Bring the Salmon Home
Background information for the Klamath River DAM REMOVAL
Campaign
By S. Craig Tucker, Ph.D.
Klamath Campaign Coordinator
Karuk Tribe
Introduction
Fed by snowmelt from the Cascade Mountains, the Klamath River
begins as a series of wetlands, marshes, and lakes in the high mountain desert
of Southeastern Oregon. Often called the “Everglades of the West”, this
area once hosted an incredible diversity of wildlife, from the millions of
migratory fowl that winter in the marshes to unique species of fish that
inhabit the lakes and river. With up to 1.1 million adult fish being produced
annually, including chinook, coho, pinks and chum salmon as well as abundant
steelhead, the Klamath was once the third most productive salmon river system
on the west coast.
For thousands of years, Native People including the Klamath, Karuk, Hoopa and
Yurok Tribes sustained themselves on the bounty of the river. As white
settlers came to the area, a sustainable commercial fishery developed.
Today all of this has changed. The current Klamath River fall
chinook salmon productivity is now less than 8 percent of its historical
abundance. For coho salmon, once the workhorse of the west coast fishing
industry, the numbers are less than 1 percent. Chum and pink salmon, once
abundant in the Klamath, are long gone and totally extinct. Coho salmon are
listed as a threatened species, the Lost River Sucker, and the Short Nosed
Sucker are listed as Endangered Species. Today, the Karuk no longer hold a
First Salmon Ceremony for there are virtually no spring run salmon to harvest.
Many factors can be blamed for the Klamath’s decline, but
none are more outstanding or timely to address than the dams which stand
between salmon and there home spawning grounds in the Upper Basin.
Dams
When the Copco 1 Dam was constructed on the Klamath River in
1918, it permanently blocked access to more than 300 miles of salmon and
steelhead habitat in the main stem of the upper Klamath and its tributaries.
Another dam, Copco 2, was constructed just a quarter-mile downstream of the
original facility in 1925. These dams not only blocked salmon and steel-head
migration, they significantly altered river flows, causing releases that could
drop by 1,500 percent or more in a matter of minutes. Such radically altered
flows severely damaged one of the most important salmon spawning areas on the
Klamath for spring-run chinook and steelhead, stranding adult and young fish
alike, exposing egg nests, cementing spawning gravels, and preventing upstream
recruitment of new spawning gravels. The aptly named 173-foot-high Iron Gate
Dam was constructed in 1962 to re-regulate the wildly varying flows from the
upstream Copco dams and run a 20 megawatt power plant.
With the construction of Iron Gate, another seven miles of
spawning habitat in the mainstem as well as access to important tributaries
such as Camp Creek was blocked.
Today, all anadromous runs of salmon and steelhead, once
abundant in the upper basin, are now extinct above Iron Gate Dam. This means
over 350 miles of historic salmon habitat is unreachable by fish and much of
it buried beneath reservoirs.
In all, there are six dams on the mainstem of the Klamath
River: Iron Gate, Copco I and Copco II, J.C. Boyle, Keno, and Link River.
Since Keno and Link effectively replace natural reefs that were destroyed and
serve the need of re-regulating erratic flows for the upstream irrigation
project, river advocates seek the removal of the lower four dams. However,
Keno and Link must be fitted will functional ladders.
The Impact on Klamath Basin Tribes
Discounted by the Bureau of Reclamation, and until recent court
orders rarely part of its planning, were the water and fishing rights of the
Basin’s Native Peoples. Originally the Upper Klamath Lake supported a Tribal
subsistence fishery of more than 50 tons per year as well as a booming
recreational fishery and at least one cannery.
The Klamath Tribes, located above all six dams in Chiloquin,
Oregon area have been denied access to salmon and steelhead for over 80 years.
For down river tribes, the dams have contributed to the near
extirpation of spring-run salmon, and a dramatic decline for salmon and
steelhead overall. This robs the Karuk, Hoopa, and Yurok Tribes of an
important economic resource, but more importantly, it robs the tribes’ of a
vital cultural resource and subsistence fishery.
In 2004, the Karuk harvested less that 100 salmon from their
last remaining dip net site, Ishi Pishi falls.
The Disaster of 2002
In the fall of 2002, the cumulative impacts of dams,
diversions, and poor management led to the Klamath’s worst single disaster
when over 68,000 fish died in a matter of days. This represents the largest
fish kill in US history. The fish kill was caused by warm water and low flows,
a situation created by a combination of poor water management from the Upper
Klamath Irrigation Project and water quality degradation by the dams.
Opportunities Afforded by Hydrorelicensing
In February, PacifiCorp filed a license application for the
operation of Iron Gate, Copco 1, Copco 2, J.C. Boyle, and Keno dams. The
current license expires in 2006. Despite years of meetings with Tribes,
environmentalists, and fishermen, PacifiCorp ignored all calls for fish
passage in their final license application..
When the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issues a
new license in 2006, it will last for 50 years. Thus relicensing provides a
once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to address restoration via dam removal.
Federal agencies such as Fish and Wildlife Service and National
Marine Fisheries Service have the authority to demand adequate measures for
fish restoration. Likewise, the state Water Resources Control Board has
mandatory conditioning authority. This means the state of California can
demand protection of the Klamath’s “beneficial uses” in the license.
This includes water quality, recreation, and fish habitat. Therefore Gov.
Schwarzenegger has the power to require a feasible strategy to return salmon
to the upper Klamath Basin. The state’s demands could include a combination
of functional ladders and dam removal to achieve these goals.
Myths told by dam supporters:
Myth: The dams improve water quality
Fact: Dams degrade water quality by allow otherwise cold water to warm as it
sits behind the dam, stagnant beneath the sun. The Klamath water is unusually
loaded with nutrients from fertilizers used upstream. This allows water in the
reservoirs to host massive algal blooms that create a host water quality
problems downstream
Myth: We are desperate for the electricity the Klamath dams
produce
Fact: The Klamath dams produce a relatively small amount of energy, 147
mega-watts. According to the California Energy Commission’s 2002 California
Hydroelectricity Outlook Report: “Because of the small capacity of the
Klamath hydro units…removal of these units will not have a significant
reliability impact on a larger regional scale.”
Myth: These dams are needed by agriculture
Fact: None of the dams targeted for removal are used to create irrigation
diversions
Myth: The dams are needed for flood control
Fact: The dams were not designed for or effectively used for flood control.
Who is PacifiCorp?
As it turns out, PacifiCorp is a wholly owned subsidiary of the
international energy giant, Scottish Power (NYSE - SPI). Scottish Power is the
28th largest energy company in the world, with a market worth over $14.9
billion. Three of PacifiCorp’s top 10 institutional shareholders are located
in San Francisco: Dodge and Cox, Duff & Phelps Investment Management Co.,
and UBS Realty Investors LLC.
What you can do to help:
Write or call your elected officials on the local, state
and federal levels. Let them know that you want to see the Klamath salmon
return home.
• It is important ecologically. The Klamath is one of the
most diverse regions of the west and offers one of the best opportunities for
restoration in the state. The Klamath once hosted 1.1 million fish each year
but today hosts 100,000 in a good year.
• It is important economically. The bounty of the Klamath
could be worth $4.5 billion to the national economy through fishing and
canneries. With construction of the Klamath dams, the economic base for CA
north coast communities was slowly destroyed. Dam removal coupled to other
restoration strategies could rebuild it.
• It is the moral thing to do. Klamath Basin tribes are
suffering from the loss of fish. The Karuk, Hoopa, Yurok, Klamath Tribes and
others lived along
the river for thousands of years and developed cultural
practices based on the fishery. Loss of the fishery intimately affects the
Tribes’ culture and robs them of an economic base for modern Tribal
economies.
Keep pace with the latest news and action alerts which
can be found at: http://www.karuk.us/.
Just click on our campaign link.
Join a conservation organization such as Friends of the
River that is working with the Tribes to Bring the Salmon Home.
Send your letter to:
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger
State Capitol Building Sacramento, CA 95814 Phone: 916-445-2841 Fax:
916-445-4633 governor@governor.ca.gov
Also Scottish Power is the Corporation that owns the dams.
Scottish Power plc
Attn: Board of Directors
1 Atlantic Quay
Glasgow G2 8sp
Scotland, United Kingdom
For more information contact Craig Tucker, Klamath River
Campaign Coordinator for the Karuk Tribe, at ctucker@karuk.us.