Monday June 20, 2022
San Francisco Chronicle —
About 200,000 baby salmon were released into San Francisco Bay on Sunday night in an effort to save them from drought conditions that threaten their life-cycle swims to the ocean.
The fish came in two tanker trucks from the Feather River Fish Hatchery in Oroville, and the assist with their migration is part of a larger effort by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife to help its hatchery salmon survive by trucking them to the San Francisco and San Pablo bays.
The release took place at 9 p.m. and was done within moments. The timing was calibrated so that the tide would be receding fast and the sky would be dark enough that birds wouldn’t see they had to feast on a buffet of smolts no more than five inches long.
“We want these fish to be pulled to the Golden Gate,” where they will head into the ocean, said John McManus, president of the Golden State Salmon Association. “And we want to prevent seagulls and cormorants from getting the wrong idea.”