Four environmental and fishing organizations have sued the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, alleging the agency failed to meet a deadline for a report that would help determine whether the white sturgeon fish in San Francisco Bay should be added to a state list of threatened or endangered species.
San Francisco Baykeeper, California Sportfishing Protection Alliance, Restore the Delta, and Friends of the River filed the petition in Alameda County Superior Court on Monday. These nonprofits are united around the preservation of California’s rivers and streams, with emphasis on keeping the waters of the San Francisco Bay-Delta fishable, swimmable and drinkable.
The groups are not asking a judge to order that the fish be listed as endangered. They want the court to order the department to complete and release the report.
With that report in hand, the California Fish and Game Commission must hold a public hearing and make a final decision, based on the best available scientific information, to determine whether the state will grant the species protected status. The scientific report from the Department of Fish and Wildlife is needed by the commission to make the final decision on whether to list the species.
In an email from CDFW spokesperson Krysten Kellum, the agency declined to comment on the litigation. She added that the species is currently protected throughout the process because the commission had classified it as a “candidate” for protection in 2024.
“A candidate species has all the same protections under the California Endangered Species Act as a species that is listed, as we work through the status review,” said Kellum.
Once it was classified a “candidate” in 2024, the clock started for the department to produce a peer-reviewed scientific report on the species’ status. The initial due date was July 2025, which was extended to Jan. 12 of this year.
Long-lived, long-traveled
The white sturgeon is native to several large North American rivers that drain to the Pacific Ocean. The fish primarily live in estuaries of large rivers but migrate long distances to spawn in deep sections of rivers with swift currents. They can live up to 100 years.
At the federal level, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lists the species as endangered in the Kootenai River system in Idaho, Montana and British Columbia, but not in California.
The fish’s only California home is through the San Francisco Bay Estuary and up the Sacramento River and San Joaquin River watersheds, areas occupied by industry, farming and development.
In the 1980s, the abundance of adult California white sturgeon was estimated at about 150,000 fish. In 2024, the CDFW conducted an updated survey which estimated the population was 6,447, according to the lawsuit.
The term “endangered” means a species is considered to be at high risk of becoming extinct throughout all or most of its range. It is listed as “threatened” when it is not presently in danger of extinction but is likely to become endangered in the foreseeable future without special protection and management efforts, according to the CDFW.
The suit states that water quality conditions, overharvest and harmful impacts to the population from toxic algal blooms, such as those that occurred in 2022 and 2023, are to blame for the species’ population decline in the state.
“Furthermore, proposed projects that would increase diversion of water from rivers where California white sturgeon spawn, and from the Delta where juvenile California white sturgeon rear, represent an imminent additional threat to this already imperiled population,” the suit said.
Tunnel turmoil
Environmental groups have long opposed increased diversions of freshwater from the Delta to supplement water shortages in cities and counties to the south.
In June, the California Department of Water Resources received biological opinions from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service that said construction of the Delta Conveyance Tunnel can proceed under conditions designed to protect endangered species and sensitive habitat.
The proposed 36-foot-diameter tunnel is a $20 billion state infrastructure project intended to move excess rain and floodwater beneath the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta and deliver it directly into the State Water Project. The water project is used and supported by 29 public water agencies, largely based in the South Bay, Central Coast, South Coast, Inland Empire and Kern County.
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