(a) For the purposes of this chapter, “trout” includes steelhead trout.
(b) The department, in administering its existing wild trout program, shall maintain an inventory of all California trout streams and lakes to determine the most suitable angling regulations for each stream or lake. The department shall determine for each stream or lake whether it should be managed as a wild trout fishery, or whether its management should involve the temporary planting of native trout species to supplement wild trout populations that is consistent with this chapter. In maintaining the inventory, the department shall give priority to those streams and lakes that have the highest biological potential for producing sizeable wild trout, which are inhabited by rare species, or where the quality of the fishery is threatened or endangered and take into consideration public use. The biological and physical inventories prepared and maintained for each stream, stream system, or lake shall include an assessment of the resource status, threats to the continued well-being of the fishery resource, the potential for fishery resource development, and recommendations, including necessary changes in the allowed take of trout, for the development of each stream or lake to its full capacity as a fishery, consistent with this chapter.
(c) This section does not provide any public entity or private party with any new or additional authority to affect the management of, or access to, any private land without the written consent of the owner. Privately owned lakes and ponds not open to the use of the general public shall be subject to this section only with the written consent of the owner. This chapter shall not be construed as authorizing or requiring special treatment of adjacent land areas or requiring land use restrictions. It is the intent of the Legislature that this chapter should not diminish the existing authority of the department.
(d) The department shall make the inventory maintained pursuant to subdivision (b) publicly available on the department’s Internet Web site and the department shall continuously revise that inventory with the goal of reviewing every watershed once per decade.
(Amended by Stats. 2012, Ch. 565, Sec. 8. (SB 1148) Effective January 1, 2013.)