On Mon, 25 Sep 1995, John Shelton - ext. 4051 wrote:

> Actually I was thinking of a similar case here in Portland where the Sea
> Lions travel about 100 miles up the Columbia and Willamette Rivers to dine
> on salmon milling around the base of Willamette Falls. After watching Sea
> Lions bring beautiful bright fish to the surface and take one bite out of
> them only to drop them and go after another, it's easy for me to imagine
> that they could have a major impact on the dwindling salmon runs.

John,

The chinook salmon runs into the Willamette River are quite healthy, and
are not among those stocks in decline (which have been whipped into a
major "salmon extinction" story by the media frenzy). In fact, the
Willamette system supports a healthy recreational, commercial and tribal
chinook fishery separate from the problems of the declining upriver
Columbia stocks.

The fact that the seals/sea lions take a portion of a healthy fish run is
bemoaned by many "sportsmen" who would be happy to take those fish at the
"Hog Line" below the falls. Where fish passage is relatively unimpeded,
marine mammals do little harm. Where the passage is restricted and the
fish are subject to constant, steady predation, marine mammals have been
indicted as one of the causes of the precipitous declines of the
steelhead run in Seattle's Lake Washington.

It's easy to jump on the sea lion as the villian of the steelhead story,
and they are certainly causing severe impacts to that run, where each
fish becomes a significant percentage of the total populaton. But keep in
mind that the Lake Washington sockeye and coho stocks are also in decline
- and these have not had "Herschel" identified as the culprit. We also
need to be aware of the tremendous habitat problems wrought by the
Urbanization of the Puget Trough and the Willamette Valley. The loss and
destruction of habitat for our fisheries resources due to home building,
5-acre farms, "modern" agriculture, hydroelectric dams, timber harvest, and
factory outlet malls far outweigh the losses of a few fish to a seal.

Predation of fish can be impressive, given the right conditions... The
Calif. Sea Lions take a large proportion of a weak steelhead run. But...

I have a copy of a 1960 edition "Fisheries: Conservation - Propagation -
Regulation" from the old Wash. Dept Fisheries. An entire chapter is
dedicated to "Predator Control". Citing Genesis 1:28 ("God gave man
dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over
every living thing that moveth upon the earth."), the authors noted that
"With this power of dominion divinely bestowed, it is not only man's
right but his duty to so exercise this dominion, that the animals of the
earth, the fowls of the air, the fish of the sea and every living
creature be so taken and so managed as to do the most good for mankind."

Subchapters include: "Operation Mergansers", "Kingfishers'
Depredations", "Other Predators" (ospreys, blue herons, sculpins,
squawfish, snakes(!), loons, sea lions, hair seals, etc. etc), and
"Menace of Dogfish Sharks". The last subchapter is titled: "Seagulls -
Their role in pollution and their effects on the fisheries resources"
(Did you know that these things *defecate* in our waters!! Next time I
come down with typhoid, cholera, or dysentery, I'm going to complain to
Seattle Audubon!). I especially like this quote: "The gull is the rat
of the bird kingdom."

Sometimes I think we've come so far since the 50s. Other times I read my
mail from Rep Linda Smith or Slick Slade....

Jon. Anderson
Olympia, WA
anderjda at dfw.wa.gov