Federal authorities said this morning that they expect Oregon and Washington to ask permission to kill dozens of sea lions eating endangered salmon at the Bonneville Dam.

Brian Gorman, a spokesman for the National Marine Fisheries Service office in Seattle, said his agency is expecting the application asking for permission to kill the animals at any time.

The process is a lengthy and involved one that is expected to take at least a year to process. Such permission is rarely sought, Gorman said. He said the last time the agency approved a request to kill sea lions was seven years ago when a handful of the animals were gobbling up steelhead at Ballard Locks in Seattle.

In that case, the animals were even trucked to California only to return to the locks. Before they could be killed, they were transferred to SeaWorld in Florida, Gorman said.

Sea lions are protected under the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act, though they are not endangered.