News release: Repeat of massive sturgeon die-offs likely
Huge die-offs of white sturgeon in the San Francisco Bay/Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta estuary over the last two years were so devastating that the California Fish and Game Commission recently moved to list the iconic gamefish under the state Endangered Species Act. But that decision is hardly an adequate substitute for meaningful action, said Tom Cannon, a fisheries expert and consulting biologist for the California Water Impact Network. The reasons adult white sturgeon died by the thousands in 2022 and 2023 were warm water and algae blooms, conditions caused by excessive state and federal water diversions for corporate San Joaquin agriculture. “The one meaningful thing the Newsom administration could do to avoid another kill is increase cool water flows down the Delta,” said Cannon. “But they aren’t doing that, and now we’re seeing the same conditions in the Bay/Delta that we saw in 2022 and 2023 just prior to the die-offs.”