Gold or fish? Battle brews on California rivers

CAMPTONVILLE -- In his 49th year of life, veteran miner Jeff Kilgore feels increased kinship with the original 49ers who long ago worked the same frigid river high in the Sierra Nevada.

It's different now. The Gold Rush is gone. Kilgore uses modern equipment -- a gas-powered gold dredger -- to vacuum precious flecks from the cobbled rock beneath the Yuba River. And the takings are slim.

On good days, thanks to high gold prices, Kilgore says he recovers enough gold to earn $100 selling minuscule pieces and dust to jewelry makers and tourist shops along historic Highway 49. He used to take in barely $40 a day, working two mining claims six days a week.

Now Kilgore says he fears his modest livelihood is in danger from state legislation that seeks to restrict gold dredging in order to protect fish populations.

"They're messing with heritage here a little bit," Kilgore said of a species protection bill for native trout, aquatic and amphibian species moving through the Legislature. "Do people forget what put California on the map? It was the independent miners and the discovery of gold."

Assemblywoman Lois Wolk, D-Davis, and the California Trout environmental and sport fishing group say the state needs greater authority to ban gold seekers from using vacuum or suction dredge machines on rivers and streams where endangered fish species live.

Wolk's bill, AB 1032, would empower the state Department of Fish and Game to close down some 1,100 "wild heritage trout streams" and ban gold dredgers if it believes there is a threat to fish.

The bill followed declarations by state Department of Fish and Game biologists and researchers that gold dredging in some Northern California rivers is damaging spawning grounds for coho salmon, green sturgeon and other fish.

Jeff Shellito, governmental affairs manager for California Trout, also claims the dredgers vacuum up treasured river gravel for steelhead and other wild trout, spread mercury left over from the Gold Rush era and chase fish "fingerlings out into the middle of the river, where the temperature is too cold" for survival.

"If those things (dredging machines) aren't regulated properly, they definitely cause harm to fish," Shellito said.

But Wolk's bill, which has cleared the Assembly and is expected to be voted on in the Senate in August, has riled up gold miners and lobbyists for rural counties who feel the dredging industry is unfairly under assault.

Lighting up Internet message boards and appealing to Capitol politicians and the media, they argue that the state already restricts gold dredging during fish-spawning seasons and that users of the equipment must have permits.

They complain that the legislation could lead the Department of Fish and Game -- which issues about 3,000 dredging permits a year -- to abuse its authority by shutting off rivers and streams. They contend that such actions would harm tourism in Mother Lode counties and violate their rights under federal law to work gold claims.

"There's a fear factor. We don't know who is going to make the decision to shut down the rivers -- and for what reason," said Bill Kinzie, 55, a recreational dredger who works a mining claim on the Yuba River.

Wolk said her bill would give state Fish and Game officials the authority to ban gold dredging on about 5 percent of 20,000 California rivers and streams if the agency feels such actions are needed to protect fish. The bill would still allow miners to obtain special permits to dredge specific sites on closed river stretches.

Wolk said the legislation wouldn't affect recreational gold panning but "would restrict motorized dredging, the major commercial type operations."

"It's not a family going out on the stream panning for gold. It's a giant suction machine that simply vacuums the bottom of the stream and has a very harmful effect on fish," she said.

But Wolk's depictions only infuriate Dave DeCosta, a Butte County resident who works gold claims on the Yuba River and Spanish Creek in Plumas County.

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• The Bee's Peter Hecht can be reached at (916) 326-5539 or phecht@sacbee.com.