Feds
won’t add coho to threatened species list
From local and AP reports
- Roseburg News Review
January 18, 2006
Crediting strong efforts by the
state of Oregon to limit fishing, reform hatchery production and improve
freshwater habitat, NOAA Fisheries said Tuesday it’s shelving its proposal
to return Oregon coastal coho to the threatened species list.
“I applaud the hard work of local agriculture, forestry, state, tribal and
other federal partners to develop a solid plan for recovery,” Bob Lohn, the
NOAA Fisheries Northwest regional administrator, said in a statement. “This
is an encouraging example of the diverse interests that can come together to
improve conditions for salmon in the Pacific Northwest.”
With no federal protection, there will be fewer regulations on logging,
agriculture, land development and restoration work from Astoria to Port Orford.
Douglas Timber Operators Executive Director Bob Ragon said the decision
won’t likely increase logging in the region, but will ultimately mean less
threat of lawsuits and restrictive bureaucratic red tape in the future.
“It’s been a decision that we’ve been looking forward to and it’s good
news,” Ragon said.
The state of Oregon will have a draft plan ready this summer detailing how it
will continue rebuilding Oregon coastal coho populations, said Ed Bowles,
fisheries chief for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.
“Nothing on the ground is going to change because of this from the fish’s
perspective,” Bowles said. “We will still continue doing the good
stewardship activities. We will continue to fix things that are broken within
the watersheds.”
Salmon advocates said the decision was premature, with many scientists,
including some within NOAA Fisheries, believing recent improvements in Oregon
coastal coho numbers are largely due to weather patterns producing more food
in the ocean — a condition subject to periodic change.
“We need a few more years under our belt before we know what the population
trends really are,” said Jeff Curtis of Trout Unlimited. “If this is not a
scientific decision, it’s probably based more on politics than scientists. I
think they’re trying to get at least one species not on the endangered
species list. I think they picked Oregon coastal coho.”
If NOAA Fisheries had gone through with its proposal to list, Oregon coastal
coho would have become the 27th population of Pacific salmon stretching from
the Canadian border to Southern California to be protected by the Endangered
Species Act since 1991. None has ever been judged healthy enough to be
delisted.
Ken Ferguson of Roseburg, director of the Steamboaters, a locally based
fly-fishing conservation group, said the decision reeks as a far-reaching
example of the White House’s influence on environmental rules and laws.
“I’m not surprised given the current administration. I’ve seen politics
trump science more than once,” Ferguson said.
Oregon coastal coho spawn in small rivers running out of the Coast Range into
the Pacific from the mouth of the Columbia south to the Sixes River near Port
Orford. The area is largely private land, controlled by timber companies and
farms. Historically, annual returns numbered more than 1 million fish, but
that dropped to a low of about 25,000 in 1997. Returns now are running around
100,000, Bowles said.
They were the bread and butter of the Oregon salmon fleet until 1994, when
federal authorities shut off ocean fishing due to plummeting numbers. They
were listed as a threatened species in 1998, primarily due to overfishing,
loss of habitat to logging, agriculture and urban development, and misguided
hatchery practices.
At the time, hatcheries intent on boosting harvests produced as many as 8
million young fish a year, with no regard for the harm to wild fish from
diluting their gene pool and producing competitors for scarce habitat. That
has since been reduced to 1 million.
The 1998 threatened species listing was overturned in 2001, when a federal
judge ruled that NOAA Fisheries had erred in lumping hatchery and wild fish in
the same population group, but only granting threatened species protections to
wild fish. That ruling was put on hold, but finally upheld in 2003.
The ruling prompted NOAA Fisheries to evaluate all its salmon listings, and it
eventually decided to keep them all on the threatened and endangered species
lists, even adding one.
In 2003, Gov. Ted Kulongoski reached an agreement with NOAA Fisheries to
revive an earlier Oregon Plan for Salmon, which emphasized voluntary efforts
to restore the fish, and last spring the Oregon Department of Fish and
Wildlife came out with a report finding that Oregon coastal coho remained
viable as a species, even when ocean conditions were poor.
“A ‘no-list’ under federal ESA does not mean these fish are firing on
all cylinders,” said Bowles. “All this means is that the fish are doing
well enough to not require federal protection through the ESA.”
Jim Muck, ODFW Roseburg district fish biologist, said the decision means that
Oregon has done a good enough job of watershed assessment for the past eight
years to prevent federal government intervention — keeping Oregon coastal
coho in state control.
“We won’t have the government on our back,” Muck said.
Muck stresses, however, that there’s plenty of work to be done before wild
coho can be considered fishable. Coho in the district average about 21 to 23
fish per mile in the Umpqua watershed’s rivers and streams. He said hatchery
fish make up about 2 to 3 percent of that figure in the district. ODFW’s
goal is to bring that figure to about 42 fish per mile.
“Even though the fish isn’t listed, we still need to continue our efforts.
They’re still not healthy enough to harvest,” Muck said.
News-Review reporter Adam Pearson contributed to this report. He can be
reached at 957-4213 or by e-mail at apearson@newsreview.info.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, any copyrighted
material herein is distributed without profit or payment to those who
have
expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for
non-profit
research and educational purposes only. For more information go to:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml
Source: http://www.newsreview.info/article/20060118/NEWS/60118003
