Joe, what is your take on this? And what are the famers growing there that requires so much irrigation?

As Thousands of Salmon Die, Fight for River Erupts Again By TIMOTHY EGAN

SEATTLE, Sept. 27 — More than 10,000 chinook salmon have died in the Klamath River in northern California in recent days, leaving biologists stunned and Indian tribes and fishermen angered at the Bush administration, which they say caused the deaths by favoring farmers in one of the most contentious water disputes in the West.

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Federal officials, while not conceding that administration policy had anything to do with the die-off, said they would reverse an earlier policy and begin releasing water from Upper Klamath Lake in southern Oregon in an effort to revitalize the Klamath River downstream. The slow-moving river is littered with thousands of dead, bloated salmon, rotting in the sun.

Biologists say they have never seen a salmon kill of this size. It comes six months after the Bush administration decided to divert more Klamath Lake water to irrigation in the Klamath basin, saying the decision would satisfy farmers and comply with environmental laws.

Indian tribes and fishermen say the administration broke the law — and starved the river — by favoring farmers over fish.

"We're seeing dead fish everywhere; it's just tragic," said David Hillemeier, a biologist with the Yurok Indian Tribe in northern California. "No matter what happens now, the damage is done. We could lose 30,000 fish."

Although biologists disagree on what caused the fish to die, they say a very warm and dry September in the Pacific Northwest and low water flows in the Klamath River are the two major reasons the river is too low for fish to move upstream and spawn, as they would normally do this time of year. Instead, the fish are crowded into small pools and dying of disease.

On Thursday, fishermen and environmental groups went to federal court in Oakland, Calif., charging the Bush administration with giving too much water to irrigation interests at the risk of thousands of salmon, including coho, which are listed as threatened with extinction, and king salmon, or chinook, which are considered the most desirable and grow to 70 pounds or more.

"Basically, the administration created a drought in the lower river," said Zeke Grader, with the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen, the largest trade group of salmon fishers on the West Coast.

"We were expecting a really good run of fish this year. And now we've got the federal government essentially killing fish to satisfy their irrigation interests."

Bush officials said they had acted on the best information from scientists and were baffled by the death of the salmon. Allocating more water to irrigators, who staged protests last summer when they were denied their usual amount of water for farming, may not have been a factor in the die-off, the officials said.

"It's an anomaly," said Mark Limbaugh, director of external affairs at the Bureau of Reclamation, which controls water in the upper Klamath Basin. "No one has ever seen a problem like this, and it may very well turn out to be a natural phenomenon."

The Indians say that the warm and dry weather has not affected any river except the Klamath and that the fish die-off can be directly tied to the withholding of river water.

"We begged them for more water, starting in the spring," said Sue Mastern, chairwoman of the Yurok Indian Tribe, which has 4,500 members and lives in northern California. "They would not consult with us. They ignored us. And now people are feeling helpless and outraged. It's just a sickening feeling."

Just six months ago, the Bush administration held an elaborate ceremony in Klamath Falls, where officials released water for irrigation that had been held up because of concerns for endangered fish. As farmers chanted, "Let the water flow," Bush officials unveiled a 10-year plan that they said would settle the water war, one of the biggest in the West.

Property rights groups and farm interests portrayed the fight as a battle between sucker fish, which live in Upper Klamath Lake and were dying because of little water, and farmers, who depend on backed up river water to irrigate 200,000 acres. The downstream salmon, and the Indians and fishermen who depend on them, were largely forgotten in the debate, though some biologists warned that there was not enough water to satisfy all the interests.

Under Indian treaty law, the federal government has a "trust" responsibility to tribes and their water, fishing and property rights.

"This water will be released beginning today to meet tribal trust responsibilities and to support the migrating salmon during this emergency," Interior Secretary Gale A. Norton said. "We are doing our best to respond to this situation."

Federal officials say the water release, which they call a "pulse" and will go on for 14 days, may not be enough to help the thousands of fast-dying fish. "No one is certain exactly what effect the water will have on fish," said Steve Williams, director of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. "But we are all determined to do something to quickly address the situation."

Fish runs vary greatly. The 10,000 fish killed this week are more than the river's entire salmon population in some years. Other years, like this one, are more bountiful, and biologists had been expecting a big run on the Klamath.

It will take about three days for today's first release of water to make it downstream to where the fish are trapped in warm pools. The release comes at a time when irrigators say they have adequate water to give some back to fish.

"We believe increasing the flows is justified at this time," said Dan Keppen, executive director of the Klamath Water Users Association, which represents 1,500 farm families. "We had an extra slug of water available, and we've got a cushion right now."

Indians and fishermen say it is precisely that extra water that should have gone to other needs of the river starting last spring.

"It's been clear all summer long that this river is ailing," said Kristen Boyles, a lawyer with Earthjustice, an environmental legal group, which is suing the administration on behalf of fishing groups and others. "Now we have this massive die-off, and it's the result of six months of water mismanagement."

-- Anonymous, September 28, 2002

Answers

Sorry I forgot to turn off the red! :D

-- Anonymous, September 28, 2002

Hi, EM, by coincidence, I just got done "penning" a letter to a member of the Middle Rogue Watershed Council about this very topic, in response to a letter he sent me. Here it is, for your enjoyment:

Hi, Dave,

Thanks for the article, and your excellent letter.

I’ve been a vocal opponent to the Govt’s policies on the Klamath River ever since learning of the big controversy last year. I’ve called in several times on the Jefferson Exchange, where there have been various people representing both sides of the issue. You likely heard these programs; do you remember one “expert” who claims that the “suckers” thrive on less water? He also claimed that the worst thing that could be done was to let more water flow down the Klamath, because the water in the lake was warmer than the water on the lower Klamath. I don’t have any hard data to say if that’s true one way or the other, though I suspect he is right. I did, however, point out to him that even if the water is warmer at the lake outlet than the lower Klamath, the extra water would still help keep the lower Klamath’s temperature down, for two reasons: 1) temperatures drop every night; thus even warm water will cool off to a more or less equilibrium temperature after a few days on the river, 2) water temperature is dependent on two primary forces-insolation and flow rate. If the flow rate is low, the same amount of insolation (which is a constant on a river of that size for all practical purposes) will cause the stream temperature to be high. I don’t remember the formula, but the temperature rise is directly proportional toi the flow. So, obviously, to me at least, the added Klamath Lake water would keep the temperatures down in the lower river.

I’ve also mentioned, many, many times, that it’s not just the Klamath Lake out flows that are the problem/solution. The problem, imho, is too many people sharing too few water resources. Every water withdrawal in the Klamath Basin affects the temperature, and the flow, of the lower Klamath River.

That’s not to say that we don’t need to address the Klamath Lake issue (duh); rather it’s to say that we need to also address the other issues.

I also have attempted, with little impact so far, to add another focus to the water quality issue in the Lake, and thus the river.

I’ve mentioned this on the Exchange, I’ve written to the Tribes, and exchanged several letters with the Tribal attorney; I’ve done quite a bit of research to confirm what I already thought I knew, and I convinced a group of limnologists who have implemented my idea in other areas to contact the Tribal attorney when he acted disinterested in my plan.

As I said, so far nothing seems to phase the Tribes, and I’m sure the ranchers aren’t going to be interested in my ideas.

So here’s my plan. One of the big problems with the Klamath Lake is that it’s very eutrophic. It may be naturally eutrophic; I don’t know. However, it is almost certainly unnaturally MORE eutrophic, considering what the ranchers have done, and continue to do, to the lake’s inflow. I’ve canoed one of the lake’s major tributaries-the Wood River-and I believe this is not an exceptional condition; I’ve heard that other tribs have similar problems.

We began our float not far downstream from a State Park, whose name eludes me at the moment. The river at this point was as clear as any I’ve ever seen. Clear as gin. Gorgeous.

A few miles downstream, we found ourselves in a large irrigation ditch, having missed the necessary portage to remain in the river channel itself. (1/2-2/3 the Wood’s flow went into this canal) We did the portage, and continued down the river.

A few miles down from this major diversion, the return flow entered the river. The return flow was disgustiing. So bad it was, that the river from this point all the way to our takeout, and presumably all the way to Klamath lake itself, had the appearance and smell of the outflow of a dairy barn which is being cleaned with lots of water. In other words, more like a barnyard than a river. Yech!

What’s happening, as I understand it, is that the ranchers (raunchers?) are flood irrigating their fields, and the water that runs off is loaded with cowshit.

Here’s the deal: the cowshit is, as you know, excellent fertilizer. Great for ranches and farms, but bad for a lake which is already overloaded with nitrates, hydrogen sulfide, and ammonia.

Here’s my solution: stop taking the pristine waters out of the Klamath Lake tributary streams, let them help dilute the polluted lake, and take the water from the lake itself, preferably from the most polluted areas of the lake practical. Pump this polluted water (which happens to be loaded with nitrates, hydrogen sulfide, and ammonia) onto the ranches and farms. Kills two birds with one stone-cleans the lake, and fertilizes the land.

Seems like a no-brainer, at least to me. Sure, it will add some costs to the farmers, in the form of either pipes and/or realignment of some canals, and a certain amount of pumping costs. Fortunately, the pumping costs would be extremely small, compared to, for instance, pumping water from wells. After all, the lake’s elevation is almost the same as most of the farms and ranches.

Gotta go, but I thought you’d be interested in this.

See ya,

M. (JOJ to you guys!)

As to what they are growing there, it's mostly grass for cattle. Also lots of potatoes. This area is at an elevation over 4000 feet. I understand that the potatoes, and the few other crops they grow, are not even economically feasible; that is, they can't compete with the crops grown in other areas of the country without government subisidies.

I'd also like to point out to any doubting Thomases (who claim the Earth can support our ever growing population, as long as we just have "faith" in our scientists, etc) that this is just one more example of what happens. We have too many people in the Klamath BAsin, which translates to too much water being withdrawn, which results in warm water, which results in low disolved oxygen levels, which results in dead fish. It's like the canary in the coal mine.

Mark Limbaugh's comment that "it may very well turn out to be a natural phenomenon." smacks of disingenuity. Or of Bush holding this puppet's strings. What a crock. The Klamath River SHOULD be a raging river, even in the late summer, but we've overallocated water, and continue to overallocate more and more. To say that it may be a natural phenomenon like finding a flattened skunk on the freeway, and saying it might have died of natural causes. Gimme a break!

-- Anonymous, September 28, 2002

EM, I turned off the red -- it hurt my eyes! :-( Let me know if you wanted it in a different spot. I'll have to read this later though, I can't keep my eyes open any longer (got back rather late tonight with no time for reading).

-- Anonymous, September 29, 2002

EM,if it were not for those damned government subsidies, no one in their right mind would irrigate crops at all, as it is, if all the true costs were factored into irrigated crops, no one would buy them!!! It just costs too much to pump endless water ( which is not ever free) onto semi arid and arid soils and try to grow a crop like you were back in the Midwest with adequate rainfall.

We have plenty of land here in the good ol' US of A to support common sense agriculture that needs no irrigation at all, but as long as the USDA hands out plenty of money rewarding farmers to grow stuff where it really shouldn't be grown, it is going to continue to happen. We all need to stronglt support totally free farming practices, and work to electing officials that will eliminate all governmental messing around with of the agricultural economy, let the market ride where it must to survive.

If that means paying 3 to 4 dollars a gallon for milk, so be it! Do you know that that gallon of milk took over 1500 gallons of water to produce? Factoring in all the crops, fuel, fertilizer and pesticide used, as well as what the cow itself needs, like I said before, water is never free. The true cost shows up somewhere, and right now, it's our poor rivers out West that are suffering for it!

-- Anonymous, October 01, 2002

Hear Hear, Annie! You're words are soundin mighty right-on to me today!

-- Anonymous, October 01, 2002

Wait a minute, Annie (and EM). I suppose it's a neat idea to only grow crops where they don't need irrigation (especially if you happen to live in such an area)

Where I live, though, and where the majority of the world's food is grown, I suspect, this just won't work. Also, areas where irrigation is required, such as here in SW Oregon (hard to believe, isn't it? We got .02 inches of rain yeserday, which was the first rain since June!) and much of Washington and CAlifornia, and many other areas of the west, growing crops is a much safer method than growing in areas which rely on rainfall. AFter all, rainfall is pretty fickle, whereas irrigation is pretty predicatble. Until, of course, overpopulation enters the picture, such as is happening in so many areas.

I witnessed the ultimate location for growing crops a few years ago, south of Lima, Peru. A friend of mine grew up in Lima, and she invited my wife and me to visit her father's hacienda, which her grandfather had homesteaded, long ago.

The area where the hacienda is is in the driest desert I've ever seen, or even imagined. The average rainfall in Lima, capital of Peru, and home of 7 million people, is about one eighth inch per year, and much of the area historically has NEVER received rainfall . Never!

The source of Lima's water is, of course, a river which flows out of the Andes mountains, and the Claudia's dad's hacienda uses a similar setup.

All water is delivered from this river through "acequias" (irrigation ditches) which are all gravity flow.

Her grandaddy helped build the "tomas" which divert river water into the acequias, and the system worked faithfully for amost 100 years. Then, whether it be global warming, or just a natural variation, the river almost dried up for two years. Now, I understand that things are back on track.

REgardless of that, the system has worked almost perfectly 98% of the time.

The beauty of the system is that these folks never have to worry about whether it will rain enough, or whether it will rain TOO much. It's like the garden of Eden. (except it's warm and foggy for 9 months of the year, which I wouldn't care for much)

Anyway, if you want to eliminate all the farming in dry climates, you'd best be prepared for a HUGE food shortage! A very high percentage of our food in the US, I believe, comes from the "central valley" of California. NONE of these farms would be there without irrigation.

By the way, as I've mentioned on another post, well water here costs but a millionth of dollar per gallon, which certainly does not cause an increase in food prices.

I'm not suggesting that Klamath Falls farmers should be subsidized to grow crops which can be better grown elsewhere, but rather just pointing out what I believe to be an oversight by you two.

Cheers,

JOJ

-- Anonymous, October 01, 2002

To me the point is the fact that the vast mojority of food sold in this country is produced in the arid west, and this a wrong-headed concept. If westerners need a reasonable amount of irrigation to grow food for westerners, and for a limited amount of off-season commercial product for shipment to those of us who have shorter growing seasons, that makes sense to me. What does not make sense is diverting mass amounts of river water for agricultural paradigms which seem environmentally stupid. Irrigation might be "safer," if you are comparing it to dependability of rainfall, but I see it as another symptom of short-term thinking, another example of humans trying to corral nature to their whims, instead of learning to work with Her.

Food should be produced locally in as great a degree as possible. We do not need California lettuce in the summer in NYC. New York/New Jersey can grow their own just fine. We do not need Washington state apples in Minnesota. We grow wonderful apples here, as do all the other states across the north, and many varieties keep very well in temperature controlled vaults until the following season. And Icould go on forever. There are reportedly thousands of idle greenhouses scattered across the country, once used for local production, that could be reactivated and heated with solar/wind and all manner of new efficient, clean technologies.

I don't think I need to remind folks on this board of the horrors of factory vegetable/fruit/grain farming. Even "organic" companies like Horizon and Cascadian Farms have gotten so massive its sickening. All they are doing is copying the big guys they came to replace, calling for ever increasing amounts of land, exploited immigrant labor, massive amounts of water, and the extensive resources necessary (and accompanying pollution) to truck the stuff all over the place.

It seems obvious to me that a place that gets almost no rainfall should not be a place where most of our food is grown. Here in Minnesota, we almost never even have to turn on a sprinkler or a hose. Nature gifts us with rain/snow about every two or three days most years. And we get plenty of sunshine when it isnt raining! Things grow so fast in the north you can almost watch em grow! So why in tarnation should folks go to the store and buy a green pepper (of inferior quality yet) that came from California or Florida or South America?? It's stooopid, doncha think?

-- Anonymous, October 03, 2002

EM, I agree with MOST of what you just said. I do believe, as you probably can surmise, that we've way over allocated river water for irrigation (among other things.) I guess it's back to the old population thing being a big player in the issue.

I agree with local production, but I also feel fine with your exporting something we can't grow here to us, or us sending apples to places where apples can't be grown (anywhere there's not a cold enough winter, I am told). I can also grow peppers, tomatoes, zuccinis, squash, etc like there's no tomorrow, wheras my neighbors fifty miles west on the coast can't grow these worth a damn, as it's not hot enough in the summer. They can grow lots of stuff all summer though, which we can't grow when the thermometer starts trying to pot its top off. So I don't have problem with some trading back and forth.

I personally would much rather live here, and be able to control my irrigation (cheaply and easily, by the way--all my irrigation water is merely last winter's rain, which has slowly percolated down into and through the ground, and removed by my pump.

I expect you'd rather have the 25-30 million people who currently reside in Calif, Oregon, and Washington NOT move to Minnesota, just because "It seems obvious to me that a place that gets almost no rainfall should not be a place where most of our food is grown." Believe me, you don't want 20 million LAites in your neighborhood!

I hope you realize I'm not trying to pick a fight with you; I think this is a very interesting discussion, is all. Trying to see the big picture...

-- Anonymous, October 03, 2002

I don't think EM meant the people living out there should move, just that they should grow their own food, not all the food for the entire nation.

Around here, I drive past farm after farm of acres and acres of monoculture -- either corn, or soybeans. Based on that, you would think there wasn't anything else grown around here! Well, also pasturage and dairy cows, sometimes some pigs or sheep. Yet, I KNOW many many food items can be grown here.

I do occasionally buy grapes, which have to come from places like California. But I only buy the organic variety, which means MY grape buying season is limited to the growing season in California. Getting grapes year round means they come from Chile. I have problem with that because of all the transportation costs and because the grapes are likely very heavily sprayed with chemicals. I don't want me or my birds eating those chemicals, and I don't want to be contributing to workers being exposed to all those chemicals, and a number of other reasons.

-- Anonymous, October 03, 2002

Hey, I think they SHOULD all move. God, try to drive around here...I spend 10 hours+/wk in my car going to the office 26 miles away. I spend the equivalent of ONE entire work week per month just commuting to work. Yeah, I'd love to work closer to home (or AT home). But there's no good jobs close by (maybe someday, I'll hook up to work via the 'net).

Too many people live here ("out West"). That's a fact. Too much strain on resources, be it water, transportation, food, etc. Not much anyone can do about it, *maybe*, but the economy thing might mitigate it some. Outside of Alaska (which just passed WA this month), we have the highest unemployment rate in the nation. Maybe folks will move back to wherever they came from when they can't make their $3000/mo mortgage payments...

Sorry about the rant, but my quality of life is seriously being stepped on by so damned many people moving out here...

John Wesley Powell warned us about oversettling the West. It's not Ohio, or Kentucky, or Pennsylvania, or Alabama. None believed him when he told them. Oh well. Read "Cadillac Desert". I've been talking this book up for years.

Getting old and snarly,

-- Anonymous, October 03, 2002

Hey, Joy, when you said, "I don't think EM meant the people living out there should move, just that they should grow their own food, not all the food for the entire nation. " I found the idea attractive. On the other hand, I'd hate to see you have to buy Chilean grapes! (actually I get a lot of my grapes from Chile, e.g. "Gato Negro" vino. I hadn't really thought about the chemical aspects of this-shame on me. Chile is a pretty progressive place, though, as far as I can tell. I'll have to investigate it a bit, I guess.

Hey, Snarly, sorry you have to commute so many hours; that's a drag. Where do you commute to, anyway? Seattle? That place has been growing like a weed. I have read some articles in the Seattle paper about Seattle's attempts to limit growth. I know they've at least considered using Boulder Colorado's methods, which have had some unexpected results, unfortunately.

Even litta bitty Grants Pass here is getting traffic problems, tho my friends and relatives who come here laugh at me when I complain about the traffic.

-- Anonymous, October 04, 2002

Joy, thanks for the clarification! And Joe, as I was trying to point out when I said,"... and for a limited amount of off-season commercial product for shipment to those of us who have shorter growing seasons," I have no gripe against warm, dry climate areas growing and shipping food (like grapes/raisins, citrus, figs, etc) that simply cannot be grown in cold-winter areas commercially. But those items are a very small percentage of the total amount of food produced and shipped, all year long, and that is dumb on many fronts.

-- Anonymous, October 04, 2002

JOJ,

I commute to the Eastside (which is a big mess of towns that are merging into each other, Bellevue and Redmond being the most notable. Anyway, it's east of Seattle in the intensity of the 'burbs).

I used to be able to take a lot of rural back roads to work and just hit the easternmost part of the populated areas, but these days, growth has slammed into the countryside. The same roads that used to have tractors and school buses for the only congestion are now often bumper-to-bumper with single occupancy vehicles crawling along to work (and when they ALL get behind the school bus or the tractor, it really slows down!). On top of that lately has been all the summer road work (repairing everything after too much use!) and all the construction work as the new housing goes in.

Sad. It's such a beautiful place otherwise.

I'll quit whining now. At least I'm not a salmon...

-- Anonymous, October 05, 2002

Go ahead and whine, Sheepish; it might help! (and lots of those poor salmon can't even whine anymore..

EM, I am now 100% in agreement with you! Oh, boy!

(can I still drink a couple of my favorite Chilean wines, though, for nostalgia?)

-- Anonymous, October 07, 2002

Hey Joe, have a couple for me too, will ya, since I don't indulge anymore.

Sheepish, how is the pollution up there nowadays? When I lived in Seattle (almost 30 yrs ago......yikes) it was already gettin kinda smoggy there cuz the city is kinda trapped by mountains and such. Is it worse now or did they clean things up?

-- Anonymous, October 07, 2002