After a particularly wet spring in California, consultants for Pacific Gas & Electric recently revealed some alarming results regarding foothill yellow legged frogs on the North Fork Feather River.
The flows in the Feather, and most other rivers in the state, had elevated flows throughout most of this winter and spring. Once spill flows came under control, dam operators abruptly reduced flows in the North Fork Feather River. Sierra Rivers gradually drop. The consultants found that many of the frog’s egg masses became stranded when dam operations dropped flows rapidly at the end of the high water period. The unfortunate result is that the stranded egg masses are exposed to air and generally do not produce tadpoles. The loss of these stranded egg masses has significantly reduced the number of tadpoles this year.
After consulting with several government agencies AW representatives have agreed to cancel the July whitewater release on the Cresta reach which would occur on Saturday July 21st. While several years of study have yielded no direct evidence of negative effects on tadpoles during the releases, taking a cautious approach with this small population of frogs is a prudent decision. AW insisted on an in depth look at the operations of the dams that caused many of the egg masses to be stranded as a condition for agreeing to canceling the Cresta release. “We are not going to ask boaters to bear the cost of protecting frogs if we don’t try and fix the real problem,” said California Stewardship Director, Dave Steindorf.
Frogs have been the intensive focus of biological studies during the whitewater releases over the past five years. “It has been our feeling for a long time that much of the concern over whitewater releases has been misplaced, the real issues is the project that takes 90% of the water out of the river and often creates many unnatural flow fluctuations, especially during the spring run-off period that is so critical for frogs,” stated Steindorf. The Cresta release that occurs on Saturday is the only release that is being canceled, no frogs have been found on the Rock Creek reach.
For now the release in August is still scheduled for the 26th and 27th, however, the fate of this release will be discussed at a meeting on July 19th. “We appreciated American Whitewater supporting this decision to cancel this flow event,” said Mike Taylor, Senior Hydrologist for the Plumas National Forest, “Protecting this sensitive species is a critical concern for our agency”. Please be sure to check the AW website and events calendar for notifications of any future schedule changes.