FRESH WATER FISHING
| Description - The striper is the largest member of the temperate bass
family. Body coloration is olive-green to blue-gray on the back with silvery
to brassy sides and white on the belly. It is easily recognized by the seven
or eight prominent black uninterrupted horizontal stripes along the sides.
The stripes are often interrupted or broken and are usually absent on young
fish of less than six inches. The striper is longer and sleeker and has a
larger head than its close and similar looking relative, the white bass,
which rarely exceeds three pounds. |
California Striped
Bass Association
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Striper
- Temperate Bass |
California
Central Valley Steelhead
California Wetlands Information
System
Coho Salmon Habitat
Description
Cold
Water Fisheries and Water Quality in California
Endangered
and Threatened Species
Endangered Species Petition
- California Coho
Fisheries
Programs
Fresh
Water Species More Endangered Than Mammals and Birds
Glossary of Terms
Los Penasquitos Lagoon
- San Diego, CA
Marre Dam
Study For Fish Passage Improvement
Central California
North
American Freshwater Fish Index
Recreational Fishing Alliance Home
Page
Rivers,
Streams and Watersheds
Salmon - Essential
Fish Habitat Descriptions
Salmon
Species
San
Francisco Estuary Project
Southwest Fisheries
U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Florida Game & Fresh
Water Fish Commission - Division of Fisheries
TheBassman's
Cove
Rock Creek
Rock Creek Canyon is located in California's Eastern Sierra
Nevada Mountains between Bishop and Mammoth Lakes and offers fishing
opportunities to anglers of all levels.
Fred's Fishing
Adventures
Fred's Fishing Adventures features an abundance of fresh water fishing British
Columbia opportunities and Information.
Ultimate Fishing Note
Book - Oologah, Oklahoma
Bob Meyer is an Oklahoma fisherman with a passion for detail and research.
Fred's Fishing Adventures
The Fraser Valley near Chilliwack, British Columbia, offers an abundance
of fresh water fishing opportunities.
Anglers Online Anglers
Online, your resource for Angling on the net!
BASS FISHING HOME
PAGE Low graphics, big info.
The Sport Fishing WebSite
Welcome to The SportFishing WebSite, dedicated to fresh- and salt-water
anglers.
Western Bass Western
Bass was created to give instruction and guidance on tournament bass fishing
on western waters. Western Bass will be dedicated to fishing professionals,
amateurs, and team anglers alike.
Angler's Waterfront Motel &
Pro Bass Guide Service Angler's Waterfront Motel & Pro
Guide Service is located in Buckhead Ridge, a Glades County community on
the northwestern shore of Lake Okeechobee in South Central Florida.
Pensacola Military
Bass A nonprofit Bass fishing organization. The organization
was formed in September 1989 for the purpose of engaging in the promotion
and instruction of the sport of Bass fishing, with particular attention to
the weekend angler.
On Lake Erie "dedicated
to helping you locate any and all the many services available on Lake Erie."
The Ogallala aquifer which waters the world's bread basket on the
American prairies is being 'mined' at such a rate that it will be exhausted
within 50 years.
In Central California, the rate of water removal from aquifers exceeds
the rate of refilling by 5000 billion gallons.
In Florida, over 1,000 wells have had to be closed due to pollution.
In parts of India, water tables have fallen by 25-30 metres in the past
decade. In Northern India, double cropping of wheat and rice has led
to a fall in the water table of a metre a year, in a country whose population
is growing by 17 million a year.
Each year the river Rhine carries across the German-Dutch border
1,000 tonnes of lead, 400 tonnes of phenols, 322 tonnes of arsenic,
80 tonnes of cadmium, 20 tonnes of PCBs and 16 tonnes of mercury
25% of China's lakes are classified as having eutrophic nutrient overload
due to human pollution while 33% of American medium to large lakes
are
similarly stricken.
5 million people in Britain drink water which breaches EC recommended
safety levels.
Pollution of the Great Lakes in North America is such that 25% of fish
caught is not fit for consumption.
300 million gallons of sewage are dumped into British coastal waters each
day.
90% of Brazil's sewage is discharged untreated. |
California's Wetlands:
A Briefing
A Briefing on California Water Issues
California’s Wetlands: A Briefing, published in 2000. Special thanks
go to the CALFED Bay-Delta Program that funded development of this guide
and these Internet excerpts.
CALIFORNIA’S WETLANDS: A BRIEFING
Wetlands are among the most important ecosystems in the world. They produce
high levels of oxygen, filter toxic chemicals out of water, reduce flooding
and erosion, recharge groundwater and provide a diverse range of recreational
opportunities from fishing and hunting to photography. They also serve as
critical habitat for wildlife, including a large percentage of plants and
animals on California’s endangered species list.
Where once Californians saw wetlands as mucky, stinky, buggy and sometimes
unhealthy places, many now see an environmental, economic and aesthetic value
in wetlands. Within the last two decades, there has been discussion of
wetlands’ value to individual communities, agriculture and the state
economy.
As the state has grown into one of the world’s leading economies,
Californians have developed and transformed the state’s marshes, swamps and
tidal flats, losing as much as 90 percent of the original wetlands acreage
– a greater percentage of loss than any other state in the nation. While
the conversion of wetlands has slowed, the loss in California is significant
and it affects a range of factors from water quality to quality of life.
Wetlands still remain in every part of the state, with the greatest
concentration is in the San Francisco Bay/Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta
(Bay-Delta) Estuary and its watershed, which includes the Central Valley.
While wetlands in all areas of the state are important, the Bay-Delta and
related wetlands take on special significance because they are part of the
vast complex of waterways that provide two-thirds of California’s drinking
water. A healthy estuary and healthy wetlands have an impact on nearly every
Californian.
Californians have always chosen to live and work amid wetlands. State
and federal agencies, regional boards, agriculture, industry, conservationists
and other concerned citizens are working to navigate issues and conflicting
needs to find solutions for all stakeholders in wetlands issues. Various
attempts have been undertaken to slow the loss of wetlands. Today, many
stakeholders are working to increase wetlands acreage in the state.
This is a particularly relevant time to examine the role of wetlands
in California because of the pace of growth. California is expected to grow
by another 12 million people in the next 20 years. While all of California
will feel the impact of more people, the Central Valley will experience the
most dramatic population growth – more than 50 percent. The Bay Area
has experienced significant economic and population growth in the last decade
and this will continue. With the increase in population will come additional
pressures for changes in land use, with potential impacts to wetlands in
the valley and elsewhere.
The key to the state’s water future and the key to wetlands health is
balance. Ways must be found to balance ecosystem restoration with water system
reliability and existing land use while addressing competing issues, concerns
and needs of all water users.
What is a Wetland?
In general, California’s wetlands are the bogs, swamps, estuaries and
marshes connected to streams, groundwater, rivers, lakes and coastlines.
The majority of California’s wetlands are semi-aquatic links in a water-based
chain extending from the Sierra Nevada to the Pacific Ocean.
While wetlands have characteristics of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems,
they are neither. They form their own unique systems, which typically include
specific types of soils supporting plants adapted to the soils and a watery
environment. Despite their name, wetlands are not always wet, though
characteristically, they experience periodic saturation.
Wetlands can be permanent or seasonal. Permanent wetlands tend to stay
saturated with water, and in the case of tidal wetlands are flooded or drained
twice each day. Seasonal wetlands such as tule fields and vernal pools experience
saturation or flooding only part of the year. Even though water may be present
only a few weeks out of every year, seasonal wetlands nonetheless share with
permanent wetlands the soils, plants and animal life characteristic of
"wetlands."
Another classification divides wetlands into those associated with oceans
(marine and estuarine), lakes (lacustrine), rivers and streams (riverine)
and those found in inland areas including marshes, swamps and bogs (palustrine).
The vast majority of California’s historical and remaining wetlands are estuarine
and palustrine.
Many Californians are aware only of coastal and tidal wetlands, yet the
majority of California’s wetlands lie in freshwater environments. Freshwater
marshes occur in ponds and slow moving streams vegetated with cattails, sedges
and rushes. Riparian wetlands, noted for their woody vegetation, occur on
the banks of streams, rivers and lakes. Bogs have peat soils composed of
peat and are vegetated mostly with mosses. Vernal pools form unique, short-lived
ecosystems in shallow depressions in the spring.
Benefits and Values of Wetlands
"I have never believed that the great usefulness of wetlands to people
is why they are ‘good,’ but the last 20th-century concept that they aren’t
bad at least indicates modest progress of thought," wrote Ted Williams in
Audubon Magazine.
Williams’ comment underscores an unresolvable controversy: What is the
value of wetlands and is their value to be judged entirely in human terms?
Nature and commerce, however, have begun to combine on the issue of wetlands,
making their "value" more quantifiable.
Water Quality
Water passing through wetlands contains organisms, sediments, nutrients
and pollutants that could degrade groundwater or the water quality of rivers,
lakes and estuaries. The vegetation and soil in the wetland filter the water
and do such a remarkable job of absorbing nutrients and contaminants that
they have been called the "kidneys of the landscape." Some wetland plants,
such as tules, reeds and cattails, are remarkably effective biofilters, breaking
down harmful pollutants into simple forms which not only can be used for
food for other organisms, but also can make water easier to treat for urban
uses. One acre of wetlands can filter 7.3 million gallons of water a year.
Flood Control
Wetlands can reduce the effect of floods by temporarily storing flood
waters and detaining the flow of water through the sponging effect of the
soil and the barrier effect of the vegetation. After absorbing and detaining
this water, wetlands slowly release it. Wetlands expert Bill Streever writes
in Bringing Back the Wetlands that wetlands along the Mississippi River at
one time could store the water volume of 60 days’ worth of river flow and
that loss of these wetlands compounded the 1993 flood that left 70,000 people
homeless.
Groundwater Recharge
Some wetlands recharge underground aquifers that provide urban and
agricultural water supplies. Their benefit to the aquifer is not only the
filtering service they provide, but also their ability to absorb and hold
floodwaters so that a larger amount of the precipitation is stored as groundwater
and not lost as surface runoff.
Fisheries and Shellfish
Wetlands provide direct spawning and rearing habitats and food supply
that support both freshwater and marine fisheries, a $110-billion-a-year
industry in California. The San Francisco Bay Estuary is home to 28 native
and 28 non-native fish populations in addition to salmon and steelhead
that migrate through the Delta on their journey to and from the ocean. The
tidal lands of Humboldt Bay produce 90 percent of all the oysters harvested
in California.
|