Steelhead challenged yet again!

[Pete]

From the OregonLive (A reprint of the article from today's Oregonian):

Northwest farmers and homebuilders moved to overturn threatened species protection for steelhead in the Willamette and Columbia rivers in a lawsuit filed Thursday in the federal district court in Yakima.
Lawsuit spearheads fresh challenge to fish protection

[ 03-05-2004, 11:15 AM: Message edited by: Pete ]

[Straydog]

It is beginning to appear to me that the majority of the community members here just don't care or just don't get it.

As one that has been concerned and involved since the beginning of the fish declines in the '80's and now finally seeing the positive results of years of efforts by many, many people, it is extremly disheartening to see this.

:depressed:

[skein]

First off, that's not the Oregonian, it's OregonLive, and their reporting has been suspect in the past. I read those pages with a grain of salt.

Secondly, I'm a guy who lives in a logging town decimated by the questionable science that invented the spotted owl, and a person who enjoys walking with his dog down the Oregon PUBLIC beaches (without ever harming a Plover), so I am going to watch and learn about this new threat (?) to ALL salmonids.

Yes, the pendulum is swinging, but I doubt the sky is falling. It just appears others have learned to play the "suing game" and the originators don't like the taste of their own medicine.

Please understand that I am not taking a stand either way - nor am I trying to start a war, although I fully expect that's what will happen. I just hope that both sides will grow weary of suing each other and let our fish and game be managed by valid science instead of loopholes.

Skein

[AuntyM]

It is beginning to appear to me that the majority of the community members here just don't care or just don't get it.

<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helvetica">I don't get it either.

No matter what NOAA Fisheries does in the way of satisfying the court's concerns, those same groups will be looking for another way to escape responsibilities placed on them by the ESA.

Even the ESA itself is under attack. Beware of "redefinition."

We have some sport fishing groups remaining quite silent and I worry that they are in favor of hatchery harvest more than the fate of wild fish and will either do nothing to help, or worse....

[Dragfreedrift]

what I dont understand is how in the heck do these guys want to include hatchery and wild collectively as one group? They seem to think that because the Idaho and upper Columbia and Snake have had 400,000 steelhead going over the dams each summer that the runs have no problem.

I dont get it!!! Anybody worth their salt would say that the wild component of the run is the part that is suffering and needs help...the wild returns are WAY down from historic levels.

HC

[fortywinks]

Ya know, we have a few good years of fishing and returns, and our memories grow short. I have had problems in the past with definitions and classifications of "wild" populations, but I also have seen man-made hatchery runs go bust with a turn of the calendar. We are currently riding the crest of a cyclical upturn in ocean conditions, which by definition will turn down, and if we allow other important factors to be further degraded, the fishes and sportfishers will once again pay the price.

And unfortunately, the few years of scientific study are but a spit in the ocean. God, or nature, take your personal pick, took millennia to produce these unique fish and we are not going to break the code in 30 years, especially with all the variables we have added to the mix.

My .02, for what it's worth. fw

[skookummark]

The draft said the Endangered Species Act requires that listing determinations must be based on whether salmon are likely to be self-sustaining in their natural ecosystems.

<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helvetica">If there are no natural ecosystems left doesn't that pretty much mean they can't be self-sustaining? Just a thought...

-Mark