Winter water a blessing for fish, wildlife

A sturgeon is like a tree. It takes many years to grow a forest.

Those seeds are being planted. The big winter for rain and snow, and the freshwater push from the mountains to the Delta to the bay, mean conditions are ideal this year for fish and wildlife in the bay and delta.

Similar conditions occurred after the winters of 1982-83, ’85-86, and ’97-98. The keys are the big freshwater push, that the Delta pumps were turned off for periods for repairs, and a full San Luis Reservoir, near Los Banos, which means exports to points south can be sent from the reservoir rather than from the Delta pumps.

Sturgeon, striped bass, endangered winter-run salmon and waterfowl are seeing the benefits.

Sturgeon: A mature female is 25 years old, usually about 5½ feet long, and weighing 90 pounds. The sturgeon spawn in the Delta once every four years or so and produce 400,000 eggs. Those eggs are released in the Sacramento River near Colusa in early spring. A few weeks later, the tiny fry hatch, growing to an inch long before being carried with the river current to the lower Delta, between Rio Vista to Benicia. Here, they stay for six years, reaching 3 feet long. With the pumps down or slowed, the tiny fry will flow with the current to the safe nursery grounds of northern Suisun Bay, where they’re likely to see high survival rates.

Striped bass: When striped bass spawn, their eggs are suspended in the current of the Delta for 48 hours before hatching. For years, those eggs have been sucked right down the Delta pumps, which run at 70,000 gallons per second. This spring, they will be carried, like the sturgeon fry, to their safe downstream nursery habitats.

Winter-run salmon: In the drought, endangered winterrun salmon smolts have been fooled by flows in the Delta Cross Channel near Locke. They think it’s a river, but it funnels them into the pumps. Not this year.

Waterfowl: Freshwater, not saltwater, has infused the lower Delta wetlands at Suisun Marsh. Ducks can nest in the marsh highlands and lead their hatchlings to nearby freshwater.