Click on Home or the logo above to navigate to the main California Fisheries Blog webpage.

Delta Smelt Status 2021

The Enhanced Delta Smelt Monitoring (EDSM) caught only 1 Delta smelt in 2200 smelt-targeted net tows in 2021.  This compares to 49 captured in 2020 and hundreds in prior years.  None were captured in the Spring Kodiak Trawl 2021 survey (Figure 1).  This year’s results indicate that Delta smelt are likely virtually extinct in the wild.

Figure 1. Spring Kodiak Trawl survey index of Delta smelt (2004-2021), in which none were caught in 2021. Only one was captured in 2020. (source)