For years now, the representatives of the fishing industry and various tribal counsels have argued that salmon are not getting the amount of water needed to sustain their species in the Klamath River, thanks to the federal government.
A plan by the Bureau of Reclamation, to supply enough water flowing through the Klamath watershed was implemented in 2002 through 2010, but the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco decided that the plan would only provide the coho with only 57 percent of the water it needs and fails to explain how the species will survive.
Coho salmon, which were declared a threatened species in 1997, have been fighting for their survival in just about all of the north coast streams and rivers and this decision is definitely a victory for conservationists and fishing interest in southern Oregon and northwestern California.
The Bush administration, joined by Klamath Basin farmers who depend on irrigation water, argued to the court that the eight-year water plan was the best estimated of the Cohos survival needs in the face of scientific uncertainty and that a planned increase in flows in 2010-11 would help restore the fish.
But the court said the coho, which has a three-year life cycle, might be extinct by the time the flow picked up.
Obviously, the effects of this ruling extend far beyond a single species of fish, which has been depleted by logging, dams, grazing and irrigation diversions since the 1940s. The coho inhabits Klamath tributaries as far south as Humboldt County.
The Bureau of Reclamation, who directed low water flows on the Klamath has directly been charged for the prime reason for a major salmon kill on the Klamath in 2002. Because of these low flows at the time when many salmon were migrating up the Klamath River, water temperatures began to warm and 30,000 to 60,000 fish were killed. Most were Chinook salmon, but some were coho salmon also.
A plan will now be made to supply the upper rivers farmers with the water needed for their crops, but without a doubt the salmon are going to get their fair share in order to sustain their populations.
This plan will not come to quickly, as both farmersand the fishing industries have long fought for their water rights, with one group getting a victory in court one day and the other group getting a victory the next.