Beware: Off-Limits area in the Delta

While on a recent trip to the California Delta I found myself in the middle of an unfortunate circumstance. It appears that I unknowingly fished in an area that is closed to boat traffic. When situations of this nature happen there are two options. The first and most attractive is to hide the mistake and hope other anglers don’t hear about it.
The second option is to step out and make an example of your mistake in the hopes that other anglers can learn from it and not fall into the same situation. With this post I am choosing the later.
Let me begin by stating very clearly that the small stretch of 7 Mile Slough that parallels the East shore of Brannan Island State Park near 3 Mile Slough is closed to boat traffic.
I’m sorry to admit this came as a surprise to me when an officer met me at the Brannan Island launch ramp to discuss where I had been fishing. The officer was understandably upset and I drove home with a hefty ticket in my possession.

I was quite surprised by the situation as I had never realized this area was closed. There are marked buoys at the mouth of the slough but they appear to clearly define a seperation between the swim beach and a boat lane. No other signage is present but that does not change the fact that despite the appearance, the entire slough is closed.
It seems that if I choose to fish this area again in the future it will be from shore. I hope my error finds each of you before you make a similar mistake.
I look forward to hearing your thoughts on this matter. Were you already aware of this off-limits area or does it come as a surprise to you? I hope that through this post we are able to have improved signage placed at the confluence of 3 and 7 mile sloughs to help prevent similar occurances in the future.