How Far Will You Go To Save Salmon?

If Washington wants to save its wild salmon runs, it must embrace policies that put the salmon’s needs above fishermen, developers, loggers and all the other forces killing the species, according to a long-awaited state proposal.

The state Department of Fish and Wildlife this month released a plan that had been ordered by the 1993 Legislature.

Meetings are scheduled statewide to hear public comments.

In Washington, wild salmon too often have been relegated to a status of co-client along with hatchery-fed fishing interests, developers and loggers, the impact statement said.

The result is a dying population of wild salmon, defined as salmon that spawn in the wild as opposed to those that return to their natal origins in hatcheries.

The draft, released by Fish and Wildlife Director Bern Shanks, said if wild salmon, especially chinook and coho runs, are to be saved, several painful steps must be taken:

Stop mixing the management of wild and hatchery salmon in which the two are considered a single resource available for harvest.

Manage hatchery fish as a separate species, making it possible to identify and control the taking of wild salmon. Hatchery fish would be marked by clipping the adipose fin.

Adopt and enforce environmental protection regulations to better control “killer flood flows” that have severely damaged wild salmon spawning and rearing grounds in recent years.

Among other things, the floods are caused by the increasing presence of impervious surfaces from parking lots to rooftops and from logging of forest canopies, which speeds water flow, raises stream temperatures and causes other damage to habitat.

Enforce laws that require proper equipment to allow passage of migrating salmon through culverts, dams and other obstacles and to keep them from being sucked into irrigation pipes.

Make as the first priority sufficient escapement of salmon to spawning grounds before allowing fishing.

Too often, the proposal said, fish managers gamble escapement goals by giving into pressures of competing groups, such as the tribes and sport fishermen, and place “allocation balance at a higher priority than achieving spawning escapement,” Shanks said. “The risks must be shifted to the fisheries, beginning with lower harvests by the first in line.”

“Wild salmon are in crisis,” Shanks said. “We have talked about troubled fish runs in Washington for years. All the compromises have been made and wild salmon continue to dwindle.”

The department and Fish and Wildlife Commission have the power to manage fish populations and deny users access to threatened populations. But it must rely on other government agencies, from the state Forest Practices Board to local government zoning policies, to protect salmon habitat.

“We know that achieving success in salmonid resource management will require major changes, especially for chinook and coho,” Shanks said. “We also know that to be successful overall, we will have to succeed in both fish habitat management and fish population management.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: Policy for salmon Public meetings on Washington’s proposed wild salmon and steelhead policy begin at 7 p.m. as follows in this region: April 29, Spokane County Public Health Building, 1101 W. College Ave. April 30, Walla Walla Community College Cafeteria, 500 Tausick Way. May 6, Chelan County Auditorium, 400 Douglas St. in Wenatchee.