After The Bee's story Monday about state and federal efforts to guide migrating salmon in the San Joaquin River, a Valley farmer along the river said the vast restoration of the San Joaquin is not on schedule.

He's worried about land next to the river on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley. And he seems to have a point.

A landmark agreement signed in 2006 calls for salmon restoration to begin in late December 2012. The reviving of the long-dried San Joaquin and long-dead salmon runs is news around the country.

But small dams on the river need to be bypassed in some way. A vast stretch of the river channel may need to be rebuilt. The channel needs to be opened up in some places.

None of that has taken place, says Cannon Michael, vice president of Bowles Farming Co., based in Los Banos.

He said hundreds of millions of dollars need to be spent re-establishing a river that has been dead since the 1950s. Yet these important river projects are underfunded right now, he said.

Nothing is likely to get done anytime soon, Michael says. Without those projects, how can salmon make a comeback 13 months from now? Good question.

The schedule is outlined in the restoration agreement, which was signed by environmentalists, federal officials and east Valley farmers, who have irrigated with river water for decades.

The three groups -- called settling parties -- know about the schedule problem and are talking about it. But with the deadline approaching next year, nothing has been said publicly yet.

"Someone from the settling parties needs to come forward and admit that the schedule needs to be reworked and the timeline extended," Michael says. "Acting like all is well and things are going according to plan makes those of us involved not have any trust in the process.

"We are still willing to work with the program, but we need someone to be honest at some point soon."

It is important to note that Michael and other farmers along the Valley's west side are not among the settling parties -- even though some of their land already has been damaged by experimental flows on the river.

Understandably, they say they want to know more. I think it's time to start asking a few more questions about the timetable, the funding and those projects.