FISHERYNATION.COM

   Since ElNino 2014-15, our kelp has not recovered as it usually does within a year and a half. The hot water summer event five years ago where records were set, the kelp at Pt. Loma recovered the next year although no where near recent historic levels. The last two and a half years, there has been a drastic change. When kelp recedes due to warm water it dies from the top down. The kelp is dying from the bottom up. There is no urchin quality and recruitment has halted. There are a couple ‘island of football field size kelp areas that don’t reach the surface. These are dissipating rapidly as I write. The holdfasts are necrotic, many having a live strand trying to grow. The kelp is weak and cannot withstand any stress, being easily ripped off the bottom. There is no kelp recruitment for two years.

   There is scarce food for animal life. I have collected several dozen pink & green abalone shells at Salk Creek, in a small quarter mile square area, over the last few months. The Threaded can no longer be found here. The whites are gone from San Onofre. No Turban snails, Kellet whelks, cucumbers, little purple shrimp that live on urchins, starfish are scarce, bass are gone, sheephead left. It’s a virtual moonscape. Steve Schroeter,s Wheeler North reef, the mitigation reef Edison made for SONGS, dead as a doornail. I heard second hand of professor Schroeter mentioning a ‘film’ covering the bottom at San Onofre, It’s everywhere. Algal turf and palm kelp were dominating the floor and they are thinning.

   I should have rung this bell two years ago but, we were hopeful it was just cycles. It does not appear to be cycles. We have survived and observed decades of cycles. This is different. This is poisoning. It is not warm water and the numbers prove so. It does not appear to be cycles as they recover quickly.

   About 2015 the infrastructure of sewage treatment plants, three in south OC, were upgraded, I operated a backhoe in the north Laguna facility and my boatyard is on water district property at Doheney. Been there for thirty years and I heard many dirty secrets. The thousands of gallons of chlorine used, copper from brake-pads, boat bottoms and that sunken ship of copper up in LA are suspect. Glyphosate is suspect world wide and more so from the vineyards in NorCal. We have tons of DDT spread offshore.

   We are reading available reports from sewage treatment. I have read Paul Dayton’s / Scripts study of outfall at Pt. Loma. They just don’t jive.

   We need to engage in immediate studies of this issue while there is just a tiny bit of life left to do analysis’. There are hundreds of livelihoods being lost and an economic disaster is unavoidable at this point. We need an emergency declared by Gov. Newsom. We need a team of scientists to accompany me so I can show the location of the remaining life and test it.

   I ask all to attend zoom for the Aug. 22 2023 F&W commission meeting and seek immediate action and ask the state to declare a disaster. I have included those from EPA/Waterboards* in this email and ask them to join commission meeting to expedite and prioritize this catastrophe.

 *as of delivering this email, I have not received emails for EPA/Waterboards as requested. I am adding their general emails.*