Caddis
wanna be fly fisher.
Joe T. asked me if I would post this for him:
A delicate balancing act
First published: Thursday, May 22, 2003
HANCOCK -- Shadbush is in bloom. Clear, cold trout-supporting water is
spilling over the Cannonsville and Pepacton reservoir dams and the
Hendricksons and sulphurs are rising from a full, vital river.
Life for trout fishermen and the dependent local economy is good this
spring on the upper Delaware River system. The water is still a little
cold for great fishing, but there's plenty of it.
This is not to be taken for granted, and there isn't a drift boat or guide
here who doesn't know that.
Even though the Delaware, the West Branch, East Branch and the resulting
combination mainstem below Hancock is the best trout river system east of
the Mississippi.
In pounds of big, wild fish per acre of stream, this is the one. Truly a
national treasure. Not just for rainbow and brown trout up here along the
western edge of New York's Catskills, but in the big river below, for shad
and striped bass and all the eastern warm water species.
Yet year in and year out, this enormously rich river system remains
whimsically fragile.
Utterly dependent on the implementation and interpretation of a Supreme
Court decree of more than a half-century ago governing water releases,
notably for New York City's benefit, but also water supplies for other
states. The oversight is the responsibility of the Delaware River Basin
Commission, composed of representatives from New York, New Jersey,
Pennsylvania, Delaware, the federal government, and most especially, the
City of New York. Key changes in the way things are done require unanimous
consent, and the recurring fly in the soup tends to be New York City.
Sufficient quantities -- summer and winter -- of cold, pure water comprise
the key to success for the ecology of this rich river system. Yet because
of an outdated plan for water releases that historically takes little
account of ecology or the fishery, the Delaware can go from boom to bust
overnight.
Mandated flows up until recently were so low down this system that the bug
life in the river was regularly left high and dry and soon dead, and the
stressed fish chasing their tails to deeper water. In the bad times,
spawning is deeply impacted.
The paramount fact about the Delaware system is that New York City relies
on it for water. When push comes to shove, that will always be the number
one concern of the Delaware River Basin Commission. But 99 percent of the
time, we're not even close to push or shove. Regardless, in the past the
fish and the river itself have gotten little consideration. That's because
the Supreme Court decree setting up the water flow regimen, while paying
lip-service to the Delaware as a multi-faceted jewel of a resource, does
not take the fish, the ecology, the upriver recreational needs, into
consideration at all.
To suggest New York City has been totally boneheaded about it, or that no
progress has been made in recent, more ecologically-sensitive times, isn't
true or fair to the city.
Steadily, admittedly against dogged resistence, people like Hancock guide
and river activist Jim Serio, who helped found the supportive Delaware
River Foundation, have made progress. Attitudes are slowly changing at New
York City's Department of Environmental Protection. Since it's obvious
that especially in non-emergency times there's plenty of water in those
reservoirs to take care of Manhattan and New Jersey, and sulphur-sipping
brown trout.
Nor would it be correct to suggest the river does not have powerful and
persistent friends of its own. Trout Unlimited is working for the Delaware
full tilt, the Nature Conservancy as well.
As of last year, the Delaware River Basin Commission has granted a little
more steady water over the dams -- winter is even more critical in these
matters than summer for the health of the fishery. But that largesse can
be withdrawn, and the river right back into its awful roller-coaster ride
of high and low flows and temperature fluctuations.
What's needed, from the trout-eye point of view, is a newly written court
decree that does take into account the needs upriver. To suggest New York
City is ready to put on the table a court decision that currently totally
favors them is overstating the case, but there are signs that attitudes
are drifting at least in a modified way in that direction.
However, that puts the environmental community on the spot. We've seen
demonstrated for years the devastation of what happens when flows in the
Delaware fall below a life-supporting level.
But, what exactly, is enough? That is a question that needs answering
before any rewriting of rules. According to Serio, there is not a lot of
baseline data on what the river needs as minimum sustaining flows, for all
seasons and all situations. The Nature Conservancy biologists over the
next couple of years hope to provide that base data.
Before we can have a plan the fish can live with, East Branch and West,
summer and winter, we've got to really study the macroinvertebrate life
over a couple of cycles. Surprisingly, that hasn't been done in great
detail, says Serio, by the state's Department of Environmental
Conservation, any of the interested parties, and certainly not by New York
City.
Meanwhile, let's bask in the sun while the sun's out.
The Delaware is fishing well right now. There's nothing much New York City
can say about water flowing over the dam, Mother Nature's way of trumping
a court decree.
To reach Fred LeBrun, call 454-5453.
A delicate balancing act
First published: Thursday, May 22, 2003
HANCOCK -- Shadbush is in bloom. Clear, cold trout-supporting water is
spilling over the Cannonsville and Pepacton reservoir dams and the
Hendricksons and sulphurs are rising from a full, vital river.
Life for trout fishermen and the dependent local economy is good this
spring on the upper Delaware River system. The water is still a little
cold for great fishing, but there's plenty of it.
This is not to be taken for granted, and there isn't a drift boat or guide
here who doesn't know that.
Even though the Delaware, the West Branch, East Branch and the resulting
combination mainstem below Hancock is the best trout river system east of
the Mississippi.
In pounds of big, wild fish per acre of stream, this is the one. Truly a
national treasure. Not just for rainbow and brown trout up here along the
western edge of New York's Catskills, but in the big river below, for shad
and striped bass and all the eastern warm water species.
Yet year in and year out, this enormously rich river system remains
whimsically fragile.
Utterly dependent on the implementation and interpretation of a Supreme
Court decree of more than a half-century ago governing water releases,
notably for New York City's benefit, but also water supplies for other
states. The oversight is the responsibility of the Delaware River Basin
Commission, composed of representatives from New York, New Jersey,
Pennsylvania, Delaware, the federal government, and most especially, the
City of New York. Key changes in the way things are done require unanimous
consent, and the recurring fly in the soup tends to be New York City.
Sufficient quantities -- summer and winter -- of cold, pure water comprise
the key to success for the ecology of this rich river system. Yet because
of an outdated plan for water releases that historically takes little
account of ecology or the fishery, the Delaware can go from boom to bust
overnight.
Mandated flows up until recently were so low down this system that the bug
life in the river was regularly left high and dry and soon dead, and the
stressed fish chasing their tails to deeper water. In the bad times,
spawning is deeply impacted.
The paramount fact about the Delaware system is that New York City relies
on it for water. When push comes to shove, that will always be the number
one concern of the Delaware River Basin Commission. But 99 percent of the
time, we're not even close to push or shove. Regardless, in the past the
fish and the river itself have gotten little consideration. That's because
the Supreme Court decree setting up the water flow regimen, while paying
lip-service to the Delaware as a multi-faceted jewel of a resource, does
not take the fish, the ecology, the upriver recreational needs, into
consideration at all.
To suggest New York City has been totally boneheaded about it, or that no
progress has been made in recent, more ecologically-sensitive times, isn't
true or fair to the city.
Steadily, admittedly against dogged resistence, people like Hancock guide
and river activist Jim Serio, who helped found the supportive Delaware
River Foundation, have made progress. Attitudes are slowly changing at New
York City's Department of Environmental Protection. Since it's obvious
that especially in non-emergency times there's plenty of water in those
reservoirs to take care of Manhattan and New Jersey, and sulphur-sipping
brown trout.
Nor would it be correct to suggest the river does not have powerful and
persistent friends of its own. Trout Unlimited is working for the Delaware
full tilt, the Nature Conservancy as well.
As of last year, the Delaware River Basin Commission has granted a little
more steady water over the dams -- winter is even more critical in these
matters than summer for the health of the fishery. But that largesse can
be withdrawn, and the river right back into its awful roller-coaster ride
of high and low flows and temperature fluctuations.
What's needed, from the trout-eye point of view, is a newly written court
decree that does take into account the needs upriver. To suggest New York
City is ready to put on the table a court decision that currently totally
favors them is overstating the case, but there are signs that attitudes
are drifting at least in a modified way in that direction.
However, that puts the environmental community on the spot. We've seen
demonstrated for years the devastation of what happens when flows in the
Delaware fall below a life-supporting level.
But, what exactly, is enough? That is a question that needs answering
before any rewriting of rules. According to Serio, there is not a lot of
baseline data on what the river needs as minimum sustaining flows, for all
seasons and all situations. The Nature Conservancy biologists over the
next couple of years hope to provide that base data.
Before we can have a plan the fish can live with, East Branch and West,
summer and winter, we've got to really study the macroinvertebrate life
over a couple of cycles. Surprisingly, that hasn't been done in great
detail, says Serio, by the state's Department of Environmental
Conservation, any of the interested parties, and certainly not by New York
City.
Meanwhile, let's bask in the sun while the sun's out.
The Delaware is fishing well right now. There's nothing much New York City
can say about water flowing over the dam, Mother Nature's way of trumping
a court decree.
To reach Fred LeBrun, call 454-5453.
