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Scientists favor reserving water to protect Klamath Basin fish

A state panel's recommendations conflict with a federal report that opposes holding back irrigation water to more than 1,000 farms

10/29/03

MICHAEL MILSTEIN

A state science panel has found that federal agencies acted reasonably when they withheld water from Klamath Basin farms to aid protected fish -- just a week after a national panel ruled the move had been misguided.
    
The state scientists concluded after two years of study that reserving water for fish remains "one of several appropriate management tools" to reduce risk to the species. But more water alone will not safeguard them, the panel warned.

The two panels agreed on almost all points but the most contentious one: whether a 2001 cutoff of irrigation water to more than 1,000 Klamath farms made scientific sense. Their conflicting results illustrate continuing uncertainty over how to counter ecological declines evident in Klamath's failing water quality and fish populations.

Both panels are advisory. But the Oregon report carries clout at the state level because state law requires Oregon agencies to address the findings as they work to resolve the arid basin's emotionally charged water wars.

Federal agencies make many water decisions in the basin straddling the Oregon-California line. But Oregon agencies have a critical role in unraveling long-running water rights conflicts that make unclear who owns what water.

"It's going to reinforce some of the things we're doing, and it will probably lead us in some new directions, too," said Paul Cleary, director of the Oregon Department of Water Resources.

Both the state and national panels pushed for better coordination among all agencies that oversee water and wildlife in Klamath. Both stressed that declines in native fish cannot be reversed merely by keeping water from farms in the federal Klamath Project, as federal agencies did during a drought two years ago.

Repairs to deteriorated wildlife habitat and removal of dams that block fish migrations are also essential, they said.

"I think we all see a need to look across the landscape for solutions," said Stanley Gregory, an Oregon State University professor who is co-chairman of the state panel.

Oregon law created the group to provide advice on the needs of protected salmon. In April 2001, as Klamath farms began drying up, then-Gov. John Kitzhaber asked the scientists to review the science driving the cutoff of irrigation water.

The state panel includes scientists from Oregon State, the University of Idaho, the U.S. Geological Survey and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. It agreed on its position in April, and sent its report to Gov. Ted Kulongoski early this month.

The governor's staff is reviewing the report, said spokeswoman Mary Ellen Glynn.

The state group worked parallel to a separate science panel assembled by the National Research Council at the request of Interior Secretary Gale Norton. That group released its report last week, assuaging farmers by saying the 2001 cutoff of water had been unwarranted.

"Precautionary approach" The state report, however, backed "a precautionary approach" to protecting endangered suckers in Upper Klamath Lake and threatened coho salmon in the Klamath River. Federal agencies had few options to help fish through 2001 beyond keeping more water for them, the state panel said.

"It was reasonable given what they had to work with," Gregory said. "We didn't see any fatal flaws."

More water in the lake was the only immediate step to ease the threat of algae blooms that have killed fish and to open more habitat for suckers in marshes along the lakeshore, the panel said. Fewer young suckers survive in years of low lake levels, it said. In contrast, the federal panel found no relationship between algae blooms and lake levels.

It also concluded that there was little evidence more water flowing into the Klamath River during summer would help coho salmon there. But the state panel disagreed, saying more water could create extra room for fish and cool the river slightly.

Bob Gasser, a fertilizer dealer in the farm town of Merrill, said the timing of the state report is "unfortunate," because it might revive debate about the past when basin residents must address the future.

"We know we have to do our part, we want to do our part, but let's everybody do their part," he said. "We're trying to find solutions because nobody wants to go through what we did in 2001 again."

But Steve Pedery of WaterWatch of Oregon said the state report recognized that stopgap help for fish may be needed until longer-term remedies emerge.

The state scientists wrote that much more research is needed to better understand the needs and outlook of the protected fish species. But they concluded that the federal agencies that made the decision to reserve water for fish in 2001 used the "best available science" at the time.

The state report is available online at www.fsl.orst.edu/imst/ under "technical reports."

Michael Milstein: 503-294-7689; michaelmilstein@news.oregonian.com


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