Yuba River Salmon Tours Begin November 1

Yuba River Salmon Tours Begin November 1

by Dan Bacher

For thousands of years, wild chinook salmon have returned from the ocean through San Francisco Bay to Central Valley rivers to complete their long journey of sex, death, and rebirth that connects the ocean to the mountains. After the adult salmon die every fall after spawning, their carcasses recycle nutrients into the food chain that sustains juvenile salmon, steelhead and other fish species.

As a longtime recreational fisherman that has caught many salmon in the ocean off central and northern California and in the Sacramento, American and Feather rivers over the years, I am very familiar with the annual journey of these wonderful fish. However, there are many people in California who have never seen a salmon in their native habitat. The Source to Sea Collective invites you to come witness an amazing phenomena that is taking place in your own watershed, your own backyard.

Central Valley chinook salmon are in their greatest crisis ever now. The population of Sacramento River fall run fish has collapsed from over 800,000 fish in 2002 to only 60,000 fish this year, due to massive increases in water exports from the California Delta and declining water quality under the Bush and Schwarzenegger administrations, combined with poor ocean conditions in 2005 and other factors. On the Yuba River, salmon populations have declined to less than ten thousand fish in the Yuba in recent years.

Salmon fishing is closed for the first time in history in ocean waters off California and Oregon and Central Valley rivers this year. Only a short recreational salmon fishing season from November 1 through December 31 in a limited stretch of the Sacramento River from Knights Landing to Red Bluff will be allowed this year.

A broad coalition of recreational anglers, commercial fishermen, environmentalists and California Indian Tribes is engaged in a fierce battle to restore these beautiful fish to Central Valley rivers by opposing increased water exports, working to bring down dams, fighting against water pollution and restoring habitat.

In partnership with the San Francisco-based Environmental Traveling Companions, SYRCL (the South Yuba River Citizens League) is sponsoring their annual Salmon Raft Tours for the public this November on the Yuba River, a tributary of the Feather River. These easy float tours are guided by experienced rafters with staff and experts from SYRCL giving talks about the amazing life-cycle of salmon and the current predicaments facing our native California wild salmon populations.

The dates are: Saturday, November 1st, Saturday, November 8th, and Saturday, November 15th.

Have you ever seen a salmon up close? "It is an experience not to be missed," according to the Source to Sea Collective. "Come watch them in their mad dash to get upstream, see the nests (called redds) that they build out of gravel, check out the dams and ridiculously outdated fish ladders that impede their journey, and examine the carcasses that are left behind after they complete this all important spawning act."

The tour's cost is $50 for SYRCL members, $65 for non-members and $35 for children ages 7-12. For more information or to reserve your spot, contact Davido Crow at Environmental Traveling Companions: 415-474-7662 ext. 15 or riverprogram [at] etctrips.org.

The tours run out of Nevada City, CA - a beautiful and historic town nestled in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada and a little less than a 3 hour drive from the Bay Area. If you'd like more information about where to stay, where to eat, and how to get to Nevada City, contact Jessie Raeder from the Source to Sea Collective at sourcetosea [at] gmail.com.

Source to Sea-er Jessie Raeder says: "Last year's Salmon Tour was both fun and an incredibly wonderful re-introduction to a lost heritage. Sadly, even though I am a lifelong Californian, it was first time I became acquainted with this majestic creature. Before that tour I had never seen a salmon swimming in our rivers (they don't make it past the dams to the upper Yuba or the other rivers where I swam as a kid), nor had I known that salmon play such a major role in the history and ecology of California."

"These fish are California's heritage, and it ought to be a birthright to watch their migration upstream," emphasized Raeder. "Instead of a right, however, we have a great responsibility - to improve the conditions we have created so that these fish might thrive again.

Source to Sea is a collective of Bay Area activists, artists, performers, and "fish-hugging river lovers" dedicated to seeing the dams come down, the Yuba River restored, and the wild salmon returning to their ancestral spawning ground. To be added to their contact list, email sourcetosea [at] gmail.com.