SAN FRANCISCO – Endangered native salmon suffered a second straight disastrous year in California’s drought, with all but 3 percent of the latest generation dying in too-shallow, too-hot rivers, federal officials said Monday.
Survival rates for California’s endangered native fish regularly are a flashpoint in the disputes among fishermen, farmers and others about how federal and state authorities divvy up the state’s water supplies.
Just 318,000 juvenile winter-run salmon survived last year, or 3 percent of nearly 10 million eggs, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s fisheries agency said Monday. That compares to just 5 percent survival the previous year — and 41 percent in 2011, just before California’s drought set in.
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