Shrinking Salmon Populations

  • A close view of salmon eggs and developing salmon fry. (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)

A federal judge says the Obama
Administration soon has to come
up with a plan to restore endangered
salmon runs to the Pacific Northwest’s
biggest rivers. Ann Dornfeld went
gill net fishing on the Columbia
River to find out what’s at stake:

Transcript

A federal judge says the Obama
Administration soon has to come
up with a plan to restore endangered
salmon runs to the Pacific Northwest’s
biggest rivers. Ann Dornfeld went
gill net fishing on the Columbia
River to find out what’s at stake:

(sound of a boat moving through water)

Gary Soderstrom is a fourth-generation Columbia River salmon fisherman. Even though it’s his work, on a sunny summer day there are few places he’d rather be than casting a gill net on this tranquil bay near the mouth of the Columbia.

“Just being this far from the dock, it’s just a whole different world! All the nights and the days I’ve put out here, I still feel good when I get out here.” (laughs)

Soderstrom – or Suds, as he’s better known – says gillnetters today catch salmon pretty much the same way his great-great-grandfather caught them. The main difference today is motors help fishers lay out and reel in their nets.

(sound of reel squeaking as net is laid)

“See how he’s layin’ up the bank here, and then he’s gonna go across. That’ll create a trap for the fish if he leads ’em over to the beach, and they might get confused.”

The technique might not have changed much. But this river has. These days, a dozen species of salmon and steelhead on the Columbia are listed as endangered. One of the biggest factors is the hydroelectric dam system that provides most of the power to the Pacific Northwest. Those dams keep young salmon from making it to the ocean. Suds says that’s why his son won’t be a fifth generation fisherman.

“There used to be several thousand fishermen on the Columbia at one time. Now there’s a couple hundred of us that are still active. Most guys like my son and them have went and got other jobs to try and raise families on.”

Federal law requires the government to restore the endangered salmon runs. For years, fishers and environmental groups have been calling for the removal of four dams on the Snake River, a tributary of the Columbia.

But the Clinton and Bush Administrations backed other plans to restore salmon runs. Those plans ranged from spilling a small portion of water through the dams to trucking baby salmon around the dams. Federal courts rejected those plans as insufficient. Now a federal judge has told the Obama Administration it has until mid-September to come up with a plan that goes far beyond the scheme President Bush proposed last year.

Ann Dornfeld: “What do you think is the chance that they’re gonna take out the dams?”

Gary Soderstrom: “Well, about like me winnin’ the Powerball! (laughs) I mean, don’t think it’s ever gonna happen, but realistically, it’d work.”

Suds says he’d also like to see tougher restrictions put on farmers who irrigate their crops with water from the Columbia.

“Irrigation systems, a lot of them are still water hogs. I think they should be forced into using the least amount of water they can get by with.”

It’s been about 15 minutes, and it’s time to reel in the nets.

(sound of reeling in nets)

We’ve brought in one 17-pound coho.

(sound of salmon hitting the floor)

But like most of the other fish caught on the Columbia these days, it was raised in a hatchery upstream.

Suds says for years he’s been volunteering his time on advisory councils and boards throughout the state to try to restore the habitat that once brought millions of salmon down the river the natural way. But what he’d really like to do is meet with President Obama and explain the river’s history to him firsthand.

“But in my situation, being a peon fisherman, you’ll never get to talk to a guy like him. Y’know, if you could bring him out here and show him what I’ve shown you today, maybe he’d have a clearer understanding of what’s going on out here.”

Suds Soderstrom says he wants the president to make good on his promise to let science dictate his policies, rather than politics – which always seem to favor development.

“Sooner or later you’re either gonna have fish or people. And the people seem to be winning.”

The new Administration has until September 15th to propose its plan to save endangered salmon. The federal judge who’s been overseeing the process for years has made one requirement: this time, the plan has to work.

For The Environment Report, I’m Ann Dornfeld.

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Whose Nature Are We Talking About?

  • Several neighbors near Cook County Illinois' Bunker Hill Forest Preserve are concerned about the loss of trees. Bathsheba Burmin is third from the left. (Photo by Shawn Allee)

When somebody says a natural area, does everybody have the same thing in mind? Some might see a park with baseball fields or a golf course as a natural area. But natural area means what it looked like for hundreds or thousands of years before humans started changing the landscape. Sometimes, that natural landscape was changed so long ago, when it’s restored to the way it looked oringally, it’s not very familiar to the people who live there now. Shawn Allee talked with some people who disagree about the idea of restoring natural areas:

Transcript

When somebody says a natural area, dose everybody have the same thing in mind? Some might see a park with baseball fields or a golf course as a natural area. But natural area means what it looked like for hundreds or thousands of years before humans started changing the landscape. Sometimes, that natural landscape was changed so long ago, when it’s restored to the way it looked oringally, it’s not very familiar to the people who live there now. Shawn Allee talked with some people who disagree about the idea of restoring natural areas:

If you go to the Bunker Hill Forest Preserve just outside Chicago, you find picnic spaces, bike trails, and woods – acres of woods.

If it’s the wrong day, though, a security guard will turn you back from the woods.

Guard: “Closed off for a while? It’s closed off for a while. They’re doing a controlled burn – they’re burning that field over there.”

Man: “What are you doing exactly? Burning?”

Guard: “Controlled burn.”

Forest preserve workers in sooty, yellow fire suits are burning brush and trees.

They say soil tests show this land was once savanna – a kind of grassland with a few trees mixed in.

They’re trying to restore it to that original landscape.

Volunteers help out with this restoration, but a small number of people want to stop it.

“Everything they burned today is area they’ve cleared over the past two years. We’re opposed to cutting our urban forests.”

Bathsheba Burmin shows me the site – after it’s cooled.

She wants me to see what it takes to turn woods into savanna.

Burmin: “It’s a little muddy, so…”

Allee: “It’s hard not to notice.”

(sounds of walking through mud)

Allee: “This place is being actively transformed.”

Burmin: “Yes.”

Allee: “You can see brush piles moved around, trees have obviously been cut because you can see the stumps, and obviously they burned just today.”

Burmin: “What it does is tell the story of what the restructuring of an ecosystem looks like.”

Burmin and a few of her neighbors have protested the transformation of these woods into savanna.

Some don’t believe this was ever grassy savanna in the first place.

Burmin says, even if it was savanna – it’s not now; it’s woodland – and she regrets losing the trees.

Burmin: “If you’re not familiar with the site and you hear there’s an increase in grassland species you must be doing something wonderful. Nobody talked about what happened to all the woodland species. The reason you have an increase in grassland species, but that’s because you took out all the forest.”

Habitat restoration can be violent.

It can involve poisoning or burning unwanted plants or maybe killing animals like deer that graze on more desirable plants.

Wildlife managers use restoration techniques all the time, but on occasion critics like Burmin ask tough questions about it.

When that happens, people like Stephen Packard rush to its defense.

“Now we’re standing in a place where all the brush was cut last year.”

Packard heads the Chicago chapter of the Audobon Society.

He’s offered to show me some restored savanna, about ten miles north of that Bunker Hill spot.

It looks kinda familiar.

Allee: “There’re stumps and sticks everywhere.”

Packard: “Is this ugly or is it not ugly? Here’s my perspective on it. To me it’s like a bunch of broken eggshells after someone made an omelet. I think this is a beautiful thing to see the first stage of recovery. It is stumps, it is bare ground, but from doing this, I know certain plants will start to come up and keep developing.”

Packard says no one restores savanna because they like chopping trees.

It’s just that some plants need open space and light – like in a savanna. Dense woods create too much shade for them.

He says if we let some natural areas literally run wild, a few aggressive species take over, and the rare ones lose out.

“You lose millions of years of evolution of these thousands of species that may be important to the planet, so why not have some places where we can take care of them?”

Packard says some natural areas are so unhealthy, that for now, we need to protect some parts of nature from others.

And if you don’t buy that – you don’t buy restoration.

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

Related Links

One Man, a Marsh, and Birds

  • Ken Brunswick at the Limberlost marsh (Photo by Sam Hendren)

Biologists say we’ve lost about half
of the number of songbirds we had just 50 years
ago. Part of the reason is the loss of habitat.
Many birds need wetlands. Sam Hendren has the
story of one man’s love of those birds and his
work to save their home:

Transcript

Biologists say we’ve lost about half
of the number of songbirds we had just 50 years
ago. Part of the reason is the loss of habitat.
Many birds need wetlands. Sam Hendren has the
story of one man’s love of those birds and his
work to save their home:

When Ken Brunswick was a kid, he wanted
to study birds. Brunswick grew up near the
western Ohio town of St. Henry in the 1950s. He
says it didn’t take long to read all the books
about birds in the local library.

“I knew exactly where all the bird books were
because at that time that’s what I had my heart
set on, being an ornithologist,” Brunswick says.

One of the books that inspired Brunswick
was written by Gene Stratton-Porter. She was a
popular novelist in the early 1900s. Stratton-
Porter was best known for her fictional accounts
set in and around an Indiana swamp called the
Limberlost. She was also an amateur naturalist
and wrote several books about birds.

“I was in the eighth grade in that little two-room
schoolhouse reading ‘What I Have Done With
Birds’ by Gene Stratton-Porter, and the teacher
walked up to see what book I was reading, and
looked at it and the teacher said, ‘You know that
place isn’t very far from here.’ And I didn’t know
what she was talking about.”

The Limberlost actually was only a few miles
west across the state line. Stratton-Porter
moved to the area in 1888. But to the locals, the
trees were valuable lumber and the swamp was
a waste of land. Stratton-Porter wrote that
commerce attacked the Limberlost and began,
she said, its usual process of devastation. By
1910, two decades of destruction were
complete.

“This Loblolly Marsh was what I consider the
heart of the Limberlost area and this marsh was
actually the last thing that was drained in this
area so the farmers could start farming it,” says
Brunswick.

Brunswick became a farmer himself. He
started a dairy only a mile from the old Loblolly
Marsh. Through the years he learned more about
the swamp and the birds that lived there.

Later he formed the Limberlost
Remembered project. The group’s mission: to
bring Loblolly Marsh back to life. And they’ve
made a lot of headway.

Brunswick, who’s 63, is retried from farming.
He’s now an ecologist for the Indiana
Department of Natural Resources. He oversees
the Limberlost restoration.
We take a look at the changes aboard his ATV.

He’s maneuvering along a path near the edge of
the marsh. It’s thick with prairie cord grass,
switch grass and blue stem. Some of the grasses
have been planted here; other plant seeds have
lain dormant for decades and are now reclaiming
the ground on their own.

Out in the marsh the water is a gentle sea of
green and wildflowers abound around the edges.
But Brunswick’s love of the birds has not gone
away. And he’s thrilled to see them returning to
their marsh home.

“This is the area where we see American Bittern
once in a while. There’s been Virginia Rail, we
hear Sora Rail in here also. Sora is just a real
little bird that has just the dandiest sound when
it makes its call,” Brunswick says.

These birds and others like them are in
trouble. Most of the wetlands and prairies where
birds once thrived have disappeared.

Brunswick’s dream of becoming an
ornithologist never happened. But his work to
save the Limberlost has been his way of doing
something for the birds he loves.

“Actually when I think about this work I’m doing
it takes me back to that dream I had when I was
a kid in that two room schoolhouse. That dream
of being an ornithologist was taken away and
here, about 30 years later, seeing this land
flooding, I’m seeing birds that, some of them, I
never saw before.”

And the work of an old farmer has restored
the wetlands and natural areas that farmers
before him destroyed.

For The Environment Report, I’m Sam
Hendren.

Related Links

Money for Great Lakes Restoration?

The federal government, states, and Indian tribes recently finished a plan to restore the Great Lakes. The plan is expensive, but environmentalists hope federal money is in the works. They’re looking to other restoration projects for inspiration. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Shawn Allee
reports:

Transcript

The federal government, states, and Indian tribes recently finished a plan
to restore the Great Lakes. The plan is expensive, but environmentalists
hope federal money is in the works. They’re looking to other restoration
projects for inspiration. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Shawn
Allee reports:


Congress already backs cleanup plans, such as the one in Chesapeake
Bay, but will Congress support Great Lakes restoration, too?


One advocacy group says the track record’s unclear. A report by the
Northeast Midwest Institute compared seven eco-restoration efforts. Co-
Author Karen Vigmostad says Congress starts projects, but doesn’t
always stay committed.


She cites the Florida Everglades.


“There’s been some planning money, but in terms of actually
implementing the plan, the money has not been forthcoming. The state
of Florida’s pretty much been footing that bill.”


The Great Lakes restoration plan faces its first major hurdle soon.
President Bush will release his budget by February. Great Lakes
advocates want 300 million dollars to kick-start the project.
The administration staff is divided on whether to spend that much.


For the GLRC, I’m Shawn Allee.

Related Links

Army Corps to Expand Mississippi Locks

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is moving ahead with
recommendations to expand locks on the Mississippi River despite
an earlier report that found the Corps’ calculations in making a similar
plan were wrong. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham
reports:

Transcript

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is moving ahead with recommendations to expand
locks on
the Mississippi River despite an earlier report that found the Corps’ calculations
in making a
similar plan were wrong. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:


The Corps of Engineers proposes spending 8.3 billion dollars to expand navigation
locks for
heavier barge traffic and restore the ecosystem of the upper Mississippi River. The
National
Research Council was highly critical of an earlier plan, saying the Corps’
projections of greater
traffic on the river were flawed. In a statement, the Corps says this new plan
balances the need
for economic growth and environmental sustainability.


Environmentalists say it’s still wrong. Melissa Samet is with the group American
Rivers.


“The Corps has done a great disservice to the nation by recommending this project.
We have
other needs. It’s a significant amount of money. The recommendation is based on
unsound
science and unsound economics. And that’s just not the way a federal agency should
be working.
It’s certainly not serving the American people.”


Critics say they expect the Corps of Engineers to lobby Congress hard for funding
the expansion
of the locks and not as hard for the environmental restoration.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.

Related Links

Another Cutback in Amtrak Rail Service

  • Amtrak is starting to phase out the Three Rivers route. The National Association of Railroad Passengers is trying to prevent this from continuing. (photo by Michael Jastremski)

Phase-outs have started for an Amtrak passenger train that crosses through the Midwest. It’s the latest in a series of service cutbacks over the last few decades. But some riders are trying to reverse Amtrak’s decision. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach recently rode the rail line in question and talked with some passengers about the pending loss of service:

Transcript

Phase-outs have started for an Amtrak passenger train that crosses through the Midwest. It’s the latest in a series of service cutbacks over the last few decades. But some riders are trying to reverse Amtrak’s decision. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach recently rode the rail line in question and talked with some passengers about the pending loss of service:


(sound of train)


Amtrak has started reducing service on the Three Rivers line between Chicago and Philadelphia. By next April, people in Nappanee, Indiana and Akron, Youngstown, and Fostoria, Ohio will no longer have a passenger train in their city.


On a recent morning, Chicago resident Martin Escutia was riding the Three Rivers to see a friend in Youngstown. He had just flown to Chicago from Central America.


“Being as tired as I was, having the opportunity to be able to bed down and wake up at my destination it’s good convenience, it’s good to have.”


Escutia says losing the Three Rivers will put more people on highways and take away a transportation option. The National Association of Railroad Passengers is trying to restore the cutbacks. But Amtrak says Three Rivers service between Pittsburgh and Chicago was only started to haul bulk mail, and Amtrak is dropping the mail service because it doesn’t make enough money.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.

Related Links

New ‘Great Lakes Coalition’ Seeks Restoration Funds

  • A newly formed coalition to preserve the Great Lakes looks to Congress for support. (Photo by Brandon Bankston)

Philanthropist Peter Wege of the Wege Foundation recently announced a five million dollar grant to build widespread public support to help restore the Great Lakes. The money will be spent to form a group called the Great Lakes Coalition. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Kaomi Goetz reports:

Transcript

Philanthropist Peter Wege and the Wege Foundation recently announced a five million
dollar grant to help build widespread public support to help restore the Great Lakes. The
money will be spent to form a group called the Great Lakes Coalition. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Kaomi Goetz reports:


The Great Lakes Coalition was formed to help set a national agenda and to influence federal
policy. Its members include the National Wildlife Federation and the National Parks Conservation
Association, who are taking a leading role in the group. Coalition consultant Mark Van Putten says
the coalition’s aim is to make restoration of the region a national priority.


“Many of the members of Congress who will vote on Great Lakes restoration don’t come from the
region. Much of the American people don’t know the importance of the Great Lakes and this is a
grant that is designed to have broad public education and outreach to inform people around the
country.”


The coalition is modeled after one formed in the mid-80’s to restore the Florida Everglades.
In 2000, Congress passed a 30-year, eight billion dollar plan to restore the Everglades. The new
coalition hopes to secure similar support.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Kaomi Goetz.

Related Links

Artists Ply the Waters

  • “Fritz Seegers and Mary Brodbeck in front of 'Alwita.’ They’ ll sail the wooden boat around Lake Superior this summer.”

This month a rotating group of artists begin circumnavigating Lake Superior in a sailboat. The artists will be painting, photographing, and making sketches of their journey. They’ll also be collecting stories to share with school children after their return. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tamar Charney caught up with some of the artists before they left: