Sometimes support for arguments that advocates of Klamath Basin ag have been trying to make for years can come from the most unlikely of sources.
Recently, an environmental advocate wrote a post for “The KlamBlog”, that did that very thing.
In the post, “Why the recent “Big Win” for the Klamath River is actually a big loss”, the author laments that recent federal investment of $162 million over five years to restore habitat critical to salmon and sucker fish isn’t going to help recover those populations. The writer cites 40 years of restoration efforts that thus far haven’t aided in any of the fish populations rebounding. If anything, the river advocate opines, all the funding for the Klamath River restoration projects has created “restoration dependency” on federal funding for various Tribal and environmental organizations.
We couldn’t agree more on that point.
Not only has the last 40 years of Upper Klamath Lake and Klamath River restoration efforts resulted in zero gain for salmon, C’waam and Koptu populations, the last 20-plus years of single species (mis)management of the Klamath Project mandated by the Endangered Species Act (ESA) has hurt Klamath Basin communities. Instead of the Bureau of Reclamation operating the Klamath Project as designed, it’s been sending warm, algae-rich water straight from Upper Klamath Lake down the Klamath River for flushing flows and to keep river water-levels artificially high in an effort to protect salmon from the C. Shasta parasite.
The result? Continued dwindling of coho and chinook salmon populations and over two decades of economic harm to Klamath Basin communities by drying up farmland. Despite the fact these misguided policies only serve to harm communities while providing zero gain for fish, the National Marine Fisheries Service in Arcata, California, keeps pushing them.
Towards the end of the article, we surprisingly find another point of common-ground with the author- the need to free up more water during drought.
While the author calls for “retiring water rights” to increase the available acre feet of water, there are already programs in place that would do something similar – if used correctly. The Bureau of Reclamation’s drought response programs are that opportunity. Instead of forcing family farmers and ranchers to take an economic hit, drought response programs could be used to encourage cooperation for the benefit of wildlife up and down the Klamath Basin.
For example, in 2021 the Klamath Drainage District had willing landowners who were ready to help by idling 11,000 acres of rich farmland, which could have conservatively yielded nearly 16,500 acre-feet of water. This year, 2022, KDD willing landowners were ready to idle 8,000 acres which would have provided another 12,000 acre-feet. However, it didn’t happen that way.
Rather than encouraging help, the Bureau of Reclamation decided to take punitive actions against KDD and prevent these same landowners from participating in Klamath Project Drought Response Agency programs. What could have been an opportunity to foster cooperation was instead an unnecessarily combative situation between KDD patrons and the Bureau of Reclamation. From December of 2021 through August of 2022, KDD landowners delivered over 3,100 acre-feet to Lower Klamath Lake National Wildlife Refuge, via its drainage infrastructure and pumping plants to. help the wetlands and wildlife. KDD family farmers and ranchers are already willing to help, yet through the Bureau’s actions and mismanagement of the DRA that help was declined.
Imagine how beneficial it would have been to wildlife on that refuge if the Bureau had elected to work with these same landowners. Lower Klamath Lake Wildlife Refuge receiving more water would have further helped the birds of the Pacific Flyway, and that same water could have been cooled and cleaned before sending it downriver for salmon.
By creating a more robust and flexible drought response program, in years when the salmon and sucker fish are threatened by drought, more water would be available to them. And by not permanently retiring water rights from that ground, when we need more food production, such as we’re seeing the need with the Russian incursion into Ukraine, that same ground can be put back to work to benefit our nation and our allies.
Instead of creating conflict to help save salmon as the writer fears, if the Bureau of Reclamation chose to work with landowners versus bullying them, Klamath Basin ag would be a part of the solution. Expecting farmers and ranchers to bear the community and economic brunt is not only unfair, it’s not productive. We’ve seen what over 20 years of operating the Klamath Project has done – or more specifically – not done.
Using the ESA as a cudgel to the benefit of a single species instead of taking a more holistic approach to the Klamath Basin has only worked to inflict harm on Tule Lake and Lower Klamath Lake refuges. It’s bred mistrust between the parties that could actually work together to help recover salmon and sucker fish species. It’s pushed small family businesses to ruin while chasing generations of future farmers and ranchers out of the Klamath Basin.
If Tribal and environmental advocates are serious about Klamath River restoration and recovery efforts, they need to look to Klamath Basin ag as an ally and voice support for drought response programs that encourage land idling. Also rethinking how water gets from Upper Klamath Lake to the Klamath River is necessary and needed. Simply pushing water from the lake to the river while ignoring the benefits of the Klamath Drainage District and the Klamath Project is not only short-sighted, in the long-term this approach is creating the next environmental catastrophe that will impact wildlife and the well-being of Tribal and Klamath Basin ag communities.
By utilizing the wetlands of the Tule Lake and Lower Klamath Lake refuges as “scrubbers” for the water before it’s sent down the Klamath, we might start seeing the salmon recovery that we all hope for. And if a drought response program was set up by the Bureau of Reclamation that encouraged cooperation versus submission, Upper Klamath Lake could get some of the water the Klamath Tribes claim is needed for sucker fish populations to recover.
While we disagree about how restoration and Klamath River recovery efforts for coho and chinook should look, there are two points we can find common ground on: the current 40 years of approach isn’t working, and there’s opportunities to free up more acre feet of water.
KDD landowners have shown they are ready to help. We just need a federal agency that’s willing to work with us.