Idaho town pleads for salmon season

[BuzzH]

Heres an interesting article....I thought salmon werent very important to local economies?

Important enough to have a town and all its public officials in an uproar.

The sad thing is, if they had runs equivilant to the pre-dam runs, these towns would be making a killing!

The good thing that has come from the last 3 years of better salmon runs is towns like Riggins, Orifino, Kooskia, Kamiah, etc. have seen and felt the positive impacts (economics) of salmon. Maybe they'll wake up and start trying to get those worthless dams on the Snake breached. The more salmon there are in the river the more money they will make.

Anyway, heres the article:

May 8, 2003

Last modified May 8, 2003 - 12:29 am
Town wants salmon season

KOOSKIA, Idaho (AP) -- The city of Kooskia wants a piece of the economic gains brought in by salmon season.

The Idaho County Commission, the Kooskia Chamber of Commerce and the town's mayor want the Idaho Fish and Game Commission to open a chinook salmon season on the main stem of the Clearwater River.

The Commission approved a fishing season for hatchery spring chinook salmon between Lewiston and Orofino, butdid not open the stretch between Orofino and Kooskia. Now the town wants the department to reconsider its decision.

"It brings in just an awful lot of money from the outside," Kooskia Mayor John Schurbon said. "We have a lot of fishermen come in, from Montana especially, and this just knocks us out of the running entirely."

The county commission passed a resolution last week asking the commission to consider three options for a season. They include holding a catch-and-release season starting at Lewiston and running to the East Kooskia Bridge, holding a catch-and-release season from the Orofino Bridge to the East Kooskia Bridge or holding a catch-and-release season from the Orofino Bridge to the Kamiah Bridge along with a catch-and-keep season, with a limit of one fish per day, from the Kamiah Bridge to the East Kooskia Bridge.

Area fishery managers said preseason predictions indicate the Kooskia Hatchery will barely meet its spawning goals.

About 2,500 excess chinook are expected to return to the Dworshak Hatchery, leaving 1,250 each for sport and tribal anglers. The excess at Kooskia is expected to be only 280 chinook, leaving 140 for sport anglers and 140 for tribal fishers.

"Everything is pointing to us to be cautious here," Bill Miller, manager of the Dworshak National Fish Hatchery at Ahsahka said.

But he said he understands why people in the upper Clearwater valley want a salmon season.

"I can sympathize with the people of Kooskia and Kamiah," he said. "They get a lot of business up there when we can open a season."

The Fish and Game Commission will consider the request today at its meeting in Lewiston.
Copyright © The Billings Gazette, a division of Lee Enterprises.

 

[Ithaca 37]

Maybe some residents along the Clearwater and Salmon Rivers are finally starting to wake up and figure out where the money is! We get excited now if we have a 3% return on smolts that try to swim to the ocean now and we think the fishin' is great. People come from all over the country for the terrific fishin'!

Can you imagine what it would be like if we even had a 20% return? It would turn into a boom worth 100s of millions of dollars a year to Idaho. Plus many millions more for the Washington towns along the river.

People who don't want to breach the dams are crazy! And if the locals ever figure out how much damage the logging and grazing is doing to water quality that affects spawning they'll never want to see another cow or logging road across a steep hillside again!

Finally the message from the wildlife proponents is starting to sink in!

Too bad some of the HT posters haven't figured it out yet.

 

[Delw]

Buzz...

I dont have problems with dam's as much as I have the problem with the damn indian's netting 90% of the rivers and staggering every other net.

In 1980 when the federal court gave the puyallup indians the ok to gill net 90% of the river, the did one better ten feet behind the next first net they put another one so it was staggered... fish generally swim a straight line, so there was nearly a 100% catch rate, the next year they did the same thing and so on.....
Now in 1884 the indians blamed the white man for no salmon, and demanded money. Then the animal wako groups got involved and said the salmon problem was due to damn and and growth.... Funny thing there is no damns in the puyallup river and there no cities in the puyallup river....
This also happened on the cowlitz, green, snohomish and many other rivers in western washington.
Even the columbia river the indians net a majority of the river before it goes to the first dam....(they did back in the early 80's)
In 1992 I went back for my sisters wedding and in april there was 2 fish that came over the scales(south praire creek). one was a steelhead and one was a pink salmon(humpback). that was from the first part of the year till april 4 months.... and no dams where in the way.
This river(creek) was a tributary from the puyallup river it was about 20 feet wide at its narrowist spot and about 2 feet deep. When I lived there I used to drive there from the house put the waders on and go pick up salmon with my bare hands. you couldnt believe the amount of salmon in that creek unless you lived there and saw it for yourself. this was just one of 1000's of rivers that got raped by the indians(not dams)

The second most important problem due to the destruction of the salmon runs are the commercial fisheries and the indian fisheries in the bays at the mouth of these rivers. you get 50-500 boats out there dragging nets at the mouth of the river on a low tide and that will whipe out a good chunk of the salmon also.

so people wonder why there are no salmon. they try to find blame on other probelms like dams and over population when in fact the major runs of salmon were detroyed thanks to the indians and greed. Animal rights activist blame it on the dams due to the fact they cant blame it on the indians because of the federal law .. they have to find someone to blame it on.

I would say dams are a problem but not the major problem. its more of a problem for inland salmon ie idaho and past the dams... However fish ladders due work when the salmon numbers are up. but then again its legal for indians to net infront of a fish ladder and right on top where the fish ladder enters the lake made by the dam( it was back in the late 70's and early 80's)...
I think the study was that fish ladders work for about 50% of the population of salmon that made the yearly salmon run. Ive gone to these fish ladders when I was a kid just to watch the salmon go up them(it was pretty cool) and there was litterally 1000's per day...

If we can get the numbers back up on the salmon then I think you would see more fish in the inland rivers....

Its kinda funny how the indians always bitch about not having salmon when they are the ones that caused the destruction fo the salmon...


Delw

 

[Delw]

Oh yeah on another note....

this town rely's on

"Nestled amid protective hills at the confluence of the Southfork and Middlefork of the Clearwater River lies the city of Kooskia (Pronounced Koos-kee). Lumber production, farming, cattle raising, logging, and tourism are the major industries of the Kooskia area."

OMG Cattle ranching and Lumber production....

Delw

 

[Ithaca 37]

Del, look at "Another chance for Salmon"---the other thread.

 

[BuzzH]

Delw, your wrong, and thats a fact.

The tribal take cannot exceed 50% of the available salmon returns, so your estimate of 90% is off base.

Also, dont forget that the treaties of 1837 and 1855 guaranteed the tribes the salmon as a resource. In return the tribes ceded 40 million acres of land to the US Government in the same agreement. The treaty reads as follows:"the exclusive right of taking fish at usual and accustomed places, in all streams."

Further, a court hearing later determined that the Tribes have exclusive rights to 50% of the fish, and US Supreme Courts have upheld treaty rights as "high law".

To go even one step further, because of the treaties, the tribes filed a 226 page document a couple years ago to the National Marine Fisheries service that read more like a legal brief than a report. In it they make reference to the 40 million acres they ceded, the 388,000 acres of flooded hunting grounds they lost to dams and between 243 and 400 million pounds of salmon lost after Snake river dam construction. Put in dollars and cents, the tax payers will be paying out the ass to compensate for the loss that the US government is RESPONSIBLE for. According to several government legal experts, the lawsuit would result in the tax payers coughing up 100-120 billion (minimum) in compensation. The same experts also make reference to the fact that nearly 100% of the time the Supreme court has upheld treaty rights...meaning there is basically no chance of the US Gov. winning a lawsuit if one is filed by the tribes.

As far as the causes of the loss of salmon, you're dead wrong. Over 200 experts, from agencies ranging from the NMFS, USFWS, Game and Fish departments of ID, OR, MT, and WA, Tribal game and fish dept. (everyone involved with the PATH report) all came to the same conclusion that Dams are the number one reason why anadromous fish are threatened throughout the entire Columbia river drainage. I find it hard to argue with 200 individuals and no fewer than 20 agencies directly involved in Salmon recovery.

The problem is not with returning adults (the ladders work fine) the problem is with smolt getting to the ocean. One report I read stated that before dams a smolt would make it from Idaho to the Pacific, tail first, in 2 weeks. Now, because of slack behind dams, controlled flow, etc. the same smolt take nearly 2 months swimming head first, to reach the Pacific. When the dams went in, the Army Corp guaranteed a 10-12 percent smolt-adult return rate from hatcheries. Care to make a guess what the highest return rate has been? Not even 5 percent. But its the Indians over-harvesting right? Last time I checked they werent netting smolt.

Your wrong too about the commercial fishing, sure they catch some, but the number of commercial fishermen has declined to a pitance of what it was historically.

The problem we have is that when salmon returns are as low as they've been and in steady decline for 25 years, people like you point the blame at only what you see. Think of this, if 20 million Salmon hit the mouth of the Columbia (numbers before dams), would it matter if Indians took a couple million and commercial fishermen took another couple million? I know it wouldnt.

The problem with poor salmon returns is dams, and thats an indisputable fact.

Oh, and about Kooskia, that town is such a depressed place, you can literally buy any house in town for 35K. In fact, my buddy and I seriously considered buying a nice 3 bedroom home there....15K, for a place to stay when we fish down there. I would have, but because of the piss poor management of the anadromous fish, it wouldnt be worth it for a season every 20 years....Oh, but thats right its the Indians taking all the fish...

 

[Delw]

Buzz in 1980 or close to the federal gov gave the indians permission to gill net 90% of the river..... it was suppose to be for 30 days I believe. but they did it for months why the courts were trying to get it over turned...

Has far as historic verse now . we cant even go thier due to the migration ways of the salmon... if they were whiped out on a river in 1980 chance are your not going to be close to it now even if that river is left alone.....


Now Buzz.. Are you saying that the indians are not the reason for the destruction of the salmon runs? what would it be? most of the rivers dont have dams and they have little to no salmon runs.... so how can this be?
Delw

 

[BuzzH]

Most of what rivers dont have dams?

The Columbia drainage has 211 dams.

The amount of available habitat for spawning on the main stem Columbia has been reduced from 1200 to 55 miles. The Snake has lost 400 of 500 miles of spawning habitat. The N. Fork of the Clearwater is another loss of 1000 or so miles of main-stem and trib. spawning loss. Everything upstream of Grand Coulee is lost. Everything upstream of Hells Canyon is lost.

You dont see any reason why our anadromous fish of the Columbia are in trouble and still believe that Indians netting them is the number one problem?

Hatchery return rates of smolts to adults of (typically) less than 1 percent arent a problem? The best years its 2-3 percent, again no problem eh?

95-99 percent smolt mortality isnt a problem?

Its all the Indians and their nets right?

Come on, Delw, I know you're too smart to believe that.

While I may give you some latitude on the rivers in WA, you cant honestly believe that the number one reason for loss of anadromous fish in the Columbia is anything other than dams.

 

[ELKCHSR]

As I understand it, the Indians are supposed to only net 1/3 the river in any given place, so they set gill nets, which I have seen, across the first third of the river, then up a hundred yards it goes out across the third of the middle of the river, then a little farther along, it goes across the remaining third of the river. This process may go on for a mile or two, while only a third is gill netted at any one time, how are the fish to know to go around the nets, hence the name gild net. There are no fish that make it thru the nets as they have them set up. I have also seen tons of bad fish dumped on back roads for whatever reasons the waste occurred, I hear the fish are stripped of eggs and the rest tossed away. This to me is a piss poor reason to waste thousands of fish every year...
Just an observation on my part and I will back every thing that was stated by Del, it is pretty common knowledge along the coastal areas amongst those that are interested in this subject.

 

[Ten Bears]

I've seen the gill nets, and I've seen the waste. I've even seem tribal members have their fishing rights revoked by the tribal council for waste and destruction (doesn't happen enough to some guys). I cna't speak for everyone, and wont even try, but if gill nets were restricted, and only traditional harvest methods were allowed, it'd be a different story.

<FONT COLOR="#800080" SIZE="1">[ 05-12-2003 09:12: Message edited by: Ten Bears ]</font>

 

[Delw]

This was a 2001 article

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Columbia River Chinook Run!

David T. Sprague Co-Founder

The huge number of spring Chinook that crossed the Bonneville Dam this last year is only a prelude to the record expected in 2001.

Nearly 365,000 spring Chinook are expected to cross the dam this year, according to a panel of state, federal and tribal biologists.

That's more than twice last year's run of 178,600 - also a record. We at FishWithUs.Net sure hope these predictions are correct!

According to the figures released, more than 80 percent of the run will hatchery-born. That means that while one threatened wild run - Snake River Chinook listed under the Endangered Species Act - rebounds, wild fish remain in serious trouble.

So measures to protect threatened and endangered salmon, including fishing restrictions and constraints on the operation of the Columbia River hydroelectric dams, will remain in effect. Biologists say the upswing may not last. Large runs are expected in 2002, but forecasts for 2003 and beyond are uncertain.

And other runs of salmon - including fall Chinook in the Columbia and Coho along the Oregon coast - are not expected to rebound nearly as dramatically. Projections for those fish next year have not yet been completed. Still, fish managers are thrilled.

"The stars lined up just perfect for this brood," said Steve King, salmon fishery manager for the Department of Fish and Wildlife. "The region should be pleased." The spike can be attributed to many factors: good ocean conditions, lots of rain five years ago that helped young salmon reach the sea and changes in the way Columbia River dams are operated. Fishery managers are bracing for the challenges the fish boom will bring. They will have to set fish regulations that would allow public access to the hatchery bonanza while protecting wild runs.

Commercial, tribal and sport fishing limits for 2001 haven't yet been set. Other problems also are expected - including the fact that returning hatchery-born fish will swamp hatcheries. Because state and federal biologists do not want hatchery fish to breed in the wild and overwhelm their wild cousins, excess hatchery fish will be killed. That practice has drawn widespread protest from people who think hatchery fish should be allowed to spawn. "We're a region that's not prepared for abundances," said Charles Hudson, a spokesman for the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, which represents four tribes with treaty rights to Columbia River salmon. Last year, tribes caught 11,200 spring Chinook and were allowed to sell the fish commercially.

This year, the tribes could request a catch of more than 35,000 spring Chinook, said Mike Matylewich, head of the commission's fish management department. The National Marine Fisheries Service, however, has called for fishing levels to be held constant or even decreased until salmon return. The fisheries service has proposed that Snake River spring/summer Chinook be removed from the endangered species list when, among other things, the wild population exceeds an average of 34,400 for eight years running. This year's return is projected at 42,400 - triple last year's number and the highest since the run was added to the endangered species list. We all look forward with hopeful hearts to another great fishery in 2001.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

http://www.fishwithus.net/article1200columbiariver.html

Hey they successfully crossed a dam

Delw

 

[Bullhound]

Buzz,

It's obvious as hell that you don't know the real facts and haven't spent the time in these areas that have been plundered by the Indians. You obviously are easily convinced when you want to be. Wake up.....the coffees' burnin'...........

 

[Ithaca 37]

Here's what it comes down to: How many smolts fail to make it to the ocean because of dams?

How many returning fish are taken by Indians?

Answer those questions and you'll see where the major problem is.

 

[JoseCuervo]

Solve the issue for the smolts going downstream, and then we will all look like a greedy bunch as we argue over the 10 million adult fish that swim upstream.

We would all be so damn sick of salmon, that we would ONLY practice catch and release.

 

[Delw]

Ithaca..

I understand what you are saying but there are other factors as well..... and the indians are the MAIN Decline for the salmon population in washington state.... Breeching the Dams isnt the answer for the rest of the state cause there is no Damn Dam problems anywhere but along the snake..... but trying to save a fish by breeching damns is a little excessive..... remember people come first not there pets... If for some reason salon cant make it to idaho in certain places we'll thats just tough shit. they just dont get any until something is figured out... but to remove people or change thier life styles for a few fish that are everywhere else in the sate(there can be more if the indians leave them alone)....

This is almost as bad as the problem we are having here with roosevelt lake....

You see we had a drought , so they built the dam a little bigger.. well why all this was taken place a bird decided to make a next in the lake bed AZ willow fly catcher.. Now they cant fill the lake even if we had the water due to its an endangered species and people are in an uproar about misplacing this bird....
The funny part is that the bird wasnt there before(cause there was water there) and now it is(because we have no water thier)..So now the bird wins at least for a while until some barn cat eats the damn thing

Delw

 

[JoseCuervo]

Del,

My family's lifestyle was catching fish. Every fall they would go up on the Weiser and catch a bunch for canning and smoking. In the summers, my grandpa used to catch many in Johnson Creek (Trib of the East Fork of the South Fork of the Salmon).

So you are asking ME and MY family to change our lifestyle, for YOUR damn dams?

I actually think this is one of the issues, that has already been won. The dams are coming down, and we will have fish again. My kids can catch salmon in Idaho, if they choose, and so can your kids.

Long Live The King!!! Salmon that is....

 

[Delw]

You lost it to make way for progress..

I agree some dam's shouldnt even be built....
Heck we have 4 out here in AZ and there aint any fugging water around here for 100 miles... I Kid you not they are in the middle of the desert valley... reason being in case it floods people house wont get wet.... Well excuess me if your stupid enough to build in a flood plain then you deserve to loose your hous...


unfortunatly it happens......

Delw

 

[JoseCuervo]

Del,

If you are bored, and want to study about dams in Idaho, read about the Sunbeam dam. It was on the Main Salmon, below Stanley.

Mysteriously, in 1934 it was blown up one night, and the breached dam still stands, and does not hinder fish. In Conley's book about it, he has a great quote: "It is amazing how much can get done, when no one takes credit".

Environmental "monkey wrenching" is a noble calling.

Actually, I just look at it as my family's way of life was temporarily taken from me, and so I will fight to get it back. Right now, my best fight is in the court rooms, and right now, we are winning in the court rooms, and actually, we are winning in the media.

er

 

[Delw]

I will look it up tomorrow maybe today.... I am interested in this due to the fact thats all I did in washington state was fish for salmon and steelies , and fisheries interest me alot...
Delw

 

[BuzzH]

Delw and Bullhound, I dont understand the issue? Really, I find that kind of funny when Delw said that "90% of the fish are gill netted by Indians"

Huh??? Wait a minute, hows that when Delw Then provides an article that says 11,000 out of a run of 178,000 are taken by Indians....The next year a run of 365,000 sets a record and the tribes catch is 35,000 fish.

Now, I'll admit right out to not being much of a math wizard, but I know enough to see thats about 10%...not 90% of the runs that are being harvested by Indians.

I also provided this fact, taken from the PATH report, now read this closely:

"Not once since the completion of the lower Snake dams has the Corps achieved its own goal of smolt to adult returns. Science tells us that we need at least two percent of the outgoing juvenile salmon to return as adults to sustain just a skeletal population. Right now, the smolt to adult ratio is .4 percent. That is one fifth the number we need just to hold the line."

Thats right .4 percent of the smolt released make it back to the Columbia...thats piss poor. Again my math isnt great but roughly 1 adult makes it for about 250 smolt released.

Yet, I DONT KNOW THE ISSUE??? Explain to me what the bigger problem is, 10% of the adults being taken by Indians or a smolt to adult return rate of .4 percent.

Oh, and its also fair to note that many rivers in Oregon, Washington, British Columbia, Alaska, etc. get smolt to adult returns of 20% or higher...of course those river drainages dont have 211 dams on them either.

Believe what you want, but the experts, the science, and common sense point to the real problem with the Columbia and Snake River anadromous fish...now I think I'll START the fire under that Coffee.