Human Rights Law

USGS: Freshwater biodiversity collapsing in North America

By melvin

Nearly 40 percent of fish species in North American streams, rivers and lakes are now in jeopardy . . .

The 700 fishes now listed represent a staggering 92 percent increase over the 364 listed as "imperiled" in the previous 1989 study . . . .

The statements above come not from Greenpeace or the Center for Biological Diversity, but from the US Geological Survey - an organization not prone to hyperbole - in its press release announcing the publication of Conservation status of imperiled North American freshwater and diadromous fishes (the bulk of a 60-page pdf), the third such comprehensive assessment undertaken by Mexican, Canadian and American scientists led by the USGS.

(The link above is to August 2008 issue of Fisheries, a journal of the American Fisheries Society, where this study is published by tradition. The report can be found on pages 8-43 of the pdf, which are pages 372-407 of the journal.)
As the map at right illustrates, the areas with the most species in trouble are the southeastern US and the lower Rio Grande, as well as the heavily exploited Lerma-Chapala basin in Mexico, closely followed by several of the central Pacific regions. Region 10 covers the rapidly disappearing delta smelt along with many of California's dying salmon runs.

(Clicking on the map or here will take you to USGS' excellent interactive version, with infomation broken down by region, state, and species.)

Why are our fish disappearing? Loss of habitat, loss of habitat, loss of habitat, and the introduction of alien species. The story is the same from the Tennessee Valley Authority to the upper Columbia.

One thing is not conveyed in this or any report or map: the extant to which dozens of species are still here at all only because of years and years of work by conservationists in the watersheds and in the courts. Someone stood up and started fighting for the Snake River salmon, because of their economic significance to west coast fishermen and their importance culturally and as a food source to interior native Americans. No one did for the Potosí pupfish, and it vanished without a trace in 1994 when the spring that was its only habitat was overused to the point of total depletion.

The loss of freshwater resources gets more attention in some parts of the country than others, but probably nowhere more than here in the Northwest, the only area I know much about.

Take regions 6, 7, and 8 for example. Together they constitute the Columbia and Snake River watersheds, where the salmon wars have raged for 35 years (since the Boldt decision) and more, and won't be over any time soon. What's happening in my back yard these days?

Here are just a couple recent developments of note:

The public is finally beginning to understand that the Pacific lamprey is rapidly nearing extinction in the Columbia River drainage, as 2008 has seen a record low number of adults migrating upstream through Bonneville Dam.

The members of the Columbia River Intertribal Fish Commission, who consider the lamprey sacred and have been concerned about its decline since the 70's, have already prepared an exceedingly detailed recovery plan, and they want it implemented now. From the executive summary of the Tribal Pacific Lamprey Restoration Plan for the Columbia River Basin (68-page pdf):

For over 10,000 years the people of the Nez Perce, Umatilla, Yakama and Warm Springs tribes depended on lamprey (eels), salmon, and roots and berries. The tribal people used the eel for food and medicine and through the years many stories and legends surrounding the eel were passed down from generation to generation. Before The Dalles Dam, the river at Celilo Falls was black with eels and tribal members took just what their families needed for a year. Eels were plentiful in the Walla Walla River, Asotin Creek, Lolo Creek, the south fork of the Salmon River, Swan Falls, the upper portions of the Yakama River, and the tributaries of the upper Columbia.

Now these great rivers have no eels, or at best remnant numbers. The eel has vanished from the tribal longhouse tables. As eels disappear, younger tribal members are losing their collective memory for the species and the culture that it surrounds.

The tribes propose this plan for restoration of the species to numbers adequate for tribal use and ecological health of the region. The tribes believe action must be taken now, despite a general paucity of information about the life history and population dynamics of the species.

Achieving improvements in dam passage efficiencies and survival is of primary importance. Only about 50% of adult lamprey successfully pass a single dam. Improving dam passage will require a set of operational and structural modifications to the existing dams. These modifications are possible, practical, and should be undertaken immediately. They include the use of 24 hour video counting, installation of lamprey passage systems, altering existing fishway structures to prevent trapping, reducing velocity barriers, reducing/eliminating juvenile impingement on screens and reducing fishway flows at night.

Improving tributary and mainstem habitat for lamprey ammocoetes and macrophalmia is also important. This draft plan contains detailed subbasin plans by each tribe for achieving these goals. We also recommend the development of effective tagging technology and installation of devices preventing entrainment of juveniles into irrigation canals and tributary water diversion.
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There is no time to waste. The Pacific lamprey has been neglected and ignored for too long.

(The first few pages of this Restoration Plan should be required reading for anyone who wants to understand the cultural and historical context of the lamprey and its decline. For those not familiar with Pacific lamprey at all, see CRITFC's two-page factsheet.)

Consider those numbers. If ten thousand adult lampreys that originated in the Nez Perce country of the upper Snake began were ready to return home to spawn and started their journey from Portland, 9960 of them would die just attempting the passage around the eight dams in their way, never mind the normal natural causes. Juveniles face similar problems in their downstream migration. The fish ladders and all the apparatus installed to aid in salmon migration and the salmon transportion program have been a disaster for the lamprey. The Corps of Engineers is working on the problem within its operating constraints. Please note that while it is easy enough to bash the Corps, 1) it doesn't solve anything, and 2) the Corps is a creature entirely at Congress' disposal and does as it is told. Someone else - Congress - is supposed to be setting policy and overseeing it.

Meanwhile on the Kootenai River, the Center for Biological Diversity, the Kootenai Tribe of Idaho, the state of Montana, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, the Corps of Engineers, and the Bonneville Power Administration have managed after a mere six years of legal manoeuvring to reach an agreement to try to save the Kootenai River white sturgeon, whose numbers have been crashing since Libby Dam came online in 1974. Water flows through the dam will be managed with more of an eye to the sturgeons needs (they are unable to reproduce without very specific river conditions, those found in freeflowing rivers) and several more miles of river will be protected for their use.

Once again, it is the tribes that have led the way. The Kootenais have for nearly twenty years been operating their Kootenai River White Sturgeon Study and Conservation Aquaculture Project, including a breeding hatchery which the tribe views as purely a stopgap measure until proper river conditions can be restored. And it is not a simple matter breeding sturgeon, which don't reach sexual maturity until they are 20 years old.

While this USGS/AFS report was restricted to fish, one of its lead authors noted:

Fish are not the only aquatic organisms undergoing precipitous declines. Freshwater crayfishes, snails and mussels are exhibiting similar or even greater levels of decline and extinction.

He might have added, amphibians and turtles too. Here in Washington, "headstarting" and realease of captive bred Oregon spotted frogs is underway in hopes of meeting with the limited success the same approach has had for the western pond turtle.

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Footnote: The Kootenai Tribe of Idaho is tiny, but feisty. It is probably most famous for declaring war on the United States - in 1975. At the behest of Tribal Chairwoman Amy Trice, then 34, tribal members stopped traffic at gunpoint and charged a 50-cent toll to cross their land. The war only lasted three days, and no one was hurt - there were rumors the guns were never loaded. The tribe got a very small parcel of land for their efforts - and a tremendous amount of respect. Trice:

We did not sign a treaty, never will. Why should I have to sign a treaty when this is my country?

Full post as published by Never In Our Names on September 18, 2008 (boomark / email).