Bad Science - Bad Government - Bad Deal for
Farmers
On June 16th, biologist David A. Vogel testified before the House
Committee on Resources Oversight Field Hearing on "Water Management
and Endangered Species Issues in the Klamath Basin." Mr. Vogel, a
fisheries scientist for the past 26 years, worked 15 of those years for
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and the National Marine
Fisheries Service (NMFS). During his tenure with the federal government,
he received numerous superior and outstanding achievement awards and
commendations, including Fisheries Management Biologist of the Year Award
for six western states.
The Klamath farm situation is an "artificially created regulatory
crisis that has been imposed on the Upper Klamath basin," Vogel
pointed out. "In my entire professional career," he said,
"I have never been involved in a decision-making process that was as
closed, segregated, and poor as we now have in the Klamath basin. The
constructive science-based processes I have been involved in elsewhere
have involved an honest and open dialogue among people having scientific
expertise. Hypotheses are developed, then rigorously tested against
empirical evidence. None of those elements of good science characterize
the decision-making process for the Klamath Project."
A comprehensive survey of the research on the suckers shows that the
original "endangered" listing of the species in 1988 was as
flawed and fraudulent as the 2001 decision to cut off irrigation water.
Vogel found that "the information used by the USFWS to list the two
sucker species as endangered in 1988 under the Endangered Species Act (ESA)
is now very much in question. The USFWS so selectively reported the
available information that it can only be considered a distorted view of
information available to the agency at that time." In other words,
the USFWS fudged from the beginning, using the suckers as a pretext to
justify regulatory control of the Klamath Basin. Vogel testified:
Surveys performed just after the sucker listing found substantial
populations of suckers in Clear Lake (reported as "common")
exhibiting a biologically desirable diverse age distribution. Within
California, the USFWS surveyors considered populations of both species as
"relatively abundant, particularly shortnose, and exist in mixed age
populations, indicating successful reproduction."
After citing much other data showing that the suckers are really doing
quite well, Vogel then showed that, if the fish were truly endangered, the
USFWS plan for recovery would be completely wrong-headed anyway. He noted
that "it is evident the sucker populations do not experience a
population-limiting condition from lower lake elevations as incorrectly
postulated by the USFWS. In fact, one of the strongest year classes of
suckers occurred during a drought year in 1991 when lake levels were lower
than average."
In fact, the federal policy in Klamath is almost certainly hurting the
suckers as well as the farmers. "This measure of artificially
maintaining higher-than-historical lake elevations is likely to be
detrimental, not beneficial, for sucker populations," Vogel
testified. Fred Fleck, a retired fish biologist who conducted fish studies
on the Klamath as far back as 1946, explained to this reporter why that
is. "Suckers are warm water fish that thrive when the water is low
and warm," he said. "They don’t do as well in cold water, so
to say they need more water, deeper water is ridiculous. I don’t believe
the USFWS biologists can really believe that. This is obviously politics
at work here, not science."
The USFWS biological opinion on the suckers that forms the basis of the
destructive Klamath policy has also come under criticism from Dr. Alex
Horn, professor of limnology at the University of California at Berkeley.
And an Oregon State University (OSU) assessment of USFWS biological
opinion said the opinion was comprised of "illogical
conclusions," "inconsistent and contradictory statements,"
and "factual inaccuracies and rampant speculation." The OSU
review also stated that the document had the potential to severely damage
the public credibility of the USFWS.
The "threatened" Coho salmon pretext is equally preposterous.
Many Oregonians were astonished and outraged last year when it was
revealed that state workers were clubbing to death tens of thousands of
the "threatened" Coho. A video of the slaughter was obtained by
Oregonians In Action (OIA) and run as a television commercial. While the
video scenes showed Oregon state employees netting and clubbing Coho and
chopping the heads off the fish, the OIA narration indignantly explained:
Oregon taxpayers laid out $47 million to operate these hatcheries, but the
government slaughters the fish and then sells the carcasses for cat food
and the salmon eggs for fish bait! Politicians have spent hundreds of
millions of dollars trying to bring the salmon back, but it’s been a
miserable failure. It’s time ordinary Oregonians start to examine the
scientific facts.
And the scientific facts are, says biologist Fred Fleck, that we had a
much higher than average Coho run, in spite of the state sponsored
slaughter. "There are other factors adversely affecting the Coho and
other salmon that the environmental extremists don’t want to look
at," he says. "Such as the huge number of protected sea lions
and harbor seals that are taking an enormous predation toll on all of the
salmon. Also, the federal government is allowing foreign fishing fleets to
take massive salmon catches off our coast. These and other factors are
having a much, much greater impact on salmon than the Klamath farmers. The
farmers are just being made the scapegoats."
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NAS/NRC
COMMITTEE TO REVIEW SUCKER SCIENCE
This is the way the most significant water and property rights battle
in the nation is now shaping up:
After raising the most significant national attention ever generated on
the seizure of water and property rights, the folks in the Klamath Basin
are about be ambushed by the Bush Administration. Sec. of Interior Gale
Norton has handed off scientific review of the near-fraudulent USFWS
Biological Opinion and Hardy Flow studies to the National Academy of
Sciences (NAS) which in turn has handed the review off to the National
Research Council (NRC).
The NRC has consistently endorsed science that is patently ideological
and has not met the high standards of impartiality necessary to the
science upon which public policy is based. A look at the panel makeup
shows that this review committee will be no exception. Simply put, the
scientific review panel is set up to provide a scientific smoke screen by
which the farmers and ranchers in the Klamath Basin will have their water
seized, their land de-valued and their Constitutional rights violated.
This smoke screen will provide a convenient excuse for the Bush
Administration and Congress to wash their hands of the problem and say
there is nothing they can do in the face of "peer review."
Everyone will wring their hands and say they tried, but what can they do
in the face of "overwhelming" scientific evidence? Never mind
that this is committee only perpetuates the fraud.
We cannot allow such a devious fatal blow to property rights in this
country to be dealt with so little fanfare as is being focused on these
hearings!
The only hope for the Klamath Basin farmers is to expose this panel for
the sham that it is. Let the National Academy of Sciences know that you
will not allow this to happen without raising every bit of ruckus you can.
Notify everyone you can that these hearings will be taking place in
Sacramento beginning on Tuesday, Nov. 6 in Sacramento, CA.
Felice Pace and Glen Spain of the two organizations that brought suit
to seize the farmers' water will be speaking that day. Let them know we
are still watching and won't stand for them doing their dirty work in the
dark of such obscure bureaucratic functions. These panels are where they
do their most devious damage and we have allowed them to go virtually
unchallenged.
This panel will irrevocably set in motion the apparatus by which this
national disgrace will become a national tragedy. Don't let this happen
without a fight!
Ric Costales, President, Pacific Region Frontiers of Freedom-People for
the USA
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Update 2/6/02
Despite the possibilities expressed in the
previous article, the NAS released a favorable interim report on
2/6/02. For more info go to the Klamath Basin timeline
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
KLAMATH BASIN
REALITIES vs. ENVIRO MYTHS
Strange how the facts keep being different than
what the agencies provide.
In the Portland, OR Oregonian on
March 15, 2001, reporter Beth Quinn quotes Wendell Wood of the ONRC as
saying, "Wildlife officials worry that Upper Klamath Lake's suckers
may already be doomed following fish kills in 1995, 1996, and 1997 that
wiped out 90% of the adult fish."
* Reality #1:
In 1970 the number of Lost River suckers was "unknown." The
number of Shortnose suckers was "very rare". (Bond, C. E. August
12, 1970 in a letter to Clinton Lostetter, Bureau of Sport Fisheries and
Wildlife regarding the Lost River Sucker)
* Reality #2:
In 1976 there were 94,000 Lost River suckers and 252,000 Shortnose
suckers. In 1997 there were 46,000 Lost River suckers and 146,000
Shortnose suckers. (Official ODFW estimates)
Factually, if we don't know how many
suckers there were in 1970 how can it be said that suckers are
"doomed" or 90% were "wiped out"? Rationally, it would
appear that there was at least a very significant increase in numbers
during that period.
Examining lake levels for the years
'92,' 94 '95, '96 and '97 we find the following:
Year Min Lake Elev
1992 4137.37 No fish kills
1994 4136.79 No fish kills
1995 4138.60 Fish kills
1996 4138.72 Fish kills
1997 4140.10 Fish kills
(Source: US Bureau of Reclamation)
Please notice that the higher lake
levels in '95, '96, and '97 produced fish kills whereas the lower lake
levels in '92 and '94 did not. Also notice that the lake level in '97 was
almost 1 1/2 feet higher than in '96 and there were fewer fish reported in
'97 by the Fish and Wildlife Service.
* Reality #3:
Higher lake levels produce fish kills. Heavy algae blooms reduce oxygen
levels at the bottom of the lake where we find sucker habitat. Higher lake
levels prevent winds and currents from "turning over" lake
water. Simply and factually, higher lake levels endanger the suckers.
Steve Lewis is the biologist who gave
the biological opinion for the US Fish and Wildlife Service recommending
that the minimum lake level be raised to its highest level in history.
* Reality #4:
Mr. Lewis, while handing down the opinion, was the Commodore of the
Klamath Yacht Club. In late summer when the lake levels drop, yachtsmen
must take their boats out of the water because their keels are in the mud.
Mr. Lewis owns a boat on Upper Klamath Lake. Is Mr. Lewis protecting the
sucker, or is Mr. Lewis protecting himself and his real love, boating?
* Reality #6:
Shutting off water to 225,000 acres of farmland plus hundreds of miles of
ditches plus the Tulelake National Wildlife Refuge, an entire ecosystem is
being destroyed. Habitat for ducks and geese, deer and antelope, muskrats,
birds, insects and a myriad of other wildlife is destroyed or severely
limited.
In a full page ad in the Herald and
News on April 10, 2001, subscribed to by; The Pacific Coast Federation of
Fisherman's Assoc., California Council of Trout Unlimited, Salmonid
Restoration Federation, Northern California Assoc. of River Guides,
Waterwatch, The Wilderness Society, Klamath Forest Alliance, and the ONRC
we find the following: "Each year the Federal government provides
billions of dollars in assistance to farmers who suffer from drought,
other natural disasters or from global market forces beyond their
control." ----"We also support the efforts to enhance water
supplies and storage, so long as the environment is not further
compromised in the process"
* Reality #7:
Grain is the only crop subsidized in the Klamath Basin and only a small
part of that. In 1989 we had a microburst pass through Merrill,OR. We
personally lost between $300,000 and $400.000. We received $20,000 in
government aid . a far cry from the billions asserted by the
environmentalists.
The environmentalist's campaign of
mistruths and downright lies have painted a picture that Klamath Lake is
"nearly dry." The misinformed public, without understanding the
reality, is led to believe that Klamath Basin agriculture is responsible
for an environmental disaster.
* Reality #8:
The lake elevation today is at 4143.09. In only 3 years since 1991 has the
lake elevation been higher. In 1996 and 2000 it was 0.08 feet higher than
today. In 1995 it was 0.12 feet higher. Recall that high lake levels in
'95, '96, and '97 produced the significant fish kills.
With proper management we can have a
normal irrigation season and protect our natural environment. Wild-eyed
hysterical claims of pending environmental disaster are predicated upon
fiction. Careful management is based upon reality.
I hope this information will clarify
the misinformation that has been given to the public.
Dick Carleton Dcarl@aol.com (Dick
Carleton is a retired educator who operates a family farm near Merrill,
Oregon)
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ESA, The Green God
1400 Klamath Basin farm families are the latest
human sacrifice demanded by the green god, ESA The same
worshippers of the deep ecology cult that deified the spotted owl,
have now thrown more victims into ESAs grinning maw by pleading
for the demi-gods, sucker fish and coho salmon, in federal court.
The judge, an acolyte at the same altars as these ecologists,
stripped away the water rights, the livelihoods and the
dignity of these once independent farmers by ordering ever willing
federal water regulators to shut off the lifeblood of their farms
- irrigation water - and reserve that water for the objects of
their cult worship, the salmon and the suckers.
So the farmers organized a bucket brigade, that
old symbol of community effort in crisis, to symbolize their
resistance to this assault on their rights and their lifestyle.
Their refusal to throw themselves on ESA’s altar galvanized the
attention of freedom fighters everywhere and may have caused the
main stream media and politicians some concern about how to ignore
this newest outbreak of freedom. Nevertheless the brigade’s
buckets of pride did not settle the dust in the irrigation canals
or move the bureacrats in Washington - old administration or new.
Driven by need and anger, a few farmers in true
Boston Tea Party spirit violated the federal temple at the
headgates and released the waters to the thirsty canals. Not for
long though. The gates of the temple are now closed and watched by
temple guards - federal park police.
Still refusing to be sacrificed these yeoman
farmers, like those who made up the grit and backbone of
revolutionary America, have kept their vigil at the gates. It is
now a question of who is under siege - the farmers or the temple
guards.
An irrigation pump has been set up to pump water
from Tule lake into the canals as a symbol of their refusal to
surrender. Heroes have stepped up to set up and man that pump,
facing down local and federal police. There is word that a much
bigger pump will be set up - for the resistance continues. And the
call still goes out for HELP. Help us all you love freedom. Spread
the word and send help.
And we will. The Klamath Basin has become
Concord Bridge in the never -ending struggle against tyranny that
Americans have carried forward since they first stepped ashore on
Plymouth Rock. We will, for we must, shake off our self-centered
indifference and fill the ranks of that bucket brigade until it
reaches clear across the continent and pours out a new spirit and
a new will in the jaded halls and chambers on Captol Hill.
by Gary Hall
Click here for
more info on Bucket
Brigade or go to http://www.klamathbasincrisis.org
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ENDANGERED SPECIES
