DFG Nabs Nine Sturgeon and Salmon Poaching Suspects

California Department of Fish and Game wardens arrested nine suspects Friday morning for violations involving the illegal take of white sturgeon, a species whose population has declined in recent years, in “Operation Sacked Again."

The DFG’s Delta Bay Enhancement Enforcement Program and Special Operations Unit (SOU) carried out the arrests and searches after an investigation of two groups of local sturgeon anglers observed fishing in the Sacramento River, according to the DFG press release. In addition to the illegally-caught sturgeon seized, wardens also confiscated juvenile chinook salmon that the poachers had caught to use for sturgeon bait.

“We continue to throw all resources we can afford at the sturgeon poaching problem plaguing our river system this time of year,” said Assistant Chief of Enforcement Tony Warrington. “In this case, not only do we have illegal take of sturgeon, we have repeat violations of illegal use of young salmon as bait when the river’s salmon population is significantly low.”

The poaching of juvenile salmon is particularly alarming as commercial and recreational fishermen face fishing closures off the California and Oregon coast due to the unprecedented collapse of Central Valley chinook salmon.

There is no doubt that poaching is a serious problem in the California Delta and Central Valley - and I applaud the wardens for busting the poachers. However, I have two problems with the DFG press release.

First, it gives the image to the public that the Department of Fish and Game wardens are out in rivers in force, enforcing fish and game laws and nabbing poachers. There is nothing in the release to indicate that the DFG is the most underfunded wildlife protection department in the nation.

In California, a state of 37.4 million people, there are only 198 Fish and Game Wardens in the field working to prevent and prosecute polluters, and protect fisheries, wildlife, fauna, and the public. This staffing level is the same as in the 1950’s in actual personnel. This state level of wardens per capita to the general populace is the "worst in America," according to the" 2007 California Fish and Game Warden Expose Update."

Maryland, with 5.3 million people, has 225 wardens. "The impacts of these historic low CA Warden levels can be seen everywhere across the state," the report states. "For example, between the mouth of the Klamath and Yreka, a distance of nearly 200 river miles; not to mention all the tributaries and river stems in between, there are no Wardens residing to stop brazen salmon poaching. Vulnerable salmon on their spawning grounds lie totally exposed to criminals."

Meanwhile, the DFG patrol boat based in Eureka to regulate commercial and sport fishermen in the ocean on the north coast remains un-staffed. "The result is absolutely predictable-historic low levels of salmon that will only continue to decrease unless there is protection by Wardens," the report concludes.

My second problem is that this release, while portraying the Department as out in force on our rivers when the DFG's enforcement division is in fact drastically underfunded and understaffed, appears to be another attempt to point the finger away from the Department of Water Resources for killing off thousands and thousands of fish in the Delta pumps and destroying the Delta food chain by increasing water exports from 2001 to present.

If the DFG "leadership" really wanted to make a difference, they would prosecute state and federal officials for presiding over the destruction of our public trust salmon, steelhead, striped bass, sturgeon and other fisheries. But the DFG is the proverbial fox in the hen house. The DFG "leadership" is partners with DWR and Bureau of Reclamation in the destruction of our fisheries. They are complicit in the crime.

The DFG still hasn't returned my calls on the "progress" of their so-called "criminal investigation" of the Prospect Island fish kill. My instinct says that the Governor's staff pressured the DFG to either stall the investigation or drop it. But since nobody will call me back, I guess I'll never know.

Poaching of sturgeon, salmon, striped bass and other species is a serious crime, but the impacts of poaching are overshadowed by the thousands and thousands of gamefish and endangered species that the Bureau of Reclamation and Department of Water Resources kill in the California Delta every year.

Staged high profile media-oriented "busts" like this latest one are red herrings to distract people from the real causes of our fishery declines: massive increases in water exports and the failure of the State Water Resources Control Board to stop increasing pollution by agricultural waste water.

Poachers should be prosecuted, no doubt, but so should Department of Water Resources and Bureau of Reclamation officials responsible for fishery declines. I, along with most people I talk to, have completely lost respect for the DFG "leadership."

There is a giant crisis of confidence among anglers and the public regarding the California Department of Fish and Game. We had high hopes when Schwarzenegger appointed Ryan Broddrick as director, but Broddrick resigned and went to work for the "dark side," the water contractors, in a classic case of the revolving door of government/corporate corruption.

Until we get a new Governor and a Legislature that stands up for the enforcement of the California Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act and other laws, we can expect more of the same from the DFG. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, the worst governor for fish and the environment in California, is portrayed as the "green governor" by the mainstream media as he consistently vetoes necessary funding to staff the DFG's enforcement division and pushes for the construction of the peripheral canal and two new dams, a proposal that would result in the further destruction of the Bay-Delta estuary's delta smelt, longfin smelt, chinook salmon, steelhead, striped bass, white sturgeon, green sturgeon and other fish populations.

The only thing that stands in the way of the complete destruction of Central Valley and Delta fisheries is heroic groups like the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance and Earthjustice that are standing up for the fish in court by filing lawsuits.