Cal-Nevada Water Resource

I am not sure the exact report you are speaking too, but if perhaps you are interested I can summarize my limited understanding of the reintroduction efforts. Mountain yellow-legged frogs were split into two species some years back. The southern sierra nevada populations, who are worse off, retained the common name and scientific name ( R. muscosa). The northern sierra nevada populations are now the Sierra Nevada yellow-legged frog (R. sierrae). They were both listed as endangered at the State and Federal levels semi-recently around the time of the species split. I believe two of the larger reasons to their declines are due to introduced trout into historically fishless mountain lakes and and a pathogen called chytrid which is fucking up amphibians worldwide, not the typical habitat loss cause. I had a colleague years back that spent summers gill netting and eating trout to eradicate the introduced trout. These efforts are ongoing and largely successful.

Most of the reintroduction efforts and the earliest ones have been for the southern species, mainly USGS and USFWS with collaborators like SD Zoo. Right off they got the odds against them because tadpoles take approx 3 years to metamorphose, compared to other amphibian species which can morph in a few months. Most ranids breed after 3 years. So instead of needing to survive 3-4 years to breed they need to survive 5-6 years plus to breed . Also mountain garter snakes are predating alot of them. They reintroduced alot of sub-adults, metamorphs, and tadpoles which tend to try to return to their natal pond, even if very far away their homing instinct can take them off the relocation site and increase the likelihood of mortality. The chytrid is still prevalent, so a percentage of the frogs become infected slow down and are easier prey or just dont make it through winter. It now is more of a best practice to translocate egg masses so their built in homing instinct is to the pond/lake they are translocated to. Even with repeated release off egg masses to now lakes restored to fishless, the chytrid and natural predators are a big obstacle to get the frogs established.

The northern species reintroduction efforts appear promising and informative in how to go about it more successfully. There are some populations which appear to be more resistant to the chytrid fungus. These populations should be genetic sources for translocation of egg masses to now fishless sites. There is some recent research that looked at chytrid loads between different sites and frogs reintroduced to the lower load site have actually been recruiting and the population is growing on it's own. I think this is key finding that could help make decisions on where to focus these efforts from a site specific standpoint.

Again, these species are out of my geographic area of focus, so I am not accurately describing the issues. However, the recent research/efforts are showing some success at specific sites with the more evolved methods compared to 15 years ago. Due to the long larval phase its not a quick turn around such as with other amphibians, therefore a slower learning curve.

 

@nDub @Hobbs works in the water industry in Some where else in California. I'll let you decide what to do with that information.

edited to reflect updated locality

 

IDK man. @Hobbs is 15 miles down the road from me. I can be in Tahoe a lot faster then I can be in LA. Bishop, and the East Side in general, is it's own section of Cali. Not north, not south, not defined actually. lol

I thought I had the 2015 MYLF PDF on my comp but I can't find it for the life of me. It was a list of lakes shocked and re-populated since 2005. The success rate was very low. I fish a lot for Goldens and some of my best lakes have been gill netted and shocked to allow frogs to be re-introduced. I'd be much more OK with it if the frogs actually started to do well. It's always been my belief that Goldens and frogs can live together. In fact they have since Goldens where first introduced in the mid 1800's. What changed that made the MYLF population plummet? In my very uneducated opinion, it wasn't the trout.

 

Your right that the success rate has been very low. I dont think there is a definitive answer of the ultimate cause of decline, it's more of a cumulative thing. My understanding is chytrid and trout are considered to be the bigger factors. The trout definitely eat the YL frogs and were introduced I dont know how long ago, 100 years? YL Frogs did not evolve with fish so once they get under that threshold population level, combined with chytrid, they can go down dramatically to the point of extirpation. The southern species is gone from something like 70-90% of where it use to be. Fish primary cause? No one can be sure. Are they contributing, yes. Did we put them there, yes. Do I believe in shoving those types of beliefs down others throats, no. Fishing license alone support so much conservation. I am not a tree hugger, politician, and farthest thing from an activist. I'm the only "technical" guy out of my core set of friends. its just fucking complicated and always will be. I fish and respect your view. Biologists that dont respect others points of view fuck it up for people like me. I side with or fight for the engineers and contractors most times.

 

Will we ever know the cause of the decline? Probably not fully. I absolutely agree fish can play a role. I enjoy having conversations like this that are open and thoughtful on the subject. It's to easy to get pigeon holed into a one sided view on things in life. In the case of the frogs I would have liked to see a group of 50 lakes restored. Give it 5 years and see what the success rate is. If it's over 25% identify why those 12 lakes succeeded when the other failed. Then target lakes that fit the success profile. You waste less resources and have a better success rate in the end. But programs like this tend to get funded and they need to use those funds to continue to get funded. Hence, 100+ lakes shocked with a low percentage of success. I'm all for conservation but truth be told I really like Muir's idea of preservation better. We're way past being able to implement that though. lol

 

Used to do fall-run chinook and steelhead surveys rowing a drift boat for CDFG back then in the beginnings of the end for them on the Tuolumne, Stanislaus, Merced and San Joaquin Rivers... they were doing ok back then until all the bastardos de ratton’s started irrigating all those vineyards for booze money and killed the runs. Haven’t been back for over 23 years until last year and was truly gobsmacked.

 

Ahhh, didnt know the shocking was that wide. I am e-fishing tomorrow actually. Backpack low voltage in waders in creeks/streams, monitoring catch and release (management for steelhead primary goal). I see where your coming from. The recent research for the northern pops suggest that due to high chytrid loads, reintroduction may not be feasible at certain sites and as you suggested focus on why certain sites succeeded and replicate. Then possibly allow fishing at the ones where reintroduction is not feasible. I could see that arguement.

That said, doubt USFWS would allow it due to their mission AND they have designated critical habitat units throughout its range. This is where lobbyist, lawsuits, and politics come in and I step out.

Also, more like 50 years to measure success, not 5

 

What do you do now?

 

Guess I’m late to the party here- I am a Project Manager for Hydro Generation at your favorite Northern California Electric Utility. I work on projects, engineering through construction, of all aspects of hydro generation and water delivery- penstocks, canals, turbine/unit overhauls, generator rewinds, exciters, switchgear, etc. it’s been a great career and taken me to some amazing places! Nice to meet you guys!

 

I just changed careers- when I was single and without kids, I worked as a wildlife biologist for feds, state and private on fish, mammals and birds since 1986, but I teach technology classes part-time now- best change ever for me as I am older and have about three months off per year with my kid and don’t have to stay in hotels away from home for long projects anymore. I miss the fun stuff, but get my chance doing volunteer stuff in the field now and then.

 

Curious- any of you work with bats? Had lots of fun working with them all over the desert mainly. My 1st Gen got a lot of offroad use doing that while visiting mines.

 

Man, one of the most eye opening things I saw was how much pressure flexing those giant penstock pipes go through at the base of the hydroelectric generating stations like the one on the North Fork of the Stanislaus River. I know it’s old tech, but it is impressive!

 

I've done bat mortality surveys in wind farms but nothing more hands on that. Now just assess potential impacts to special-status bat species for capital projects and address them in CEQA and wildlife agency permits, trying to come up with a project design to avoid the hassle of constraints and mitigation. I'm big on the use of technology and my group uses acoustics/machine learning for bat detection. I took a class last year in bat acoustics software.

 

This is one of the best aspects of working for the water resource industry, if your not a consultant. A defined geographic area and work schedule. I was a consultant prior and the hustle is alot if you want to advance. I started at a water district 3 weeks after becoming a father luckily. Plus the pay of course. I have planted my feet.

 

It wouldn’t happen to have been Joe’s class at the Sierra Field Institute? He does awesome work, and pretty much was on the cutting edge of doing automated bat call identification. Sounds like you do consulting work. My last bio job was doing some similar diverse work... monitoring big horn sheep on a highway project, doing spotted owl surveys, and mine surveys in Death Valley for bats. It was a great job as we were all over the place working with so many different species. Like I said, ot was so fun that I still have to keep my hands in it as a volunteer now and then. Best part of that is that I get to pick out the best projects and don't have to do timesheets!!

 

I don't want to clog up @nDub's thread with wildlife/fisheries topics that are not directly related to water resources. I'm thinking of starting a thread for wildlife/fisheries/botany/env. planning and permitting, etc.

Where should I start it, which forum?

Do you know users in these careers? So far I know @WildLand, @CalPoppy, and @OnHartung'sRoad. Any leads?

 

Good idea. Will PM later.

 

Yup, Joe's class and his software. FORMER CONSULTANT, now water district lifer. I am the client now .

 

I used to work at a CPA firm that specialized in water district audits. TUD was one of the first clients I worked on actually. Worked with Calaveras, Yuba County and a bunch of other regional districts in CA along with the State Water Project. Anytime I hear FERC or CAISO mentioned I swear I start getting cold sweats.

 

MWD was a huge client for me - very good to work with, also. I made a lot of friends there and had some awesome assignments too. They included spring monitoring over a 20-mile 18’ diameter underground water conveyance pipeline under a National Forest (yup, No. Cal water), doing wildlife surveys on mitigation reserves closed to the public, and wildlife work in the desert for a aquifer water program. I did get an offer to work for EastBay, but the opportunities to work with MWD were too tempting.