Lake County >> The U.S. Fish and Wildlife are reviewing the Clear Lake hitch, a species of fish only found in Clear Lake, for possible inclusion on the Endangered Species Act list. There is a 12 month status review process, during which the status will be determined. If declared endangered, there are a number of possible steps that could be taken to protect the fish, some of which have bass fishermen worried.
The bass is an invasive, predator fish, eating anything that it can catch, including the hitch. In order to protect the little fish, bass fishermen may be required to catch and keep all fish, so as to rid the lake of the predator. But according to Terry Knight, Outdoors Writer for the Record-Bee, this practice goes against the nature of the sport. “They did a survey here, they did an on-water survey, and they found 85 to 90 percent of the fishermen release the bass, they don’t take it home with them,” he said. “It’s just the nature of the individual. They don’t like to hear about people keeping fish. If they put a rule out about keeping the fish, they’ll go to a different lake.”
Bassmasters rates Clear Lake as the number two bass fishing lake in the United States and the lake hosts 20 to 30 tournaments a year, drawing in 80 to 100 fishermen each time. Declare that all fishermen must keep the bass they catch, and tournaments will no longer be held on Clear Lake, said Knight. “Tournaments are required by law to release all of the fish they catch,” he continued. “If that were imposed, the tournaments would leave the lake and not come back and in the end would cost tens of thousands of dollars. Economic-wise it’s a huge income for the county.”
With estimates claiming that bass fishermen spend $3 to $4 million a year in Lake County, the idea that the county could lose that revenue is alarming to some. When bass tournaments roll around, fishermen come to town and usually stay for four to five days. It’s estimated that they spend $250 to $300 a day. “It’s not unusual for a bass fishermen to come into a local tackle shop and spend hundreds of dollars,” Knight said. “It is a high dollar sport.”
Knight said that if bass tournaments couldn’t be held in Lake County, it “would have a devastating impact on the economy.”
Bass fishermen aren’t the only people with concerns. Farmers fear that protecting the hitch would lead to water restrictions. Water companies are worried about the expense of having to put fine mesh screens in pipes at their pumping stations.
Though Knight emphasized that these are only concerns. It’s uncertain whether any of this will actually come to be. “This is not to say that the fish and wildlife service would impose all these rules,” he said. “It is a fear of the unknown of what possibly could happen.”
The Chi Council for the Clear Lake Hitch recognizes these worries, but their primary concern is with ensuring a future for the hitch. “It’s immensely complicated,” said Peter Windrem of the Chi Council. “Any intervention we do is going to have some unintended consequences. Nobody intended to do harm to the hitch when they introduced non-native species and that’s just what happens.”
While the consequences of declaring the Hitch endangered are unclear, District 3 County Supervisor Jim Steele is confident that doing so will benefit Clear Lake’s ecosystem. “I like the idea the fish are getting some notoriety now, because if you can fix it for the hitch you can fix it for a lot of other native species and natural species that were here before,” he said.
The Clear Lake hitch have presumably always been an vital part of the lake’s environment. The fish does not appear in any other part of the world and dates back thousands of years. “When the UC was doing core samples on the lake … they found hitch scales at the 10,000 year level,” said Knight.
The hitch used to be abundant in Clear Lake and the connecting streams, but the numbers have decreased significantly. So far this year, there have only been confirmed reports of hitch in three creeks: Kelsey, Adobe and Cooper, while suckers have also been reported in Clover Creek and Seigler Canyon Creek.
Knight said that predation from bass is not the only thing affecting the hitch. For the first couple months of their lives, the hitch live in the tullies on the edge of the lake, where competitor fish and birds prey on them. Once they grow, they head out to the middle of the lake. Then they have to compete with other fish for their food. “Introduced species are also plankton species,” he said. “The hitch are in competition with them for food. It’s a rough world underwater.”
Last year the California Fish and Game Commission listed the Clear Lake hitch as a threatened species. However, the state eased many concerns when they said that they would not interfere with bass fishing. But with the issue reaching the federal level, the circumstances have changed and these concerns are once again prevalent.
According to Knight, everyone agrees that the hitch needs protection, people are just worried about the cost to the county. “My experience talking to the people, they all want to save the hitch,” he said. “Their fear is what the consequences of saving the hitch could be. They want to protect them, but they don’t know where this could go.”
During this 12 month status review process, U.S. Fish and Wildlife will study the fish and the ecology, but they cannot take economic factors into consideration when making their decision. According to Knight, they must only look at the species and whether it needs to be protected.
A few of the many factors the review will consider are the species’ biology, range and population trends, threats to its habitat or range, overutilization of the species, disease or predation and other factors affecting its continued existence.
Jennifer Gruenke can be reached at 900-2019.
