Califauna - Explore.Create.Act: Council Approves Salmon Fishing Ban

About Califauna

The goal of Califauna is to bring art education and ecological awareness to California students, elementary through high school; community groups and senior centers. Califauna will provide vital information about maintaining California’s beaches, deserts, and forests; native animals and the effects of urban sprawl and global warming on our surroundings, through the arts.

Califauna is a nonprofit project and operates under the guidance of the Pasadena Arts Council, a 501(c)(3) Organization. All donations to Califauna are tax deductible. We need your help! Your donations will help us develop
programs and get them into our local schools.

Make checks payable to the Pasadena Arts Council and send to:Califauna
63 E. Sierra Madre Blvd Unit A
Sierra Madre, CA 91024

The Bobcat

With a gray to brown coat, whiskered face, and black-tufted ears, the Bobcat resembles the other species of the mid-sized Lynx genus. It is smaller than the Canadian Lynx, with whom it shares parts of its range, but about twice as large as the domestic cat. It has distinctive black bars on its forelegs and a black-tipped, stubby tail, from which it derives its name.
Though the Bobcat prefers rabbits and hares, it will hunt anything from insects and small rodents to deer. Prey selection depends on location and habitat, season, and abundance. Like most cats, the Bobcat is territorial and largely solitary, although there is some overlap in home ranges. It uses several methods to mark its territorial boundaries, including claw marks and deposits of urine or feces. The Bobcat breeds from winter into the spring and has a gestation period of about two months.

Thursday, April 10, 2008

Council Approves Salmon Fishing Ban

"West Coast fisheries managers voted Thursday to cancel all commercial salmon fishing off the California and Oregon coasts this year. The Pacific Fishery Management Council decided to allow limited recreational fishing of coho salmon on holiday weekends off the Oregon coast, but no recreational fishing off California after several members of the panel argued that every salmon counts.
Scientists and government officials are expecting this year's West Coast salmon season to be one of the worst in history, because of the collapse of Sacramento River chinook, one of the West Coast's biggest wild salmon runs.
Although commercial salmon fishing off the Washington coast is scheduled to begin May 1, fisheries managers do not predict a good season off either the north or south Pacific coasts.
"For the entire West Coast, this is the worst in history," Don McIsaac, executive director of the Pacific Fishery Management Council, said before several close votes led to the fisheries plan for 2008."
This is an excerpt from an article by Associated Press Writer Donna Gordan Blankenship, go here to read the entire article; Council Approves Salmon Fishing Ban. The ban is an effort to help the salmon population in the Pacific Ocean recover from years of over fishing as well as habitat loss. Over the years the populations have declined because of creeks and rivers being re-routed and the construction of dams that block the salmon from migrating up these rivers and streams to spawn. We forget that the decline of one species affects all species all along the food chain. When the salmon populations dwindle, the bears and other carnivores that eat them when they are swimming up stream to spawn suffer as well. There are many possible ways to try to rectify this problem that are being discussed, this ban is just the first to come to light.