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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT size=3><STRONG><FONT face="Times New Roman"
size=1><FONT size=3>Excerpts from:</FONT> </FONT></STRONG> </FONT></DIV>
<P align=center><FONT lang=0 face="Times New Roman" size=1 PTSIZE="8"
FAMILY="SERIF"><B>A WEEKLY QUOTA OF FISHERY SHORTS CAUGHT AND LANDED BY THE
INSTITUTE FOR FISHERIES RESOURCES AND THE PACIFIC COAST FEDERATION OF
FISHERMEN'S ASSOCIATIONS</FONT><FONT lang=0 style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff"
face=Arial color=#000000 size=2 PTSIZE="10" FAMILY="SANSSERIF"
BACK="#ffffff"></B><BR>__________________________________________________________________________________________________<BR></FONT><FONT
lang=0 style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" face="Times New Roman" color=#000000
size=6 PTSIZE="24" FAMILY="SERIF" BACK="#ffffff"><B>SUBLEGALS<BR></FONT><FONT
lang=0 style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" face="Times New Roman" color=#000000
size=1 PTSIZE="8" FAMILY="SERIF" BACK="#ffffff"></B><I>~WE HOOK THE NEWS THAT'S
FIT TO NET~</FONT><FONT lang=0 style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" face=Arial
color=#000000 size=2 PTSIZE="10" FAMILY="SANSSERIF"
BACK="#ffffff"></I><BR></FONT><FONT lang=0 style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff"
face="Times New Roman" color=#000000 size=3 PTSIZE="12" FAMILY="SERIF"
BACK="#ffffff"><B>Vol. 09, No. 11</B><BR></FONT><FONT lang=0
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" face=Arial color=#000000 size=2 PTSIZE="10"
FAMILY="SANSSERIF" BACK="#ffffff"><B>19 & 26 March
2004</B><BR>__________________________________________________________________________________________________<BR><BR>
<P align=left><B><I>"The problem in our fisheries today, and that includes the
agencies, academia, industry and the environmentalists, is that we've got too
damn many theorists and too few thinkers. What's clearly needed is more
critical thought and less 'group think'."
.P.R. Templeton</B></I><BR>
<P
align=center>_________________________________________________________________________________________________<BR><B><BR>IN
THIS ISSUE
.</B><BR>
<P align=left>2002 Klamath Fish Kills May Shut Down 2005 & 2006 California
and Oregon Salmon Fisheries. <B>9:11/01.</B><BR>NMFS Science Panel Rips
Agency's Hatchery Fish Listing Policy. <B>9:11/03.</B><BR> <BR>
<P align=center><B>AND
MORE
</B><BR>___________________________________________________________________________________________________<BR>
<P align=left><BR> <B>9:11/01. 2002 KLAMATH FISH
KILLS MAY MEAN SHUTDOWN OF CALIFORNIA AND OREGON OCEAN SALMON FISHERIES IN 2005,
2006; HOW WILL KARL ROVE SPIN THIS?</B> At its 7-12 March meeting in
Tacoma, the Pacific Fishery Management Council (PFMC) released data on ocean
salmon stocks showing the number of Klamath 3-year old fall chinook numbers to
be the second lowest on record. <STRONG><U>The Klamath numbers sharply differ
with projected abundance for stocks from all other river systems, which indicate
continued abundance attributed to the wet conditions of the early part of the
decade and good ocean survival.</U></STRONG> Ocean salmon fisheries from the
central Oregon coast to the central California coast are managed on the basis of
Klamath stock abundance and coastal fall-chinook (e.g., Eel and Mattole Rivers).
Thus, predicted near record low numbers of returning Klamath 3-years olds this
year means there is a danger the "escapement floor" of 35,000 natural spawners
may not be met. This will trigger some cutbacks in this year's fishery (most
likely from Point Arena north, affecting the ports of Fort Bragg and Eureka, as
well as the southern Oregon coast) but <U>massive</U> cuts in the ocean fishery,
as well as the tribal and in-river sport fishery, for 2005. With the new
Klamath model this could mean no salmon fishing between Cape Falcon (Columbia
River) and Point Sur (southern end of Monterey Bay) in
2005.<BR><BR> <STRONG><U> Evidence explaining
extremely low Klamath 3-year olds this year clearly points to the juvenile fish
kill that occurred in the river in the spring of 2002 (see <I>Sublegals,</I>
5:18/01; 5/17/02; 5/14/02; 5:13/02). That spring, the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation (BOR), despite protests from the California Department of Fish &
Game, the Yurok Tribe and a lawsuit by PCFFA and other fishery and conservation
groups, substantially reduced flows into the river in order to provide full
delivery of irrigation water to growers in the Klamath Federal Irrigation
Project during the drought. That action led to a large kill of juvenile chinook
- this season's class of 3-year olds - as well as Endangered Species Act (ESA)
listed coho salmon. The low water conditions also led to the
much-publicized kill of over 34,000 returning adult spawners late that summer
(see <I>Sublegals,</I> 6:15/01; 6:14/01; 6:13/01; 6:12/07). Although the
fall kill was the most spectacular and publicized, the spring kill may prove to
be far more devastating. 2006 will likely see similar draconian closures due to
the September 2002 adult fish kill and the loss of their
progeny.<BR></U></STRONG><BR> Tragically, the situation
fishermen and coastal communities are faced with next season could have been
avoided had the BOR listened to the fishery biologists and provided the minimums
flows. Politics and the re-election campaign of a U.S. Senator, however, got in
the way.
<BR>
<BR> Ignoring her trust obligations to the Tribes
and the water needs of the fish, Interior Secretary Gail Norton stood in front
of a cheering crowd of growers in Klamath Falls that spring of 2002 opening the
irrigation head-gates and drying up the river. White House operative Karl Rove,
meanwhile, was meeting in the area with growers determining how to use the issue
to help the re-election of U.S. Senator Gordon Smith (R-OR). It was not
until the following year, in a 30 July 2003 expose in the <I>Wall Street
Journal</I>, that the details of the Administration's political maneuvers come
to light (see <I>Sublegals,</I> 8:05/06). In September 2003, an
investigation was called for on Rove's activities and the role of the Bush
Administration in the fish kill, but an in-house investigation by Interior's
Inspector General claimed there was no foul play. For more information,
see the 6 September 2003 issues of <I>The Olympian</I> at: <A
href="http://www.theolympian.com/home/news/20030906/northwest/93525.shtml">http://www.theolympian.com/home/news/20030906/northwest/93525.shtml</A>,
and the <I>Boston Globe</I> at: <A
href="http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2003/09/06/bush_water_policy_faces_probe">http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2003/09/06/bush_water_policy_faces_probe</A>,
as well as the 5 September 2003 print version of <I>KATU News</I> at: <A
href="http://www.katu.com/news/story.asp?ID=60481">http://www.katu.com/news/story.asp?ID=60481</A>.
Also see the 12 March 2004 issue of the <I>Oregonian</I> at: <A
href="http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1079096846322770.xml">http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1079096846322770.xml</A>.<BR><BR>
At its April meeting in Sacramento, the PFMC will make its recommendations to
the Secretary of Commerce for the 2004 salmon season. Those
recommendations will likely include some additional restrictions in the 2003
season to reduce impacts on depressed Klamath 3-year olds. But the real brunt of
the 2002 Klamath fish kill will be felt in 2005 and 2006, well after the 2004
elections, and when the new Congress will be immersed in program cuts attempting
to address the record federal budget
deficit. <BR><BR>
<B>9:11/03. NMFS SCIENCE PANEL RIPS ITS AGENCY FOR MIXING WILD WITH
HATCHERY FISH FOR COUNTING PURPOSES UNDER ESA:</B> On 26 March, a panel of six
scientists, constituting the National Marine Fisheries Service's (NMFS) Recovery
Science Review Panel, released a paper in the 26 March issue of Science,
blasting the NMFS proposal to count hatchery fish as equivalent to wild for the
purposes of determining whether a fish warrants listing and special protection
under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). On 10 September 2001, U.S. District
Court Judge Michael Hogan found NMFS' justification lacking for separately
counting wild and hatchery fish for purposes of the ESA (see <I>Sublegals,</I>
4:11/02). NMFS refused to appeal the decision, in a case brought by
developers (<I>Alsea Valley Alliance v. NMFS</I>, Oregon Dist. Ct., Civ. No.
99-6265-HO), and the issue ended up being appealed by PCFFA and other fishing
and conservation groups to the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals where it was
dismissed on jurisdictional grounds on 24 February of this year (see
<I>Sublegals,</I> 9:09/02). Because of the abundance of certain hatchery stocks,
their numbers, if counted with natural spawners, could mask problems facing wild
stocks and the need for special protections afforded under the ESA.
<BR><BR> The Review Panel had recommended NMFS respond
to Hogan's ruling by excluding hatchery fish from its general fish count, but
the agency refused and tried to quell the scientist's concerns. In its Science
article, the Review Panel recommended NMFS rewrite its rules and definitions to
distinguish between wild salmon and hatchery-raised fish both to satisfy the
legal concerns of the federal judge and to make sure wild salmon remain
protected. The fisheries service must find a legally defensible definition, the
scientists wrote, or face "devastating consequences: wild salmon could decline
or go extinct while only hatchery fish persist." The Panel Chairman, Dr.
Robert Paine of the University of Washington, told the <I>San Francisco
Chronicle</I>, "We should not open the legal door to maintaining salmon only in
hatcheries. The science is clear and unambiguous. As they are currently
operated, hatcheries cannot protect wild
stocks."<BR><BR> NMFS downplayed the article, saying
"policy and science should not be mixed," amidst charges the agency had sought
to censor the scientists' findings, similar to what it had done with the report
of one of their biologists on the Klamath following the 2002 fish kill.
"This administration has developed such a reputation for scientific censorship
that it wouldn't be a surprise if this had been ordered removed from
Washington," Donald Kennedy, former President of Stanford University and now
Editor of <I>Science</I>, told the Los Angeles Times. Kennedy described the six
scientists as top-notch and noted that their article easily withstood review by
scientific peers before publication. "Differences on scientific issues should be
argued on the merits," Kennedy said, "and censorship isn't the way to conduct an
honest debate."<BR><BR> PCFFA Northwest Director Glen
Spain, commenting on the Panel's <I>Science</I> article, said "The Endangered
Species Act was not intended to protect fish in tanks. It was intended to
protect them in the wild, which includes the rivers and streams where they
spawn. The fishing industry has suffered enormous losses due to over-logging,
over-grazing and the over-drafting and polluting of rivers." For more
information, see the 26 March issues of the <I>San Francisco Chronicle</I> at:
<A
href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/03/26/MNGQG5RO7F1.DTL">http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/03/26/MNGQG5RO7F1.DTL</A>,
and the <I>Los Angeles Times</I> at: <A
href="http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-salmon26mar26,1,1261298.story?coll=la-home-local">http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-salmon26mar26,1,1261298.story?coll=la-home-local</A>.<BR></P></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><EM><FONT color=#808080></FONT></EM> </DIV>
<DIV><EM><FONT color=#808080>Byron Leydecker</FONT></EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM><FONT color=#808080>Chairman, Friends of Trinity
River</FONT></EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM><FONT color=#808080>Consultant, California Trout,
Inc,</FONT></EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM><FONT color=#808080>PO Box 2327</FONT></EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM><FONT color=#808080>Mill Valley, CA 94942-2327</FONT></EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM><FONT color=#808080>415 383 4810 ph</FONT></EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM><FONT color=#808080>415 519 4810 cell</FONT></EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM><FONT color=#808080>415 383 9562 fx</FONT></EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM><A href="mailto:bwl3@comcast.net"><FONT
color=#0000ff>bwl3@comcast.net</FONT></A></EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM><A href="mailto:bleydecker@stanfordalumni.org"><FONT
color=#0000ff>bleydecker@stanfordalumni.org</FONT></A><FONT color=#0000ff>
(secondary)</FONT></EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM><A href="http://www.fotr.org/"><FONT
color=#0000ff>http://www.fotr.org</FONT></A></EM></DIV>
<DIV><A
href="http://www.caltrout.org/"><EM>http://www.caltrout.org</EM></A></DIV>
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