The Fish Sniffer's Managing Editor, Dan Bacher visited the Prospect Island fish kill site on Wednesday, November 28, 8 days after the impending fish kill became widely known, and confirmed that there were still hundreds, perhaps thousands of live striped bass trapped at the island. In addition he witness what he described as a "putrid pile" of dead fish. He also noted that more stripers appeared to be dying at the time of his visit.

Bob McDaris of Cliff’s Marina has organized a force of volunteers that are ready willing and able to move in and begin a fish rescue, yet he has still been unable to get permission for the operation.

Everyday this saga continues and everyday I get more and more angry. Sure it was the Bureau of Reclamation that initiated the project and it was a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist that signed off on it, but if I had to focus on one agency that I believe has really let California’s anglers down I would have to say it is the Department of Fish and Game.

In my mind this is a state’s rights issue that goes beyond the fact that the federal government owns the land. For anyone that believes the feds can do as they please because they own the land consider this. Let's say you are landowner and a river runs through your property. Now let's go a step further and suppose there are wild steelhead or stripers in that river. Since the river is on your land you could keep a wild steelhead and eat it or you could keep all the undersize stripers you wanted, right? Wrong…absolutely not.

While the river may be your land those fish belong to the state and all fish and game regulations are in effect. In other words if you did either of things mentioned and the DFG got wind of it you would be cited and possible arrested.

This being the case let’s jump back to the situation at Prospect Island. The fish kill has been widely publicized by the Fish Sniffer and other media outlets for over a week. The DFG has known about the fish kill for that entire time. In fact I called them on the afternoon of November 20 and reported the impending fish kill. Not only did I get the impression that the folks at Caltip didn’t care, I can’t get a warden or representative of the department to even return my calls. As I write this on November 29 a full 9 days after the DFG was informed they are still standing on the sidelines doing nothing beyond investigating the incident to see if there was any criminal wrong doing.

Yes, I want to know if any laws were broken (I can’t imagine that what was done is legal), but at this point when there are still live fish in the water facing death shouldn’t the DFG be center stage in organizing and implementing the fish rescue operation? What is their motivation? Do they want to see the fish saved or are they more interested in determining if there is an individual or company to blame that they can levy a fine against? Do they see this as an opportunity to join forces with concerned citizens and save endangered fish or do they view it as a potential windfall in revenue if they determine that they can issue fines? I’m just speculating, but it seems to me that there is no money is rescuing fish, but issuing fines can be really lucrative at a time when the DFG is desperate for revenue.

Now I’m not saying that I don’t want to see the responsible individuals held responsible for this fish kill. What I’m saying is that there will be plenty of time to investigate and issue fines down the road. Right now the most important thing is to get the remaining live fish back into the river. Unfortunately this does not seem to be a priority with the DFG.

I often hear it said that the DFG could do more if only they had more funds. They could field more wardens if only they had a bigger budget. As the incident at Prospect Island enters its second week I’m very skeptical. What is the difference between one warden standing on the levy at Prospect doing nothing versus four wardens standing on the levy doing nothing? Well not much, beyond the fact that we tax payers pay significantly less for one ineffective warden versus four ineffective wardens.

To the DFG I would say that we’ve shown you the money and we’ve given you the funding. How many of the stranded fish at Prospect have been saved so far as a result of those taxpayer and angler dollars? Well, let’s see so far the number is a big fat zero!