NANFA-- Where is the anger? (reoeat)

Bruce Stallsmith (fundulus_at_hotmail.com)
Thu, 03 Oct 2002 21:08:28 -0400

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Chris Scharpf originally posted the following last March. I saved it and
think about it a lot, especially when reading about truly stoopid activities
like the importation of large Asian carps that have escaped and established
breeding populations. The ongoing crisis in the Klamath River basin in
Oregon is another example, as a large number of returning salmon in the
river died in the last weeks from poor water quality resulting from
agricultural diversion of the waters. It doesn't have to go down like
this...

--Bruce Stallsmith
Huntsville, AL, US of A

>It seems that arguments about habitat protection rarely help and
usually
>make enemies. People seem to bring in politics and personal views
and such
>that usually don't have anything to do with the details of the issue
at
>hand. Maybe a simple review of the state of our aquatic habitats and
their
>life would be helpful.

The following is from Peter B. Moyle, author of INLAND FISHES OF
CALIFORNIA.
it dates from 1995, I think.

Where is the anger? Why is there no storm of fury over a Congress that
wants
to nullify the existence of hundreds of species? Why hasn't a ripple of
fear
passed through the nation over the actions of politicians who would
dump
more poisons into rivers and allow streams to run dry? Are we going to
sit
around quietly, drinking bottled water from France, watching the fish
die?

I wish I understood this complacency. In my office I have a map of the
Sierra Nevada that illustrates the near-disappearance of chinook salmon
that
once kept people awake at night from the splashing of a million tails.
California's coho salmon fisheries are nearly gone now. The fishermen
know
that a thousand frozen salmon from Alaska cannot replace a single coho
in
their catch.

Yet in the Pacific Northwest, keeping a few loggers employed for a few
years
(until the trees run out) or keeping a few cows grazing along unfenced
streams is regarded as worth sacrificing entire fish populations that
can
support future generations.

Of course, the fish (and humans) were not doing well even before the
present
era of "Wise Use" and congressional myopia. More than one third of all
the
fish species in North America are in serious decline even with the
Endangered Species Act in place. Every year, we pay more to filter the
water
we drink. Every year, more streams lose the vegetation along their
banks,
their runs of salmon and their ability to cleanse themselves.

My academic life has been partly spent documenting the loss of
California's
native fishes. My first paper documented the brief return of chinook
salmon
to the Kings River in the San Joaquin Valley where it had not been seen
for
25 years and has not been seen since. Subsequent papers documented
dramatic
declines in fishes and frogs native to the Sierra Nevada foothills. I
continue my academic studies, but for every ecological paper I publish,
I
publish two on species declines. In 1975, one of my students caught and
released the last known bull trout in California. Attempts to
reestablish
the species have failed. Destruction of species and ecosystems is easy
and
cheap, restoration hard and expensive.

This year it rained in California as it has not rained for years.
Fisheries
are rebounding, because the water has been purified, the spawning
gravel
cleansed and riparian habitat flooded. This gives hope that salmon,
sturgeon
and splittail can recover if we let them. However, the drought
California's
fish have suffered will be repeated if water diversions and
environmental
degradation continue.

Pressured by the Endangered Species Act and other environmental laws,
there
is an effort to negotiate solutions to California's water problems. Yet
Congress seems bent on destroying this to favor the greedy few. Where
is the
anger?
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