CASCADIA EDITORIAL


					10-20-97











The 1997 fall fishery on the Columbia River was a disaster.  A 


better extinction plan for salmon and steelhead could not be 


invented, and all the authority of the state, federal, and tribal 


fish management agencies has been focused on killing salmon and 


steelhead through the court ordered 1987 agreement called the 


Columbia River Fish Management Plan. Unfortunately, this plan is 


not balanced by a conservation agreement, that part was deferred, 


but there is no evidence that the conservation mandate in the plan 


has been followed up on by the state agencies and tribes.





The state, federal, and tribal fish management agencies have never 


questioned their harvest practices, and downplay harvest as a 


factor in salmon and steelhead decline.  The Oregon Department of 


fish and wildlife is run by the harvest management and hatchery 


staff.   Their track record has resulted in declining coho, 


chinook, cutthroat, and steelhead runs and closed fisheries.  The 


same institutional problems exist in Washington, California, 


Idaho, and with the tribes.  Its time for a shake-up of these 


agencies to make protection of wild, native salmonids a higher 


priority than their extinction. 





This year on the Columbia the wild steelhead run was less than 


half of the goal of 75,500 fish over Bonneville Dam.  Based on the 


best biological evidence developed by the fish agencies and 


tribes, this many wild fish are needed to seed the habitat of the 


basin and maintain the health of native steelhead in a multitude 


of Columbia River tributaries.  But the Columbia River Fish 


Management Plan allows for a fixed harvest impact on wild 


steelhead regardless of the run strength.  This results in 


overharvest.





At the same time, the Oregon and Washington fish agencies were 


closing tributaries down to fishing due to an all-time low run of 


wild steelhead.  Also, the temperatures in the Columbia were high, 


72 F, and the fish were stressed, seeking out cool water refuges 


near the mouth of tributaries.  The fish had stopped migrating in 


the hot water. 





Wild Snake River fall chinook, listed as a threatened species in 


1992, were also trapped in the hot water.  The native, wild 


steelhead from the Snake and upper Columbia had just been listed 


as threatened and endangered species.  To accommodate the fishery, 


the National Marine Fisheries Service decided to not officially 


list the steelhead until after the fishery closed.  The sport and 


commercial fishery continued.  The Columbia River Compact, a joint 


Oregon and Washington fishery regulation body, continued to allow 


fishing for wild steelhead and listed fall chinook because the 


Columbia River Fish Management Plan couldn't be denied.





When I asked the Compact to close to all fishing an unprotected 


cool water refuge at the mouth of Herman Creek , the request was 


denied.  Even though salmon and steelhead bound for all parts of 


the Columbia River Basin were seeking relief from hot water at 


this small creek mouth, the Oregon harvest manager, Steve King, 


said Oregon didn't close this thermo-refuge because there was no 


hatchery salmon run to protect in the creek.  I also asked that 


wild steelhead be voluntarily released in tribal dipnet fisheries.  


It would save a few fish and the tribes could show they had 


concern for these native fish.  Since the Warm Springs tribal 


fishermen release wild chinook and steelhead in their fisheries at 


Sherars Falls on the Deschutes, I believed the request, while 


modest from a conservation perspective, was reasonable.  The 


tribal officials at the Compact ignored the request. 





It became clear that the state and tribal fish agencies had 


decided to consummate a fishery regardless of the environmental 


problems, and the declining runs of wild chinook and steelhead 


because they could.  The Columbia River Fish Management Plan gave 


them the authority to ignore common sense and ethical restraint to 


protect what remains of the Columbia's living heritage of native 


salmonids.  By eating their seed corn these fisheries were 


jeopardizing their own future.





The Columbia River Fish Management Plan, if you can call it that, 


is the result of hard work over many months by Jim Martin and Jack 


Donaldson, representing Oregon's interests.  The goal was to 


secure a harvest allocation for the Indians.  After all, the 


history of harvest management was one where the states had 


routinely used up all the fish before they reached Bonneville Dam 


and then demanded that the Indians bear the full conservation 


burden.  Having enough of that, the Indians went to court and got 


their place in the harvest lineup.  Jim Martin gave steelhead 


away, especially the large B-run fish because they belonged to 


Idaho; he sacrificed wild steelhead to give the Indians access to 


fall chinook harvest.  Idaho was so mad they refused to sign the 


agreement.  





The plan also predated the listing of Snake River chinook and 


sockeye as threatened and endangered species.  The plan allows a 


30% harvest rate on listed Snake River fall chinook.  At the time 


the plan was adopted there was no spawner abundance goal for Snake 


fall chinook.  They were treated as a throwaway species by harvest 


managers eager to cash in on the more abundant Hanford Reach 


salmon.   In 1997 the threatened Snake River fall chinook return 


to the mouth of the Columbia reached an estimated 2,000 adults.  


The response on the part of the states and tribes was to increase 


the harvest impact by 5%.  The effort to rebuild Snake River fall 


chinook cannot be achieved with this kind of  management 


authority.  





In 1998 the Columbia River Fish Management Plan will be 


renegotiated.  But will it change?  Will it build a conservation 


framework and hold the parties accountable to it?  The harvest and 


hatchery management interests run the state and tribal agencies.  


These agencies are interested in salmon and steelhead only as a 


commodity.  Healthy wild runs in beautiful productive streams are 


not their concern.  Biological diversity is treated as a 


constraint rather than a goal of management. These same 


professionals  will decide the new institutional authority to rule 


on the Columbia River.  As long as they can point a finger at the 


dams, loggers, cattlemen, farmers, and ocean productivity as the 


killers of wild salmon, and by doing so, divert attention from 


their role in promoting the decline and extinction of wild salmon,  


then a comprehensive solution to the wild salmon crisis will 


remain beyond our reach.