If the fight to save Chinook Salmon is lost, it won’t be for lack of spending. More than $20 Million in Salmon habitat projects has just been announced by the State Department of Fish and Wildlife. This is the third round of grant awards made this year, bringing the total to $80 Million- and that’s just the State Fish and Wildlife money going toward Salmon. The Wildlife Conservation Board has invested $70 Million in block grants and another $59 Million to individual projects. Federal agencies have also invested tens of Millions of Dollars in various projects designed to save the Chinook. After near-record low numbers of the fish returned to California’s rivers last year, state officials enacted a full closure of inland recreational Salmon fishing, and the Pacific Fishery Management Council has ordered a closure of the 2023 season for all commercial and most recreational fishing of Chinook along the coast from Northern Oregon to the California-Mexico border. Biologists fear native California Salmon are in a spiral toward extinction.