Restrictions spawn hard times ahead

As anglers find themselves with only a scrap of a salmon season on the Sacramento River, those with livelihoods sunk into fishing are preparing for belt-tightening, while hoping to hold out for better times.

New restrictions by the state Fish and Game Commission — including a delay in the angling season to November and December — come as salmon stocks in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta have crashed to record lows.

Suppliers to the business have started laying off workers and preparing for sharp drops in business, but some conceded the limits may be needed to save the annual autumn salmon run for the future.

"If it helps salmon for next year, then I hope it does a lot of good," said Pat Kittle, whose Colusa fishing and hunting supply store, Kittle's Outdoor & Sport Co., stands mere yards from the Sacramento.

The curbs the Commission approved Friday limit angling to one salmon per person each day in November and December, and only between Knights Landing and Red Bluff.

No salmon may be taken from the Feather and Yuba rivers, or from any other tributaries of the Sacramento.

Economic losses from the angling restri tions could reach $20 million this year, according to Scott Barrow, a Fish and Game biologist.

Fishing officials acted after recording fewer than 90,000 salmon in last fall's migration from the Pacific Ocean to the Delta river system, where most of the fish are born and then return to spawn. That figure fell from nearly 800,000 fish in 2002, and state Fish and Game biologists predict just 54,000 salmon will make the journey this fall.

Last month, the Pacific Fishery Management Council canceled all ocean fishing for salmon off California and most of Oregon, the toughest crackdown ever imposed in the western U.S.

In those conditions, salvaging even a short fishing season is a partial victory, according to Bob Boucke, owner of Johnson's Bait & Tackle in Yuba City. But the late-fall window for anglers falls well outside the busiest part of the season. He expects to lose 30 percent of his business this year, and has plans to lay off some of his staff.

Limiting angling to the last two months of the year carries its own risk, according to Ralph Fusaro, an 81-year-old Colusa resident who has fished the Sacramento most of his life. By pushing the season close to the start of winter, anglers are more likely to hook females carrying eggs and thus thin out much of the next generation of fish.

For Fusaro, who said his catch fell from more than 100 salmon in 2004 to just one last year, the payoff from this year's season seemed hardly worthwhile.

"If they're going to do it, they should shut (angling) down for the full year, so we can benefit the following year," he said.

A Marysville angler welcomed the preservation of some fishing this fall, but warned that soaring costs will discourage many potential visitors even if the fishing curbs do not.

"For weekend fishermen, it's hard," said Bill Simmons, a former Yuba County supervisor. "You get two days of fishing and then you have to go back to work on Monday. The cost is horrendous — $10 to launch your boat, then you pay $4 a gallon for gas, and then you go buy bait. Pretty soon you're talking an $80, $90, $100 day just to go fishing."

"It'll be ugly," said Boucke, the Yuba City bait shop owner. "It's gonna be really hard on us."

Contact Appeal-Democrat reporter Howard Yune at 749-4708, 458-2121 or hyune@appealdemocrat.com.