Education

Pacific salmon do a strange thing. After they spawn, they die.

In evolutionary terms, it seems counterproductive. Wouldn't it be better if each fish lived to rear its young, and perhaps even get a second shot at spawning?

It turns out that Pacific Salmon, in their own way, are providing for their offspring. When salmon swim upstream, they are returning to the waters where they themselves hatched years before their bodies plump with eggs as well as the bounty of the seas.

After spawning, they leave their nutrient-rich carcasses behind. Many of the microscopic creatures that nibble on the carcasses eventually become prey for the next generation of fish. And so the parents nourish the young.

But salmon provide more than an indirect food source for baby salmon. At least 137 different species from grizzly bears to gray wolves depend on salmon for part of their diet. Even trees and plants benefit from the nutrients brought back by salmon from the seas.

It is awe-inspiring when you think about it. This mighty fish struggles up stream, jumping waterfalls, and its last act is sacrificing its body to ensure that the community that will raise its children will be thriving, teeming with life.

Which begs the question, what are we doing for our community, for the next generation?

Imagine what could be accomplished if we devoted our energies to the future the way that salmon do. Imagine if you will, a Nation of such salmon-people, leaping great obstacles to make a better place for their offspring and their ecosystem.

Winter Run Salmon Slowly Rebounding

John McManus, Earthjustice, 510-550-6707

In 1991 the winter run of Sacramento River king salmon, a species once numbering in the hundreds of thousands, stood at a mere 211 adult fish. From a high of 118,000 adult winter run salmon counted in 1969, a steady downward spiral through the 1970’s and 80’s made it clear something was driving these fish to extinction. That something was a combination of dams that cut off access to spawning habitat, water diversions that sucked water and baby salmon out of the Sacramento River and lethal temperatures in the river during drought years. Pollution from mines, ranch and farm runoff and overall habitat loss in Sacramento River tributaries were additional factors. By the early 90’s it seemed clear the Sacramento River winter run salmon would soon join the San Joaquin River spring run salmon, which once also numbered in the hundreds of thousands, in the category of fish formerly found in California but now extinct. Like the winter run, the San Joaquin spring run were driven to extinction using the same formula of dams and water diversions for agriculture, spawning habitat loss and water pollution. Just as all hope for the winter run seemed lost, the Endangered Species Act came to the rescue and the winter run was brought back from the brink. In 2001 officials estimate about 8,000 adult fish returned to spawn and in 2002 9,000 came back. The winter run salmon were being hurt mostly by projects directly or indirectly under federal control. So when ESA protections kicked in and forced the federal agencies to change the ways the Sacramento River was managed, the winter run responded. Among the steps taken to reverse winter run salmon declines:

• Shasta Dam was retrofitted to release cold water even during droughts, which is necessary for baby winter run salmon.
• At the Red Bluff Diversion Dam, which adult fish must pass to spawn and baby fish must pass to get to the ocean, gates are now kept open most of the year to allow free passage.
• Screens were installed on giant irrigation canals that suck water from the river to prevent juvenile salmon from being sucked in.
• Toxic mining discharges into the Sacramento decreased after a treatment plant was put into operation.
• Closer monitoring of juvenile winter run migration to the sea has prompted “time outs” for the huge pumps drawing water from the Sacramento/San Joaquin delta to minimize destruction of these fish. These “time outs” are not always properly timed or observed and this is an area that continues to cause problems.
  The combination of these ESA-induced factors, along with decent amounts of annual precipitation, created more favorable conditions not only for the winter run but also for

all other salmon, steelhead and trout species in the Sacramento. Commercial and sport fishermen have enjoyed healthier stocks of returning Sacramento Fall, Late Fall and Spring run salmon as a result of the modifications to the river environment forced by the ESA listing of the winter run. The entire ecosystem got a big boost from the modifications.

Some history.
Sacramento winter run king, or chinook, salmon were cut off from most of their historic spawning grounds when Shasta Dam was completed in 1944. No fish ladder was built to allow winter run access to their customary spawning waters above the dam in the McCloud and Pit Rivers. Salmon need cold water. The McCloud and Pit rivers are unique in that water temperatures during the blazing hot summer remain very cool due to springs that feed the rivers. The winter run evolved to take advantage of this unique eco niche, hatching their eggs during the summer when other Sacramento River tributaries are too warm to support baby salmon. Miraculously, after Shasta Dam went in, the winter run survived. Water spilled from the dam was cold enough to allow the winter run to successfully lay their eggs in the main stem of the Sacramento River below Shasta Dam except during drought years. A bigger problem arose when the US Bureau of Reclamation built the Red Bluff Diversion dam downstream from the Shasta Dam near the town of Red Bluff. This dam was built to create a reservoir from which irrigation waters could be drawn for agriculture. The dam went into operation in 1967 blocking many of the adult winter run returning to spawn and killing a declining number of winter run baby salmon on their way to the ocean.

Battle to save the fish.
The fight to reverse the tide for Sacramento winter run salmon started in 1985 when the American Fisheries Society petitioned the National Marine Fisheries Service to list the Sacramento River winter run Chinook salmon as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act. In early 1987 NMFS concluded the winter run had declined more than 97 percent over a period of less than two decades. In spite of these findings, NMFS refused to put the fish on the Endangered Species list. So Earthjustice (at the time it was called the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund) attorney Mike Sherwood filed a lawsuit in federal court on February 3, 1988 to force NMFS to list this fish. This was a historic action. Never since passage of the Endangered Species Act in 1973 had the government been sued to force the listing of a disappearing salmon species.

Apparently Sherwood was a little too ahead of his time in this case. The federal district court had never seen a case like this before and wasn’t prepared to arrive at the right legal conclusion. The court ruled against Sherwood who immediately appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

In 1989 the winter run returned to the Sacramento River at much lower levels than expected. Instead of the average run size of 2400 fish that had annually appeared between 1982 and 1988, the 1989 run was estimated at about 533 fish; a 75 percent decline and far below the 86,000 average between 1967 and 1969, the last years prior to the Red Bluff Diversion Dam’s impact. In 1989, with Sherwood’s case before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the National Marine Fisheries Service acknowledged the wisdom of Sherwood’s claims and finally listed the winter run chinook salmon as threatened under the ESA. They also designated the Sacramento River from Red Bluff Diversion Dam to Keswick Dam (a regulatory dam immediately below Shasta Dam) as a critical habitat.

The move came none too soon. By 1991 data available indicated that year’s returning run would be verging on non-existent. Scientists expected between 88 and 200 fish. NMFS had concluded that a bare minimum of 200 adults was required to avoid irretrievable genetic losses (independent non government scientists have calculated 500 adult fish is the real number needed to avoid long term loss of genetic variation).

When the counting was over in 1991 a mere 211 winter run salmon had returned to spawn in the Sacramento. Sherwood of Earthjustice and his clients at the American Fisheries Society asked NMFS to reclassify the status of winter run from threatened to endangered under the ESA.

NMFS agreed to take another look at the status of this salmon species. In 1992 they reported that the population of winter run Chinook salmon had dropped by almost 99 percent over a 25-year period from 1966 to 1991. Even though this species of fish was disappearing in front of them, it took until 1994 for NMFS to act. In January 1994, NMFS issued its final rule reclassifying the winter run chinook salmon as an endangered species. The action came just in time because in 1994 winter run hit their all time lowest return with just 186 adult fish returning to spawn.

Not all is peachy
Scientific studies pointed to ocean fishing as a factor in the decline of the winter run after they were added to the Endangered Species list. Changes to fishing seasons were implemented to reduce the so-called “incidental take” of winter run. Specifically the opening of ocean fishing seasons to both commercial and sport fishermen were moved from late winter to spring to allow the winter run to pass undisturbed. Most independent observers agree these changes were effective and fishermen are no longer part of the problem.

Ongoing threats
However, California’s insatiable thirst continues to threaten the winter run. In the spring of 2001 an estimated 14,000 winter run juveniles were killed by Central Valley water Project pumps while migrating from the Sacramento River to the ocean. The CVP sucks water from the San Francisco Bay Delta and exports it to farmers and cities in the San Joaquin Valley and Southern California. Based on estimations of the number of young winter run migrating to sea, the CVP project had a permit to kill 7,400, or 2 percent, of these juvenile salmon in 2001. After the massive winter run kill at the pumps in March of 2001, water officials invented explanations, suggesting the number of juvenile winter run had been underestimated and they were still within their 2 percent kill allowance. The damage was done. In January 2002 Earthjustice notified the government that if necessary, it would sue the government to protect that year’s out migration of juvenile salmon to the sea. These legal efforts continue.

All Fish Have Benefited
Winter run still have a long way to go to get back to 1969 levels but the trend is positive. When the ESA is enforced and balanced actions are taken to restore habitat, provide safe migration, and ensure safe water temperatures and adequate flow, rare salmon species like the winter run have a chance to make a comeback. According to press interviews with California Dept. of Fish and Game biologists, steps taken to protect winter run salmon have improved conditions for the other salmon species, as well as trout and steelhead, in the Sacramento River. If it can be done on the Sacramento, why can’t it be done on the Klamath and Columbia Rivers?

Epilogue
Winter run returns continued to improve or at least hold steady so far through the first decade of the 21st Century. In 2003 California’s department of Fish and Game announced 8133 adult winter run returned to spawn. In 2005 Fish and Game issued a press release saying the number had increased to 15,000. Salmon will recover if given a chance.