Save the salmon -- and us
The Obama administration's plan for the Columbia Basin doesn't go nearly far enough.
by Carl Safina
Recently, a photograph made its way to me on the Internet: In a surging Alaskan stream, a grizzly bear stands with a salmon in its jaws, and in the shallows, a wolf -- keeping its distance -- also hoists a thrashing salmon. Your eye goes to the bear, then the wolf. But the salmon convened the meeting. Without the salmon, you'd see only water.
When salmon return from the sea, their bodies are the ocean made flesh. Their tails propel ocean nutrients upstream and into forests, rivers and range lands, where they benefit hundreds of other species. Everything else in the photograph -- trees, bushes, all the animals and plants in the forest and the water -- contains ocean nutrients from salmon.
And now add orcas to the web of life fed by salmon. New research tells us that, before salmon hit the flowing streams, they are by far the most important food for resident killer whales along the Pacific Coast.
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 More broken promises from Army Corps
by Dr. Steve Bruce
Op-ed in the Idaho Statesman
January 26th, 2010
[Excerpt]
I am very familiar as a fisherman with another promise the Army Corps made when it built the lower Snake dams: that Idaho's great wild salmon runs would survive them. That is a promise that has been broken. Idaho's wild salmon and steelhead are endangered with extinction.
The Corps also promised Lewiston the Lower Snake dams would bring sustained commerce and jobs by making Lewiston an inland seaport. Another promise broken: Business and jobs at the port are fading away and its remaining customers are actively seeking road and rail transportation options for their future.
One more promise: The Lewiston levees, built with the lower Snake dams, would protect the town (downtown is below the river - think New Orleans), and give Lewiston residents a riverside walking, hiking and biking path. That promise is not yet broken - but it might not be long.
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 For healthy returns, juvenile salmon have to reach the ocean
Court-ordered spills of water on the Columbia River dam system are getting credit for helping ensure more juvenile fish reach the Pacific Ocean, where they can thrive and eventually return upstream.
Restoring iconic salmon runs in the Pacific Northwest has a corollary in the business world. Success equates to moving product.
Dramatic numbers of returning coho salmon to the upper and middle Columbia River, and equally impressive results for sockeye salmon in the Snake River basin, are directly related to quickly and safely reaching the Pacific Ocean.
Recent years of court-ordered spills at federal dams have ensured more juvenile fish are sped through the system and reach the ocean.
Michele DeHart, executive director of the Fish Passage Center in Portland, cites the role of spills in boosting fish returns.
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Release salmon findings
Obama administration should make public all documents
Register Guard Editorial - Saturday, Dec 26, 2009
The Obama administration wants federal District Judge James Redden to believe that eight hydroelectric dams currently producing power on the Columbia and Snake rivers can coexist with 13 populations of salmon and steelhead that have become imperiled, largely because of those same dams.
It’s a formidable challenge, one the administration can help meet by releasing all documents regarding its scientific review of the Bush administration’s controversial biological opinion or, as it’s better known, “bi-op.”
On Nov. 30, Judge Redden asked the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and two other federal agencies to provide those documents. Save Our Wild Salmon, a plaintiff in a federal lawsuit challenging the Bush-era plan, also has requested the documents, including the testimony of scientists and a report on their review. But so far the agencies have released less than a third of the information to the public.
That doesn’t inspire confidence that the Obama administration engaged in the thorough and independent review that federal officials say they conducted before returning with a plan that left largely intact key components of the Bush administration’s bi-op.
Read more of the editorial from the Register Guard.
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 Something's Fishy
Two respected biologists say President Obama must make good on his vow to “restore science” to salmon restoration
by Kevin Taylor
Like someone tilting a bucket into a sink, the Snake River pours winter into the sea.
In a jumble of wilderness and mountains, nearly a thousand miles from any coast — and more than a mile, in places, higher than the sea itself — snowmelt funnels and gathers from a multitude of points, braiding into a river that sluices downhill with immense mass and remorseless flow.
Don Chapman and Stephen Pettit carry this epic sense of the river as they make a rare visit to newspapers in Spokane to advocate on behalf of wild salmon.
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Will The Obama Administration Act In Behalf Of Orcas And Salmon?
 - a three part series by Howard Garrett
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 E-mails show internal debate over Obama salmon plan
By Matthew Preusch
December 24, 2009
Independent scientists largely approved of the Obama administration's plan for Northwest salmon and dam, internal e-mails show.
The administration released scores of documents related to its review of the controversial plan, meant to keep salmon from sliding closer to extinction due to the operation of federal hydroelectric dams, late last month.
The documents show considerable internal discussion over what parts of the plan need to be strengthened, as well as many positive comments from independent scientists.
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Obama was right
So it’s time for his NOAA to release scientific findings on the salmon plan
December 17th, 2009 -
In his inaugural speech, President Obama promised to restore science to its rightful place. That line was barbed comment on the presidency of George W. Bush, in which political decisions were made about biological issues. In the Bush years, government scientists were told to be silent.
Now we have evidence of a similar game at President Obama's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. After NOAA released a timid salmon plan, groups such as Save Our Wild Salmon asked to see the testimony of scientific review that was delivered on July 6-8. But NOAA denied the request.
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Commercial Fisheries, Salmon, and Orcas
by Candace Calloway Whiting
From Seattle PI's City Brights
Turn on any health/talk show, and it is not long before your might hear the host touting the benefit of eating salmon. We are told that the fats present in salmon and a few other species of fish are good for our hearts, and it is recommended that we eat moderate portions of those fish twice a week.
That is all well and good...except there are so many mouths to feed; over 300 million Americans at present, and nearly 7 billion people on the planet. If even just 10% of us eat salmon twice a week, we are talking about a tremendous amount of fish. How in the world will we ever manage to catch enough? Can we? It would seem that much is riding on the ability of the commercial fishermen and women to provide us with the salmon we need, yet leave some for the orcas, without driving wild salmon to extinction. It's a tall order...
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Legal Update: Salmon and fishing advocates in court
by Joseph Bogaard
Salmon and fishing advocates squared off with the Obama Administration in front of United States District Judge James Redden in Portland OR on Monday. This is the latest court action in our nearly 20-year battle to protect wild salmon and steelhead from extinction and restore them to healthy, self-sustaining populations.
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