Government shutdown threaten’s Idaho’s steelhead season

steelhead

The partial federal government shutdown threatens Idaho’s ability to keep its steelhead season open.

The shutdown has idled workers at NOAA Fisheries who are under deadline to complete Idaho’s steelhead fishery permit.

A closure of the Gem State’s steelhead season was narrowly averted last month when conservation groups, the Idaho River Community Alliance, and the Idaho Department of Fish and Game reached an agreement to head off threatened litigation by five conservation groups in exchange for steps taken both by the department and outfitters and guides. The deal sunsets after March 15th, and NOAA Fisheries told the state the permit was likely to be completed by mid-February.

The return of both hatchery and wild steelhead to the Snake River and its tributaries cratered for the second straight year. In October, a handful of conservation groups threatened to sue Idaho under a provision of the Endangered Species Act because the state’s federal permit had expired several years earlier. The groups argued low protected wild steelhead numbers called for additional steps to protect the fish or outright closing of the season.

The permit allowing a small number of protected fish to be harmed during seasons expired in 2010.

The state submitted a new application the same year, but NOAA Fisheries only recently began a review. Under the terms of the December agreement, the state closed stretches of the Salmon and South Fork of the Clearwater rivers where wild fish congregate, outfitters and guides agreed to adopt fishing practices that provide extra protection to wild steelhead, and the conservation groups held off on litigation. (Lewiston Tribune)

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