Put Down the Rod, Pick Up the Sword
Skagit River Hydroelectric Dam
If you haven’t done so already, read them and weep: across the board, forecast run sizes for west coast salmon and steelhead are once again grim. In my home water, the Columbia Basin, steelhead forecasts are at their lowest number since counts began at Bonneville in 1937. This is horrifically significant. Because by 1937, anadromous fish runs were already significantly diminished by overfishing, habitat destruction, and the advent of American’s dam building craze. It’s safe to bet, then, that steelhead runs in the Columbia basin are at their lowest since the last of the Missoula floods came roaring out of western Montana and across the Palouse 12,000 years ago, reconfiguring the topography of a wide swath of the Pacific Northwest.
Since your spey rod will likely be spending more time in the closet this season, it might be time to think of an alternative hobby: activism. Anglers have a problem. The vernacular of the inspiring work of saving rivers, and the salmonids that swim in them, seems to have been taken over by certified public accountants. Devoid of values, the language of fisheries biology and water management is the language of merely describing what is rather than what ought to be. As the late Colorado River guide and river rabble-rouser Martin Litton once said, “don’t ask for what is reasonable. Ask for what is right.” With that in mind, there’s so much to be done.
The best thing that can be done for Columbia River steelhead and salmon is to remove four deadbeat dams on the lower Snake River in eastern Washington.
The best thing that can be done for the Skagit River is for anglers to rise up and demand that Seattle City Light stop bullshitting the public about whether anadromous fish ever made it above their complex of dams there, as they apply for federal relicensing of the project.
Hatcheries have become a political, rather than scientific tool. Witness what happened in 2018, when Gov. Inslee’s orca recovery task force ignored the best science and recommended increasing hatchery production, despite decades of evidence that demonstrates no correlation between hatchery production and returning adults. The best hatchery is a healthy river.
The best thing that can be done for any dammed river system is to get rid of dams whenever and wherever possible.
If you’re a steelhead bum, you’ll need more than tears and beers to get through the season. If you’re in Seattle this evening, come to Emerald Water Anglers in Seattle. We’ll be talking about my new book, Cracked: the Future of Dams in a Hot, Chaotic World. And also about how your idle casting arm might be put to better use by picking up the sword of activism.
After all, sentiment without action is the ruin of the soul.
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