Santa Ynez River Fisheries Studies

Since 1993, a program of cooperative fisheries investigations and basin management planning has been underway in the Santa Ynez River (SYR). The planning was initiated to respond to concerns about providing a reasonable balance in the allocation of SYR water between Public Trust Resources (steelhead trout) and consumptive uses and has focused on the SYR basin downstream of Bradbury Dam. Participants in the program include the Bureau of Reclamation, local water agencies, Santa Barbara County, municipalities, state and federal resource agencies, environmental interest groups, and local landowners.

The primary focus of the fisheries studies has been to evaluate:

1. The diversity, abundance, and condition of existing public trust fisheries resources within the lower river;

2. Conditions which may limit the diversity, abundance, or condition of the public trust fishery resources within the lower river

3. Both flow and non-flow measures which could be expected to improve the conditions that currently act to limit the diversity, abundance, or condition of public trust fishery resources within the lower river, and

4. Alternatives to the existing operational regime of the Cachuma Project, which could be expected to improve the conditions that currently act to limit the diversity, abundance, or condition of public, trust fishery resources within the lower river.

The Santa Ynez River watershed is one of the most important water systems on California’s South Coast. Three dams and a multitude of waterworks supply water to over 325,000 people and approximately 38,000 acres of cropland in Santa Barbara County. Historically, the SYR and its tributaries supported one of the largest runs of steelhead trout in Southern California. Today, it is estimated that only a few hundred of these fish survive.

On August 18, 1997, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) listed steelhead/rainbow trout inhabiting the Southern California Evolutionary Significant Unit (ESU) as endangered under the Federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) of 1973. In response to the listing, the operations of the Cachuma Project were critically reviewed to identify and evaluate potential impacts on steelhead and instream habitats within the lower SYR.