The Independent Scientific Review Panel completed the first leg of its mission to review the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' research program that guides salmon and steelhead survival improvement efforts in federal Columbia/Snake mainstem hydrosystem.
The final legal hurdle blocking a project to deepen the Columbia River navigation channel was settled in Vancouver, Wash. last week and, for a brief period of time, that leaves financing as the only barrier still blocking the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' project.
NOAA Fisheries formally reopened its critical habitat designation process with an Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking published in the Federal Register on Sept. 29.
Idaho Gov. Dirk Kempthorne last week formalized an agreement with federal, tribal, and private partners he says will provide a framework for the long-term protection of threatened endangered native fish species and their habitat.
The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife is seeking public comment on a revised draft plan to direct agency efforts to meet its goal of healthy populations of bighorn sheep and Rocky Mountain goat in all available and suitable habitat within historic ranges.
More than 100 members of Congress are urging the Bush administration to study the option of Snake River dam removal before adopting a new Columbia Basin salmon recovery plan.
A draft report released for public comment this week by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council describes in broad terms strengths and weaknesses of a Columbia River basin hatchery network developed over the past century, and suggests it is time for some changes.
Negotiations focused on steelhead recovery among two Mid-Columbia public utility districts, area tribes and the state of Washington have resulted in an unusual agreement that meshes hatchery and harvest management, as well as recovery monitoring and evaluation, on the upper Columbia River.
A long-anticipated 2003 "check-in" report describes methodical progress toward implementation of the 10-year federal Columbia river salmon and steelhead recovery strategy -- and meteoric, relatively, improvements in the status of the stocks in question.
Two sets of special interest groups that are normally at total loggerheads found enough to talk about Saturday that they plan to meet again, with Idaho Sen. Mike Crapo as facilitator, to discuss the allocation of Upper Snake River basin water for farms and for fish.
A 16-page status report, with 18 related documents, has been forwarded to U.S. District Court Judge James A. Redden noting "substantial progress" in the efforts of NOAA Fisheries and other federal entities to rework plans to protect Columbia Basin salmon and steelhead populations that are listed under the Endangered Species Act.
Now on a tight schedule set by a Sept. 12 consent decree with conservation groups, NOAA Fisheries is beginning the difficult work of analyzing the economic impacts of designating critical habitat for 20 evolutionary significant units in California, Oregon, Idaho and Washington.
Several non-profit groups in Idaho and western Montana have received a $1 million grant from the Environmental Protection Agency's inaugural "Watershed Initiative" program.
for
the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife the Pacific Fishery
Management Council, The Bureau of Land Management and the Oregon Coastal
Zone Management Association. He is currently vice chairman of the PFMC.
Radtke detailed a variety of factors that have reduced the Columbia
Basin salmon economy to a shadow of its former self. At estimated
historic average runs sizes, the basin had the potential to net
fishermen $272 million in 1998 dollars at a 50 percent harvest rate.
That ...
Wide ranging suggestions on the near-term direction of Columbia Basin
salmon recovery efforts were offered Thursday by witnesses called to
testify at a U.S. House of Representatives Resources Committee hearing
in Pasco. All but a few said dam breaching should be dropped from
consideration.
Meanwhile, the federal agency at the front in efforts to address
Endangered Species Act issues is expected to prescribe an approach
that
withholds a breaching decision while it weighs aggressive ...
Harvest of salmon in the Columbia River is at the lowest allowed level
ever. Further changes to harvest rates would not add significantly
to
salmon recovery.
Members of the Columbia River Basin Forum, meeting last week, generally
agreed with these statements. (The Forum is attended by representatives
of Northwest governor's offices, tribal governments, and federal and
state agencies.)
Yet, fishing continues to be culturally important to Northwesterners
and
for political reasons ...
controversial channel deepening project lacked scientific foundation
and
could harm juvenile salmon traveling through the river's estuary. While
the results of the suit may be unknown at this time, other efforts
to
purchase estuary lands are moving forward.
The Columbia Land Trust, a non-profit organization located in Vancouver,
Wash. recently received $999,000 from U.S. Fish and Wildlife and $6.1
million in matching money, which it will use to purchase about 1,500
acres of wetlands and
The Northwest can neither morally or legally allow salmon to go extinct.
This is one of the most difficult challenges facing the region and
the
region will be remembered for how well it does.
This is one of the conclusions Lori Bodi, senior policy advisor for
fish
and wildlife at the Bonneville Power Administration, offered to a
gathering of lawyers, students and salmon policy people at this week's
Northwest Water Law & Policy Project fifth annual conference in
Portland.
The ...
Several efforts are in the works to purchase and set aside more wetlands
in the Columbia River estuary, but will those purchases count towards
a
mitigation requirement set by the National Marine Fisheries Service
for
a river channel deepening project?
If Debrah Marriott, executive director of the Lower Columbia River
Estuary Program (LCREP) gets her wish, the efforts would be additive,
which could result in thousands of acres of new habitat being added
to
the estuary in the next ...
It calls for preserving and expanding habitat types that are currently
in short supply. It recommends protections for areas that are unroaded,
and old growth stands that have dwindled by as much as 80 percent,
for
some species, over the last 150 years.
It projects a basin-wide 21 percent increase in merchantable timber
harvests, but just an 8 percent increase in western Montana, where
there
are wet forest types that provide habitat for creatures such as the
recently listed lynx. It ...
Local forest planners are looking for the devil in the detail of a
restoration plan that covers 62 million acres of federal lands in the
Columbia Basin.
But some who got a taste of the Interior Columbia Basin Ecosystem
Management Project last week think they've already found the devil,
and
it's not necessarily in the detail.
"One of the big concerns is all the overlapping of all these issues
and
initiatives," said Chuck Samuelson of Montanans for Multiple Use. "I
don't know how they're
If a collaboratively developed subbasin assessment template is to answer
the needs of all involved in Columbia Basin fish and wildlife recovery,
it will have to stand broader scrutiny than has so far been prescribed,
or funded.
"We do feel strongly that the use of three analytical tools is essential
to provide planners" with the necessary assessment information for
both
Endangered Species Act recovery planning and hydrosystem mitigation
responsibilities, according to Dr. Robert Bilby ...
Two Northwest Republican senators
this week said they suspect the delay
of federal agencies' recommendation
for modifying or removing lower
Snake River dams to improve salmon
recovery is aimed at helping Vice
President Al Gore's presidential
campaign.
Army Corps of Engineers Brig.
Gen. Carl Strock said the agency recently
granted a 30-day extension of
the public comment period on its final
environmental impact, which had
been scheduled for completion in
October. The extension ...
Harassment of Caspian terns in
the lower Columbia River estuary ran into
a roadblock this week when environmental
groups filed for an injunction
against hazing the birds on Rice
Island. The filing resulted in a
temporary restraining order stopping
the hazing until at least April 24,
when a Seattle U.S. District
Court will listen to arguments from both
sides.
The hazing was part of a plan
to move the terns from Rice Island to East
Sand Island and was intended
to reduce predation ...
-- Spring Chinook Count At Bonneville Stays High
The tally of adult spring chinook at Bonneville Dam is the largest in
more than 20 years for this date. The high fish counts could add up
to
one of the best years for Columbia River spring salmon since the strong
returns of the 1970s, says a Bonneville Power Administration press
release.
Scientists say Mother Nature has cooled down parts of the Pacific Ocean
where these fish mature, increasing the odds of survival for the fish.
An ...
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