Natural River Needed To Save Salmon, Lawmakers Told

Saving Northwest salmon will require sometimes costly changes at hydropower dams to return the Columbia River to a more natural state, the chairman of an independent scientific panel told Congress Tuesday.

“If you want more fish, you are going to have to manage the river more like a river,” said Richard Williams of Meridian, Idaho, a geneticist specializing in conservation biology of salmonids.

“Restoration of Columbia River salmon will require changes that move the regulated river system toward a more natural, normative set of conditions,” he said.

Williams is the chairman of the Independent Scientific Advisory Board recently formed by the Northwest Power Planning Council and National Marine Fisheries Service.

The board is made up of 11 senior scientists with expertise in fisheries, ecology and statistics. It is preparing a report on science gathered to date related to efforts to save Northwest salmon from extinction.

Preliminary findings presented to the council earlier this spring suggested some reservoir drawdowns and a periodic scouring of the river bank with flood water are crucial to restoring the river’s dwindling salmon runs.

“The traditional view of the Columbia River and salmon recovery measures have failed and will continue to fail to recover declining stocks,” Williams said today.

“Instead of looking for ecosystem-level solutions, we have sought technological Band-Aids to repair lost ecosystem functions,” he told the Senate Environment and Public Works subcommittee on drinking water, fisheries and wildlife.

Williams also said salmon reserves should be established to provide special protection for intact habitats with key populations. The best example of such habitat can be found in the Columbia’s Hanford Reach, he said.

The dramatic drop in wild salmon numbers in recent years has been blamed on a variety of factors ranging from overfishing and hydropower dams to warmer ocean temperatures.

Sen. Dirk Kempthorne, R-Idaho, said he was frustrated by the continued disagreement over the best way to save the fish.

“I’m disappointed that we seem to be back to square one every summer asking scientists and federal dam managers why more and more fish are being killed,” he said.

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