Outdoor Notes / Earl Gustkey : Disease Halts Work at Hatchery
An outbreak of a protozoan disease, PKD, has halted trout planting operations at one of the state’s Eastern Sierra trout hatcheries, Hot Creek Fish Hatchery.
The outbreak of PKD (progressive kidney disease) has affected about 200,000 catchable size Hot Creek rainbow trout, according to Bill Rowan, the Department of Fish and Game’s Eastern Sierra hatchery supervisor.
It’s the second large-scale trout disease problem Eastern Sierra hatchery personnel have faced in recent years. In 1984, a more-deadly trout ailment, whirling disease, killed more than two million rainbow and brown trout at Mt. Whitney Fish Hatchery, near Independence. That hatchery is still closed and may never open again.
PKD isn’t as deadly as whirling disease, Rowan said, and may completely disappear with time. The disease doesn’t affect humans.
“We aren’t going to plant those fish as long as they have the disease,” Rowan said. “It’s a degenerative kidney disease that can only be transmitted to other trout and we don’t want them transmitting it to fish in streams and lakes. PKD doesn’t necessarily kill trout; it just weakens them and makes them susceptible to other diseases. There have been seasonable outbreaks of PKD at one of our hatcheries on the American River for two years.”
Nearly three weeks after opening day, some dove hunters are still bagging birds in the Blythe-Palo Verde Valley area of the Lower Colorado River.
“There’re still birds around and very light hunter pressure,” DFG biologist Ron Powell said. “You can find birds in weed fields that’ve just been plowed.”
Jack Page of Palo Verde and the Palo Verde Rod and Gun Club is still shooting, he says. Normally, most of the dove hunting on the Lower Colorado River occurs on the opening Labor Day Weekend.
“I’m still getting some limits across the river, in Arizona,” he said. “There are birds on both sides of the river. If you know where to look, you can find them. Our second season (Nov. 15-29) will be a good one, I think.
“And we should have an excellent desert quail season (Oct. 18-Jan. 25). It’s the best crop I’ve seen in years. There’ve been a couple of big desert storms and there’s lots of water on the desert now.”
DFG biologists have confirmed what a lot of Southland stream fishermen have known for years: A small number of spawning steelhead trout return each year to Malibu Creek, believed to be the southernmost steelhead habitat in the United States.
Steelhead are ocean-going rainbow trout, common in northern California coastal rivers. The DFG will recommend to the Fish and Game Commission that all fishing be prohibited in a 2.5-mile stretch of the creek between the ocean and Rindge Dam from Dec. 1 until the Friday before Memorial Day, roughly the steelhead spawning season. In the remainder of the year, it will be recommended that fishing be restricted to barbless hooks.
Fishermen who had been permitted a limit of five rainbow trout now would have to release any trout they catch, because juvenile steelhead are often mistaken for adult rainbows.
The biologists’ recommendations will be considered at the Fish and Game Commission’s Oct. 3 meeting in Sacramento.
Hunter pressure was down slightly and the buck harvest up slightly compared to last year’s opening day of the Eastern Sierra deer season, game wardens and biologists reported.
Ron Thomas, DFG biologist, said a total of 207 bucks were checked on opening day at the Zone X9 and X12 check stations, compared to 197 a year ago. Thomas said the Eastern Sierra experienced its second annual decline in percentage of yearling bucks taken.
“What this tells us is that the fawn survival is in a poor state of affairs,” he said. Thomas said principal causes for the decrease in fawn recruitment are hard winters in recent years and increased development within Eastern Sierra deer winter range habitat.
Briefly
Newport Beach’s Chapter of Ducks Unlimited holds its dinner party Oct. 2 at the Balboa Bay Club. . . . Applications for waterfowl hunting on state-operated hunting areas are now available at sporting goods dealers and most DFG offices. . . . Sportfishing Institute figures show that California, in 1985, had 2,616,121 licensed fishermen who paid $33,881,893 in license and stamp fees, far more than any other state. . . . Application deadline for Arizona sandhill crane hunting permits is Sept. 30. . . . Southern California Bertram, Hatteras and Pacifica yacht dealers will be host to the Marlin Benefit Tournament at Avalon Sept. 26-27.
