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Judge
throws out threatened species listing for Oregon Coastal coho
from The Oregonian By JEFF BARNARD
GRANTS PASS, Ore. 9/13/01 (AP) -- A federal judge has thrown out
the threatened species listing for Oregon coastal coho salmon, saying
federal biologists were wrong to make a distinction between wild and
hatchery fish.
In a lawsuit brought by the Alsea Valley Alliance, U.S. District
Judge Michael J. Hogan in Eugene issued a ruling sending the 1998
listing of Oregon coastal coho as a threatened species back to the
National Marine Fisheries Service for further consideration.
"Theoretically, this (ruling) could affect all listings"
of salmon in the West, said NMFS spokesman Brian Gorman.
The judge wrote in his
Monday ruling that NMFS acted in an arbitrary and capricious manner
when it decided to protect fish spawning in the wild, but not fish
spawned in hatcheries, when they could breed together as part of the
same group known as an evolutionarily significant unit, or ESU.
The lawsuit was brought by the Pacific Legal Foundation, a
conservative public interest law firm, based on local outrage kindled
by a 1998 home video taken by Philomath banker Ron Yechout. The video
showed Department of Fish and Wildlife workers clubbing hatchery fish
on the Alsea River so they would not breed with wild fish.
"It's pretty silly when a bureaucrat can wade into a river and
pick one coho salmon and declare it protected, and pick another coho
salmon and take it home and throw it on the grill," said Pacific
Legal Foundation attorney Russ Brooks. "If they're threatened,
fine, list them all, not just part of them."
The Alsea Valley Alliance is made up of people affected by limits
on fishing in the Alsea River due to the threatened species listing of
Oregon coastal coho salmon. They include local sports fishermen, the
owner of a bait shop and the owner of a charter fishing boat, said
Brooks.
Hatcheries were once routinely built to make up for the loss of
freshwater habitat to dams, logging, grazing and development, and
historically gave little regard to maintaining genetic strength.
But in recent years, many biologists argued they were part of the
problem, not the solution, because wild fish are better able to
survive in the wild and had a more diverse genetic makeup that made
them more able to cope with a changing environment.
While environmentalists have generally opposed hatcheries, Indian
tribes have favored using them to bolster dwindling runs, as long as
they are managed is a way that mimics conditions in the wild.
"It's catastrophic," said Jason Miner, conservation
biologist for Oregon Trout, a conservation group working to restore
salmon in Oregon. "There is a factual finding that hatchery fish
and wild fish are genetically the same, which is both inaccurate and
vastly oversimplifies the complex biology of Oregon's native
fish."
While the ruling calls into question all Endangered Species Act
listings of trout, salmon and steelhead, it only affects the listing
of Oregon coastal coho, and the foundation has no immediate plans to
seek reversals of other listings, Brooks said.
"We do expect NMFS to appeal the case to the 9th Circuit
(Court of Appeals) rather than going back to the drawing board to --
as Judge Hogan told them -- to do it right next time," Brooks
said.
NMFS has not analyzed the ruling yet, and has not decided whether
to appeal, however state protections remaining in force would continue
to protect coho, Gorman said.
NMFS had originally decided not to list coho salmon on the Oregon
coast, deferring to Gov. John Kitzhaber's groundbreaking Oregon Salmon
Plan, which sought to promote voluntary improvements and protections
of salmon habitat on private lands, where the bulk of coho habitat is
located.
But environmentalists sued, and another federal judge ruled that
voluntary protections were not sufficient under the Endangered Species
Act.
Steve Williams, assistant chief of fisheries for the Oregon
Department of Fish and Wildlife, said it was too early to say what the
ruling would mean for efforts to protect and restore Oregon coho.
Kitzhaber had no immediate comment on the ruling.
"We have to study the opinion to see what its impact is on
state salmon recovery programs," said spokesman Rick Applegate.
"The governor will be meeting with representatives from the state
attorney general's office as well s his natural resources advisers to
further review the opinion."
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