Topic List: Environmental Issues

Eschmeyer’s Catalog of Fishes is the definitive global source, with the Latin name for 65,000 species compiled by biologists at the California Academy of Sciences under the leadership of Bill Eschmeyer of San Anselmo, who spent 40 years on an odyssey that took him to every museum with a collection of dead fish in jars. The database he created, which started before the Internet, was still growing and being refined long after Eschmeyer retired and moved to the East Coast to be near his three adult children. He died Dec. 30 at an assisted care facility in Nashua, N.H., said his daughter Lanea Tripp, who was named for an 18th century Swedish biologist her father admired. Eschmeyer had suffered from dementia compounded by long COVID. He was 85.

The Yurok Fisheries Department has completed a major milestone in the restoration of the Klamath River ecosystem. Following the removal of dams along a 38-mile stretch of the river, the department’s Revegetation crew recently hand-sowed 11,500 pounds of native plant seeds between the former Iron Gate Dam and JC Boyle Reservoir. The seeds included a diverse mix of native grasses, herbs, and forbs that historically thrived in the area. As part of this ambitious restoration project, the crew will plant 21,000 white oak acorns and 108,000 native trees and shrubs in the coming months. Since the project began, the team has planted approximately 76,000 trees, shrubs, and grass plugs, 28,000 acorns, and 4,200 milkweed starts. Wildflowers, pine saplings, and baby oaks are already thriving in the post-dam environment.

Four populations of California’s foothill yellow-legged frog would be protected with the help of 760,071 acres of designated critical habitat, under a Fish and Wildlife Service proposal made public Monday. The proposed critical habitat includes forested portions of the wildfire-prone Sierra Nevada as well as the Santa Cruz mountains and coastal areas. Together, the proposed critical habitat is designed to support the endangered South Sierra and South Coast populations and the threatened North Feather and Central Coast populations of the yellow-legged frog. All told, the proposed critical habitat is identified in 27 frog-occupied parcels, with 47 percent of the affected land owned by the federal government, while 49 percent of the total acreage is privately owned. Critical habitat is not a reserve, but activities involving federal funding or other action on the land require consultation with the Fish and Wildlife Service.

Related articles:

• Action News Now (Chico, Calif.): U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposes 760,000 acres of critical habitat to protect foothill yellow-legged frogs in California
• Center for Biological Diversity: 760,000 acres of critical habitat proposed to protect imperiled frogs in California

… Sandhill cranes return to the same spots every year, so seeing some birds roosting with the decoys is “very exciting,” said Greg Golet, an avian ecologist with The Nature Conservancy who helps run a program to expand wetland habitat for migratory species called Bird Returns. The Central Valley is one of the most important regions of the Pacific Flyway for cranes and other waterbirds to overwinter or rest and refuel on their way further south. It supports hundreds of resident and migratory species that come here from breeding grounds as far north as the Arctic tundra. … Protecting wild birds and the vanishing native ecosystems they depend on has left ecologists scrambling to create as much habitat as possible, where and when migrating birds need it most.

Happy New Year to all the friends, supporters, readers and participants of the tours, articles and workshops we featured in 2024!  … As we turn the page to 2025, one of our most exciting projects will be a first-ever Klamath River Basin Tour in September. We’ll visit some of the sites where four dams came down along the river’s mainstem, and talk to tribes and farmers in the region and learn from scientists watching the river’s restoration unfold. … In March, we return to the Southwest’s most important river with our Lower Colorado River Tour, and the bus is quickly filling up! We then journey across the San Joaquin Valley on our Central Valley Tour in April and take a deep dive into California’s water hub in May with our signature Bay-Delta Tour. On April 10, we will be hosting our popular Water 101 Workshop in Sacramento.

Nearly a quarter of animals living in rivers, lakes and other freshwater sources are threatened with extinction, according to new research published Wednesday. “Huge rivers like the Amazon can appear mighty, but at the same time freshwater environments are very fragile,” said study co-author Patricia Charvet, a biologist at Brazil’s Federal University of Ceará. Freshwater habitats – including rivers, lakes, ponds, streams, bogs and wetlands – cover less than 1% of the planet’s surface, but support 10% of its animal species, said Catherine Sayer, a zoologist at the International Union for Conservation of Nature in England. The researchers examined around 23,500 species of dragonflies, fish, crabs and other animals that depend exclusively on freshwater ecosystems. They found that 24% were at risk of extinction – classified as vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered – due to compounding threats from pollution, dams, water extraction, agriculture, invasive species, climate change and other disruptions.

Other fish article:

• Mercury News: Are salmon native to San Jose? South Bay volunteers are hopeful for an answer

A California ecosystem has gotten a big boost from an adorable, fluffy and hungry friend. At Elkhorn Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve, a newly-reinvigorated population of native southern sea otters has eaten so many invasive European green crabs that researchers say the otters have locally solved a problem that has plagued the West Coast for years. States are spending millions to protect their inland waterways from the tiny crabs. Though small – they reach only four inches in width – the invaders harm native wildlife and shoreline ecosystems. At stake are multi-million dollar shellfish industries for Dungeness, king crab and other species. But at the reserve, otters have almost wiped the crabs out, helping the estuary’s ecosystem come back into balance.

A new dataset for the Santiam River in Oregon, published by the U.S. Geological Survey, provides a highly detailed underwater 3D elevation map that will help support fish habitat restoration and flood modeling work.  The work was done as part of the USGS 3D Elevation Program, known as 3DEP, which uses a next-generation mapping technology to obtain highly detailed three-dimensional elevation information about the natural and constructed landscapes of the Nation, including surfaces under rivers and other inland waterbodies. Known as topobathymetric lidar, the technology uses laser pulses that penetrate water to provide accurate measurements of both the riverbed and the surrounding topography. The data are essential for understanding river dynamics, aquatic habitat conditions and flood risk. It will also be used to develop models of habitat availability for salmon and steelhead and other fish species in relation to river flow below Willamette Valley system dams.

Fish Friendly Farming, a sustainable certification program approved for Sonoma County winegrowers, recognized La Prenda Vineyard Management in November for environmentally beneficial land practices. La Prenda Vineyard Management was honored with the Next Wave of Sustainability award, a recognition given to certified growers who’ve demonstrated outstanding achievements in sustainability. The Fish Friendly Farming program was created in 1999 to protect and enhance the Russian River watershed in Sonoma County before expanding to more than 220,000 acres located in 13 California counties that are enrolled in the program. La Prenda Vineyard Management founder Ned Hill values healthy, sustainable farming practices that benefit the environment. “I was very fortunate to grow up in the Sonoma Valley and as a kid caught numerous trout in our local creeks, so it’s very important to me that we farm lightly and continue to maintain and enhance the environment with our farming practices” Hill said in a news release. 

More than a hundred industrial trade groups and chambers of commerce are urging President-elect Donald Trump to weaken or eliminate numerous Biden administration regulations on energy, air pollution, recycling, worker heat protections, consumer safeguards and corporate financing, claiming that the rules are “strangling” the nation’s economy. … On clean water protections, the manufacturers urged Trump to ensure that the EPA’s regulatory decision-making complies with a landmark 2023 Supreme Court decision scaling back federal protections for many wetlands and streams. … TheSupreme Court’s decision has drawn criticism from scientists and environmental advocates, who say the gutting of safeguards will jeopardize water quality throughout the arid West.

After nearly a century of people building dams on most of the world’s major rivers, artificial reservoirs now represent an immense freshwater footprint across the landscape. Yet, these reservoirs are understudied and overlooked for their fisheries production and management potential, indicates a study from the University of California, Davis. The study, published in the journal Scientific Reports, estimates that U.S. reservoirs hold 3.5 billion kilograms (7.7 billion pounds) of fish. Properly managed, these existing reservoir ecosystems could play major roles in food security and fisheries conservation.