Oregon Adds Plan To Protect Steelhead Trout By Voluntary Measures, The Coastal State Is Trying To Avoid Endangered Listing For Sea-Going Trout

By adding to its plan to protect the coastal coho salmon, the state of Oregon hopes to avoid a federal endangered listing of the steelhead trout.

State officials on Thursday released the steelhead strategy, which relies on the same kinds of measures - setting up local watershed councils and encouraging landowners to voluntarily restore fish habitat - that convinced the federal government to not list the coho salmon for protection under the Endangered Species Act.

“What we’re trying to get people to do is to go beyond the requirements of the Endangered Species Act,” Gov. John Kitzhaber said. “We’re suggesting there are other ways to apply the act, particularly with private landowners.”

Kitzhaber introduced the proposal, called the steelhead supplement to the Oregon Plan, flanked by representatives from California Gov. Pete Wilson and Washington Gov. Gary Locke.

The three states have much to lose if the National Marine Fisheries Service decides to list steelhead runs on the Oregon coast, the lower Columbia River and the Klamath Mountain area that runs from the southern Oregon coast into California.

A listing of the seagoing fish as either threatened or endangered would bring federal restrictions on logging, fishing, development and agriculture in the areas of the runs.

Kitzhaber and leaders in the Oregon Legislature last April crafted a $30 million plan to strengthen salmon runs on the state’s northern and central coasts. The steelhead plan covers some of the same area, as well as tributaries of the Columbia such as the Willamette, Sandy and Clackamas rivers.

Of the 80 or so populations of steelhead on the coast, fewer than 10 are thought to be in serious decline, said Jim Greer, director of the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

“The salmon and the steelhead are in deep trouble,” said Will Stelle, regional director of the National Marine Fisheries Service. “It has taken us quite a long while to dig the hole we now find ourselves in, and it will take a long while to dig ourselves out of it.”

Stelle’s agency has until Feb. 9 to decide whether to list the runs or to adopt Oregon’s proposal. While Stelle did not say whether the steelhead would need federal protection, he praised the Oregon salmon plan as “unprecedented” and indicated that similar efforts were needed to help the steelhead.

But many conservationists say a listing is needed to back up the voluntary protections.

“All we’re doing is hoping to protect a species based on a wink and a nod, not on a handshake,” said Ken Rait of the Oregon Natural Resources Council.

“We think there’s merit in the plan, but it should work hand in hand with federal protection.”