal (ballot proposition) without the assistance of Cal Trout (don't want to upset those donors in the lower part of the state), I was a contributor to Cal Trout for many years (annual membership, responded to mailings, attended dinners). I made a decision not to contribute to Cal Trout anymore (with my donation funds and time going to FFF, TU, DU, and other groups of my choosing) after a drunk “stream-keeper” threatened the safety of a fishing companion and myself at the Fall River access one evening during the Hex hatch in 1989. I haven't received any apology from Cal Trout for the actions of their "stream-keeper" and my repeated e-mail and US Mail requests to be removed from their mailing lists have been ignored.

Screw em is being polite,

Paul

Dale.....Where might I find this Garcia Report. I would be interesting in reading. (Long time no see.....Hope all is well.)

Michael

Hi Michael,

I believe that this is the "Garcia Report" that Dale is referring to:

EVALUATING THE IMPACTS OF MANUFACTURED RECREATION STREAMFLOWS ON THE MACROINVERTEBRATE COMMUNITYOF A REGULATED RIVER


Buzz

Now, I'm not a biologist, but that report seemed to be a pretty far cry from a condemnation of recretional pulse flows. We do have some biologist type people on here, I'd love to hear their take on the report. I read that some bugs were impacted, but not greatly. Other bugs seemed to not be impacted. They found that one system of collecting wasn't as good as another system. They said that short-term impacts were not very large, but that long-term impcats might be, but more studies needed to be done.

Maybe (and probably) I missed something in there, but the report is not a loud and urgent call against pulse flows.

B-

Bjorn: I'm not a biologist either, but it sure seems to me that if there is an adverse impact as noted it's kind of like being sorta pregnant....if it is, it is, there's no way to minimize or rationalize the harm. This, to me, and only IMHO, is a sure way to let things escalate over a long period of time until we have NO bugs in the streams. Would you be opposed to pulse flows in the Upper Sac?

Charlie, I'm not in favor of them anywhere. Would I like them on the Upper Sac? Hell no. What I'm saying is that if our only argument is the Garcia Report, it's not going to be enough. Relicensing is never about what is 100% best for the fishery, it's about "beneficial uses" and the wide view of what that means. If it were only about biology, we'd have a lot easier go of it. We would tear down most of these dams if it were all about the fishery. Of course, there are dams that actually creat fisheries where there wouldn't be fisheries... those tailwaters are pretty good fishing.

We want it to be black or white. How can it be when even this little bit of science is kind of hard to pull anything monochromatic from? It's just more complicated than we'd like it to be and more compromise is required than anyone would like.

B-

My understanding of the FERC agreements, including NFF, is that there is built in monitoring and mitigation. I know that Dale has a lot of knowledge about the Velma Mays, and their virtual disappearance. What needs to happen now is the studies that show it, if they're not under way already, and the subsequent mitigation. If the increased flows for whitewater recreation have caused to damage to aquatic life and the fishery, that needs to be mitigated. FERC hearings create strange bedfellows. And compromise is compromise, it's not always getting your way. I do feel like CalTrout's silence on this is disappointing. I'm going to see if I can get any response from them.

“Compromise” Now there is a process and a word that MUST have been invented by some namby pamby wishy washy do gooder liberal who truly believed that we “must get along”. What a crock of crap that is.

Compromise is the reason there are so many ills in the world right now. Not life threatening, per say, but ills none the less. How about if we made people responsible for the actions they take? An excellent example of this is one of the biggest compromises we have in this state today, the “bandruptcy laws”.
Can anyone logically explain to me why someone, of their own volition got into so much debt that they feel they can declare bankruptcy and just walk away with nothing more than seven years of bad credit? Has our criminal system completely failed to protect the innocent? Answer: Resoundingly YES!

Is giving away our resources any different? Do pulse flows harm the existing environment? Of course they do, otherwise Mother Nature would have year-long pulse flows on rivers that don’t have dams. It is my contention that we should keep these people in court to defend the rights of all the fish and insects that are gravely harmed by any actions that are so detrimental to the good of the eco system involved. These types of decisions should not be put in the hands of committees, who either knowingly or unknowingly are the pawns of power brokers with specific goals in mind that are generally not in the interest of the general public. Let complete evidence be presented to judges (in whom, believe it or not, I have complete faith in their neutrality of decision) for consideration and a ruling. However, it is also the responsibility of the people to provide sufficient funds that a complete study of the harm can be made.

LONG LIVE THE BUGS!!!!!!!!

Yes, long live the bugs... sounds good. Their lawyers are paid more than our lawyers... if we rely on the courts we stand to lose... a lot.

Compromise sucks... not sure how bankruptcy ties in to compromise, that's more getting around the system, not working in it. Compromise would be the debtee working an agreement out with the credit card company to lower fees or principal and not going into bankruptcy... each side gives a bit. If it weren't for compromise we'd have about 50 wars a year. If it weren't for compromise California would never have a budget (even with compromise it takes 2 or 3 extra months).

Who knows, maybe the next time the NFF license comes up we are producing so much power from alternative sources that we won't need those dams at all and they can come out. If we didn't need the dams in the first place, there would be no recreational flows at all, and we certainly wouldn't keep the dams up strictly to provide entertainment for some folks.