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Federal Government Restores Funding for Delta Smelt Captive Breeding Program! [1]
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Date: 2025-03-27
The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation on Tuesday said it will keep funding a captive breeding program for Delta smelt run by U.C. Davis, despite the antipathy towards the fish displayed by Donald Trump and his agribusiness allies on social media and in press conferences.
The five year contract for the Fish Culture and Conservation Laboratory (FCCL) that raises Delta smelt in Byron, California expired on Feb. 28 — and 17 staff members were laid off.
The laboratory focuses on providing “a safeguard against extinction of the Delta smelt and maintaining a population in captivity that is as genetically close as possible to the wild population,” according to UC Davis spokesperson Bill Kisliuk. It’s primary source of funding has been a five-year grant from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
“Reclamation recently awarded a five year financial assistance agreement with UC Davis so it can continue its support of Delta Smelt supplementation using the hatchery, work that helps Reclamation meet regulatory requirements to maximize water supplies from the Delta,” David Mooney, the manager of the Bureau of Reclamation’s Bay-Delta office, revealed in a statement.
“I can confirm that the Bureau of Reclamation has agreed to continue funding of the laboratory,” said Kiuslik in an email today.
No details were released on what transpired to get the Bureau to renew the funding after the contract expires.
We do know that the Bureau and UC Davis have being working cooperatively on the FCCL for more than 15 years, and had been working on the five-year renewal for over six months prior to the the expiration of the contract. “Delta smelt supplementation production at the lab started under BOR’s 2020 Record of Decision and has continued as a protective measure for the species to allow water deliveries for the Central Valley Project and State Water Resources Project,” Kiuslik said in a previous email.
“The FCCL’s work is vital for the long-term health of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and the endangered aquatic life currently at the site, including the Delta smelt. The lab is a resource for understanding the entire San Francisco Bay delta ecosystem as well as training leaders in the fields of biological science, environmental science and conservation biology,” Kiuslik said.
No Delta smelt reported in CDFW fall survey for 7 years
The news of the renewal of the grant comes as at critical time for Delta smelt and other Bay-Delta fish species. Zero Delta smelt were caught in the California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Fall Midwater Trawl Survey in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta for the seventh year in a row in 2024.
It is significant that zero Delta smelt were caught in the survey despite the release of tens of thousands of hatchery-raised Delta smelt into the Delta over the past few years by the state and federal governments.
“The 2024 abundance index was 0 and continues the trend of no catch in the FMWT since 2017,” reported Taylor Rohlin, CDFW Environmental Scientist Bay Delta Region in a Jan. 2 memo to Erin Chappell, Regional Manager Bay Delta Region: nrm.dfg.ca.gov/...
“No Delta Smelt were collected from any stations during our survey months of September-December. While FMWT did not catch any Delta Smelt, it does not mean there were no smelt present, but the numbers are very low and below the effective detection threshold by most sampling methods,” she wrote.
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