tweetsters, the plight of terns in general has been of great concern to
those of us that live and bird north of Seattle primarily. Everett, as many
of you know, used to have a very large population of nesting Caspians and up
to eight pairs of Arctic Terns not too long ago. Unfortunately, we now have
the Navy instead and we park cars and launch boats and shop where the terns
used to nest. Also, a few of us tried, unsuccessfully, to provide a place
for the terns at Jetty Island by pulling the Scot's Broom that threatened to
take over the entire island. John Flavin led that nightmare and worked
himself half to death trying to keep ahead of that weed. John and Ed Schulz
invited me out one day to help and I got a serious appreciation for just how
difficult it can be to remove mature plants. I spent a week myself out there
one time pulling plants, but a very high storm surge and tide wrecked our
fence and ruined what little we had accomplished.

In April of this year we published an article entitled *A Tern for the
Worse*, about the situation at the mouth of the Columbia. We were motivated
by the inflamatory article in the February/March issue of Salmon Trout
Steelhead magazine (1999). The articles are too lenthy to repeat here, but
should be read by those interested in this dilemma. People have destroyed
the terns preferred nesting sites and caused the birds to gather at
unnatural sites and now we want to destroy the birds because they are eating
salmon and steelhead smolts.

As I mentioned in that article the greed exhibited by some fishers and boat
manufacturers, as well as, the ancillary businesses ignored what has caused
the problem in the first place. It's the same mentality as some loggers
displayed in whacking all the trees and then wondering why the mills closed.
One of the suggestions to control the terns was to release hogs during
nesting season on the islands in the Columbia.

Anyway, I agree with those of you whom are appalled at the current thinking
on how to *manage* the terns instead of holding those accountable who
destroyed the habitat in the first place! If anyone is interested in reading
either article they may contact me personally.

Darryl Thompson, President
Pilchuck Audubon Society
1803 Hewitt Ave., #108
Everett WA 98201
<birds at cmc.net>







Hi folks,

Saw the following on the Associated Press, and thought
that people would be interested. Seems like a lot of fuss....
the birds aren't doing anything they oughtn't be doing, it's
the rest of us who depend on cheap electricity, etc. who
won't have the dams removed, which causes the fish to be
in poor shape, which causes.......

Jon. Anderson
Olympia, Washington
festuca at olywa.net
----------
No good turns from Columbia River terns

World's largest colony, 20,000 birds, ate some 20 million salmon, steelhead

September 12, 1999

Jeff Barnard; The Associated Press

ASTORIA, Ore. - Government biologists have decided that the Caspian terns
that moved onto a man-made island in the Columbia River and began feasting
on millions of young salmon have to go.

But where to send them?

With more salmon runs up and down the West Coast going on the endangered
species list, the team looking for alternative nesting areas for the
voracious birds has run into the kind of reaction they might expect from a
nuclear waste dump.

"It is a 'Not In My Back Yard' sort of issue," said Bob Willis, a biologist
with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Problems began about a dozen years
ago when Caspian terns discovered Rice Island, a 220-acre lump of dredged
sand located about eight miles from the mouth of the Columbia.

>From a tern's point of view, it is paradise: lots of bare sand on which to
lay their eggs and a veritable buffet line of young salmon swimming by on
their way to the ocean. And unlike the natural islands in the Columbia, the
sandy parts don't flood in the spring.

But from the salmon point of view, it's like reaching the next level on a
video game. They have just survived the gantlet of hydroelectric dams, with
their grinding turbines and long stretches of slackwater filled with hungry
northern pike minnows, only to be swooped down upon by 20,000 screaming terns.

As historic nesting sites, mostly inland, have succumbed to fluctuating
water levels, development, encroaching vegetation and even growing numbers
of eagles, Rice Island kept getting bigger, and so did the numbers of terns.

At some 20,000, they are the largest nesting colony of Caspian terns in the
world, according to the Pacific Seabird Group. The colony represents a
quarter of the North American population and three-quarters of the West
Coast population.

But the salmon they eat are in trouble. More than $3 billion has been spent
trying to restore dwindling Pacific salmon populations, and the government
is considering breaching four hydroelectric dams on the Snake River to
improve young salmon survival on their migration to the sea.

The 80 million young salmon and steelhead that swam down the Columbia River
this year included 11 groups on the endangered species list and represented
an investment of more than $500 million.

Based on observations and the collection of some 40,000 coded wire tags
injected in salmon before they were released from hatcheries, biologists
figure the terns on Rice Island ate as many as 20 million salmon and
steelhead, or about 25 percent of the total, said Ben Meyer, a National
Marine Fisheries Service biologist and chairman of the group of government
experts who will recommend what to do with the terns.

Details are still being debated, but the members of the group agree that the
terns have to go from Rice Island. Attempts to make Rice Island less
attractive by planting winter wheat on the bare sand nesting areas last
winter were foiled by heavy rains.

But biologists are confident they have a better plan. They will string great
swaths of bright orange plastic snow fence across the open sands so the
terns won't want to nest there. They like open spaces, and the snow fence
will cut off their view. ATV patrols will roar around to scare off any diehards.

Luring the birds to new nesting sites is no problem, either. This
summer, the Caspian Tern Relocation Project successfully lured a
couple thousand terns to East Sand Island, near the mouth of the
Columbia, by setting out tern decoys and playing a recording of the
croaking calls that ecologist Don Lyons calls "Caspian Tern Greatest
Hits."

Because they are closer to the mouth, where there are more ocean fish, the
terns' diet consisted of only about 50 percent salmon and steelhead,
compared to about 80 percent at Rice Island, Meyer said.

The ideal would be to create many new nesting colonies up and down the
coast, so each one would be have only a couple hundred birds and the impact
on fish would be small.

But Oregon isn't interested in any more sites. And though Washington has
agreed to look, it won't allow any that hurt a threatened or endangered run
of salmon, said Herb Pollard, a NMFS biologist based in Boise who also
serves on the working group.

"They are just about as welcome as morning glories in your garden," Pollard
said.

Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife biologists are considering some
islands in Grays Harbor, where terns used to nest, and hope to find another
in southern Puget Sound.

"I'm convinced we will be able to find places to assure the long-term
survival of terns in the Northwest and still not jeopardize salmon and
steelhead," said Fred Dobler, southwest regional wildlife program manager
for the department. "It won't be easy."

Les Clark, who has fished for salmon in the Columbia for 53 years, has heard
fishermen talk about taking matters into their own hands: releasing possums
and raccoons on East Sand Island to chase off the birds the way someone did
on Rice Island.

"They say that's one of the biggest colonies in the world," he said of the
terns. "They might be, but we don't want them exactly on our doorstep."

? Associated Press

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