HomePescadero Creek Angler Surveys

Pescadero Creek Angler Surveys

Our local homewater with native, wild coastal steelhead

PFF members, you can enjoy the challenges of fly fishing for native, wild steelhead 40 minutes from the Peninsula and help wildlife officials continue the restoration efforts for the Pescadero Creek fishery and watershed.

PFF enjoys a unique partnership with Trout Unlimited, California Trout and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), with the collective goals of restoring the Pescadero Creek native steelhead fishery and providing the scientific field data to justify the inclusion of Pescadero Creek to the state’s Heritage and Wild Trout Program. That program is pretty heady company; think of this local fishery being awarded the same status as Hat Creek, Fall River, the Upper Sacramento River, the Lower McCloud River, or the Lower Owens River, just to name a handful!

The coastal steelhead season on Pescadero Creek and other San Mateo and Santa Cruz county coastal creeks is from the first weekend in December through the first weekend in March. (Check the CDFW regulations for specific dates.)

PFF is the ONLY fly fishing club that is working with the above organizations to provide volunteers for steelhead angler surveys so we need your help this season!

How can you help? Two simple ways:

1) Submit an Angler Survey after Fishing

Nobody likes to do surveys, especially after a long day of fishing, but trust us – every survey submitted is reviewed and studied. There are two ways for every angler to submit their survey:

Online on your phone: You can easily access the survey form online on your smartphone. Just scan the QR code at right with your phone or type the URL bit.ly/3pWrgRn into your smartphone’s browser. Bookmark this page for future reference. Simply fill in all the fields from your day of fishing and click “Submit”. You can also save a partial report to complete later if you wish.

Click this link for a 1-page guide on completing this form: Pescadero Creek Steelhead Survey Reference Guide

Paper survey: If you prefer to fill out a paper form, simply look for the survey box at the base of a stairway leading up from Highway 1 to the Pescadero State Beach parking lot, on the bluff just south of the Highway 1 bridge that crosses Pescadero Creek. (See photo and inset.)

2. (PFF Members only) Take the Next Step -- Conduct Volunteer Angler Surveys for CDFW

Conducting volunteer angler surveys involves actually walking the banks of Pescadero Creek or waiting at the parking area and talking to anglers about their fishing results. It usually takes only a couple of minutes and our experience has been that nearly all anglers are very receptive to being interviewed and are very happy that volunteers are interested enough to gather this important data.

The commitment is a 3-4 hour window in the morning or afternoon, and you can easily combine it with fishing yourself for Pescadero’s wild, native steelhead at the same time.

Here is what’s required to do these surveys: (Note - the following documents are for PFF members ONLY and require member login.)

a. Complete and sign the CDFW Volunteer Service Agreement and return it to your coordinator (Ron Beltramo at rjbeltramo@aol.com) before scheduling or participating in any interview. You can complete the form in pen and forward the final signed copy to your coordinator by either scanning the form or taking a picture with your camera. If you need help filling out the information or have questions, please reach out.

b. The Pescadero Angler Interview Working Document (Microsoft Word file) is the same form as prior years. You should plan to have several copies of this document on hand with you as you go out for the interviews. You will be asked to fill out one of these forms as you interview anglers at Pescadero Creek and forward the completed form to your coordinator as soon as you can after conducting the interviews (like the week after you have completed interviews…the sooner the better). Coordinators will plan to accumulate and log these completed interviews and forward to Sean Cochran at least once per month.

NOTE: Depending on your web browser's settings, when you click the above link, this page may display as another window or tab, or may download automatically to your designated download folder. Either way, you should save the document to your local drive to edit and update per the instructions.

c. Scheduling will be handled via an online form (PFF member login required) that will have all of the dates and times for sign up. No special software is required to complete the form, just your web browser and Internet access. This is a Google Sheets document, so just enter your name and contact information for the date(s) and times you wish to volunteer. When finished, just close your browser tab or window. You do not have to save the file as it is saved automatically.

Here is a sample of what this document for scheduling looks like:

People can choose to sign up for specific dates either morning (9 AM to 12:30 PM) or afternoon (12:30 PM to 4 PM). Once someone has signed up for a specific date (morning or afternoon), it will be blocked out. This will occur on a first come/first served basis and will be monitored by the two coordinators. If there are any issues, please contact Ron.

d. Download and review these documents:

Pescadero Creek Volunteer Angler Interview Procedures
Pescadero Angler Interview Working Document (clicking link will download Microsoft Word file to your designated folder)
CDFW Volunteer Handbook

We appreciate everyone who signs up to participate in the Pescadero Creek Project and thank you for your efforts. Please take precautions and be safe as you approach people on the stream (social distance, wear a mask and use hand sanitizer as needed). We are looking forward to a productive year and furthering the work to assist in working toward designation of Pescadero Creek as a Heritage Wild Trout Stream. Thank you!