Wednesday, Feb 22, 2012

The North Pond

Inoperable tidal gates allow fresh salt water to enter the North Pond, increasing salinity levels and wiping out habitat for Red-Legged Frogs, the tidewater goby, and the San Francisco Garter Snake.

*Click on image to magnify.

Pescadero Marsh :: a sensitive ecosystem

DPR projects in 1993 and 1997 included building or breaching levees and excavating channels to move sediments, improve tidal circulation and/or maintain fresh water areas. The results of the work, which included excavation of wide channels has increased hydrologic function in many areas. However, the work has created some compromises in natural function through the retention of some levees and construction of the culverts acting as tidal gates. These works intended to improve the habitat for wildlife species dependent on fresh water. Unfortunately, the low levee was too low and has eroded (after being raised somewhat once) and the tidal gates were never operated to maintain the desired habitats, they are now inoperative (as you can see in the photos).

Pescadero Marsh :: a sensitive ecosystem

* Below is an excerpt from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service 5 year review of the San Francisco Garter Snake.

The population of SFGS (San Francisco Garter Snake) at Pescadero Marsh is another significant SFGS population that is most likely experiencing a decline. At this property, saline inundation of the marsh has contributed to the decline of quality fresh water habitat. Much of the marsh remains brackish (J. Smith, pers. comm.) with salinities unsuitable for the various frog species that comprise the SFGS’ diet (C. Atkinson, pers. comm.; P. Keel, pers. comm.). Further suitable habitat for these anuran (taxonomie group of amphibians containing frogs and toads) populations continues to decline in the area (J. Smith, pers. comm.). Due to this perpetuation of high salinity levels in portions of the marsh, the effectiveness of current restoration work does not appear to have reduced the quantity of sea water entering the fresh water system.
Pescadero Marsh :: a sensitive ecosystem

* This is an excerpt from Wetlands Regional Monitoring Program Plan 2002

Unpublished field and laboratory observations indicate that California redlegged frogs cannot successfully reproduce at salinities >4.5% (Jennings and Hayes 1990). Larvae cannot survive in salinities >7.0% (Jennings in litt. as cited in Miller et al. 1996). Juvenile and adult frogs seem to avoid salinities >9.0% (Jennings and Hayes 1990) and will move significant distances to escape from areas that become too saline (Rathbun et al. 1993). For these reasons, California red-legged frogs are largely restricted to freshwater and slightly brackish water habitats. For lagoon habitats such as Pescadero Marsh in Santa Cruz County, California red-legged frogs will be present only during periods when the salinities of the lagoons are within the range tolerated by these animals.

Pescadero Marsh :: a sensitive ecosystem

Pescadero Marsh :: a sensitive ecosystem
 

Help to Restore the Marsh!

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*ESTIMATES: STEEHEAD REARING*
*click to view

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Heron and other predatory birds were seen feeding on the shorelines.

November 25, 2010

January 3, 2008

KGO news report 2010

KGO news report 2003

Quotes From News Article, Reports, and Resources

  • San Mateo Times Nov 7, 2010
  • Jerry Smith Studies 1995-1996
  • HMB Review Nov 17, 2010
  • HMB Review Feb, 2010
  • HMB Review Dec 09, 2009

“We’re now 15 years in and the problem is still unsolved. When the system is in utter collapse, you don’t study that. You take action,” said Ronda Azevado Lucas, an attorney representing a group of Pescadero anglers and concerned citizens who are about to file a lawsuit accusing state resources agencies of abdicating their responsibility to protect sensitive fish and amphibians under the California Endangered Species Act.”

“Everyone acknowledges something went wrong in the 1990s, when State Parks, which owns the marsh, re-engineered the water flow with levees, culverts and water gates. Many of these fixes quickly became defective but were left in place.”

(more ...)

“North Marsh was to have been kept no more than mildly brackish, to ensure habitat for
red-legged frogs. However, saline water spilled over the low levee and filled the marsh within
months of the completion of the levee in 1993. In March 1994 the salinity of the Marsh (F2),
the ditch along the south side (El) and the sag ponds (Sl) exceeded 6.6 PPT (Table 1) and
remained saline all year.” (Smith and Reis).

(more ...)

“If you or I owned this property, we’d definitely be in jail. There are endangered species here that are in peril,” said Ronda Azevado Lucas, an attorney representing the plaintiffs. “We were ignored, and that’s why we’re in court. We had no other options.”

“In the fall months, decomposing vegetation and the water column’s salty, sulfuric underlayers use up all the oxygen in the water, which essentially suffocates the aquatic ecosystem. The salty, sulfurous layers typically remain on the bottom of the marsh ponds, and aquatic species are able to veer away from low-oxygen areas. But in late fall, when the ocean waves burst through the sandbars, the currents stir up toxic layers in the lagoons and quickly make the water lethal.”

(more ...)

“Each year of the past decade, as fall becomes winter, the Pescadero fisherman watches the silver bodies of steelhead trout wash up on the banks at Pescadero Marsh, hoping the government will heed his call for intervention and respond with action. It’s not happening fast enough.”

“My view on it is State Parks should be given a letter of intent which clearly describes the problems everyone has with the way State Parks is doing things, and (the department) should be given a chance to respond,” Steel said. “Once that’s on the table, it’s up to Parks. But if they continue to block everyone’s concerns without explaining the rationale for doing so, I have a feeling (the Native Sons) will file suit.”

(more ...)

“Around this time each year, the sandbar separating Pescadero Marsh from the Pacific Ocean breaks, ushering in another season for fishing steelhead trout and, to varying degrees, another episode of what Coastsiders call the “fish kill.” It’s a yearly phenomenon in which fish turn up dead at a critical point in their lifecycle.”

“When the sandbar broke, a passerby mistook the out pour of brackish marsh water in the ocean for an oil spill, and reported the ominous black cloud to Fish and Game.”

(more ...)