The Nez Perce Tribe’s Fisheries
Columbia River Basin
Interviewee
Joe Oatman
Nez Perce Fisheries, Deputy Program Manager
Interviewers
For Part 1: Alison M. Jones
NWNL Director and Photographer
For Part 2: Barbara Folger
NWNL Expedition Guest
Nez Perce National Historic Park, Lapwai, Idaho, on May 14, 2014
Introductory Note
What good are treaties when that which is promised has dwindled to a tiny percentage of what it was at the time of the agreements? Or when a nation’s lands are reduced to 1/3 of their original territory? Despite those limited restrictions, the Nez Perce Nation has continued as responsible custodians of their lands, fellow species and natural resources. Stewardship is a choice – and the Nez Perce continue their commitment to be responsible custodians of their waters and of the species within and dependent on the Snake River Basin waters.
Joe patiently explained to NWNL how his nation seeks the best means of protecting and fostering future healthy populations of the salmon and lamprey migrating and spawning throughout Nez Perce lands. Other fisheries in Washington, Oregon and Idaho would benefit from adopting their successful hatchery techniques to grow their fishery populations. As I listened to Joe, I thought of Bob Dylan’s words: “When will we ever learn?”
Outline
AT THE FISHERIES OFFICE
READING the NEZ PERCE MAP
NEZ PERCE VALUES on FISH
NEZ PERCE VALUES on WATER
HOW WATERSHEDS SUPPORT FISH
THE NEZ PERCE TREATY & ITS RESULTS
NEZ PERCE FISHERIES DEPARTMENT
DEEP RESPECT for a PEACEFUL LIFE
RIGHTS FOR FISH, PEOPLE & WAY of LIFE
AT THE FISH HATCHERY
THE HATCHERY
MINING SPILL in NEWSOM CREEK
WATER FLOW INCREASES for SALMON
LAMPREY & DAMS
UNDERSTANDING LAMPREY
FUKASHIMA’S RADIOACTIVITY in IDAHO FISH?
GLOBAL & NEZ PERCE WATER ISSUES
DAILY HATCHERY OPERATIONS & CARE
Key Quotes Our fate and the fate of the fish are linked. — Joseph Oatman, Nez Perce Fisheries Deputy Program Manager
From the 1855 US-Nez Perce Treaty to now, our lifestyle changed dramatically. We suddenly no longer had the abundance of fish we used to have. We could no longer use our usual accustomed fishing places to catch fish to meet our needs.
— Joseph Oatman, Nez Perce Fisheries Deputy Program Manager
Part of our traditional beliefs and religion are that water is the most important thing. Water is the first thing we consume at traditional dinners and ceremonies. Then water’s the last thing that’s consumed. Because without water, as NWNL claims, there’s no life. All the traditional foods we eat are tied to water: plants, berries, salmon, elk, buffalo, deer….
— Joseph Oatman, Nez Perce Fisheries Deputy Program Manager
All images © Alison M. Jones, unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved.
IN THE FISHERIES OFFICE
READING the NEZ PERCE MAP
NWNL Joe, thank you by beginning with a map. It helps clarify issues the Nez Perce faced in the past and face today. How does BLM work with the Forest Service vis a vis tribal lands; and how is the Forest Service involved? Do they run the land you own? Or do they own it?
JOSEPH OATMAN Essentially we have 13 million plus acres. We had about 55 million acres during treaty negotiations, but we seeded most of that to the US government and retained this reservation. A few years later, due to gold and other metals being discovered here in the Clearwater River Basin and settlers moving in, we entered a new treaty reducing the Nez Perce Reservation, out of which we own 20%. The rest is under US Forest Service administration.
Our treaty rights allow us to fish, hunt, gather roots, berries and medicines and continue other cultural-based activities there. Basically, Forest Service manages the land and we continue to exercise our treaty rights there. Our partnership with the Forest Service is strong and helps us address habitat degradation that’s occurred in this area to make it more hospitable for fish.
NEZ PERCE VALUES on FISH
NWNL I understand you have presentation you share with visitors such as myself, so I will forgo my Q & A approach, and save any questions for the end.
JOSEPH OATMAN Thank you and welcome to Nez Perce country! I want to share who the Nez Perce are, the importance of fish and water to our people, and our restoration efforts to help improve the fish runs upon which the tribe is so heavily dependent. An overview of the tribe’s fishery management program is based on one simple statement: Our fate and the fate of the fish are linked.
For time untold, the tribe has depended on our natural resources and the land on which they are found. Our fishing-based lifestyle and economy depends on the health of salmon, steelhead and other fish found within the tribe’s aboriginal territory. How salmon have fared from the mid-1800s to today also reflects how the Nez Perce people have fared. Much has changed since we entered the 1855 treaties that impacted our salmon resources and our people.
First I’d like to pose some questions – important as they elicit different responses and different perspectives. What is a truly restored watershed? How do you define it and measure it? What things are found in a watershed – and what values and beliefs can flow from that watershed?
To give you a perspective of the Nez Perce tribe, we derive our living from natural resources — both historically and more into recent times. We still continue to use our territory to fish, hunt and gather roots and berries , so we want to ensure this ecosystem is fully functioning and can support of all of its wildlife, fish, plant and bird species. Nez Perce culture and subsistence activities revolve around fish and water. We define ourselves in terms of fish and water and our relationship with all natural elements.
NEZ PERCE VALUES on WATER
For us and other tribal peoples here in the Columbia Basin, water is treated as a medicine because it nourishes and sustains all life. When water is kept pure and cold, it takes care of the salmon. And, in turn, salmon take care of the people.
So if our water cannot sustain salmon, basically it can’t sustain our people. Fish and water continue to be culturally, spiritually and materially essential to the Nez Perce way of life. The Nez Perce subsistence cycle is basically equivalent to a year, from January through December. At different times of the year, we have different resources and timing for harvesting our subsistence and supporting our economy.
The Nez Perce subsistence cycle or “seasonal round,” consists of specific yearly periods for fishing salmon, digging camus and other roots and hunting game. This economic cycle can be summarized as 10 months of salmon fishing and 2 months of berry picking – with hunting through most of the year. Also recognized is that salmon fishing has been a major source of our subsistence due to the main rivers in this area having been well-supplied with fish since aboriginal times.
Our fishing basins include the Snake River tributaries of the Clearwater, Salmon, Amnaha, Grande Ronde and Tucannon Rivers, and of course the main stem of the Snake River. It’s a tight area that was well supplied with salmon and other fish species during our aboriginal period. There were different local plants, varied fish species and many types of fishing gears we’ve used to catch those fish. Typically, we’ve used hands, spears, dip nets, weirs, seines, other sorts of fishing methods to harvest fish for our own use, as well as for the trade and commerce we used to have.
Historically, vast amounts of fish returned annually to our territory. Our salmon runs ranged from 500,000 to 2 million fish in the Snake River. Some researchers have estimated that at a minimum, Nez Perce harvests could have ranged 150,000 to 264,000 fish – since these rivers came from systems that were then biologically functional and fully productive.
HOW WATERSHEDS SUPPORT FISH
There are important services that a watershed should be able to provide for fish throughout their key life stages. For pre-spawning and spawning adults, salmon must be able to enter the spawning streams from which they originated. They must be able to find suitable holding habitat in those “streams of origin” until they spawn. And they must be able to spawn successfully in that habitat. Once spawned, those eggs must be able to incubate within, and eventually emerge from, the intra-gravel area of the “red” [the graveled circles spawning salmon establish]. And finally, they must be able to grow in that river system. And then, after becoming juveniles — that can feed over winter into these rivers; that must grow and develop into a smelt stage when they migrate down to the ocean. Thus, for success in these important life-cycle stages, we need to ensure our rivers and waters can sustain these fish.
THE NEZ PERCE TREATY & ITS RESULTS
In 1855, the Nez Perce and other tribes began negotiating with the US government. One purpose was to have US tribes receive reservations so as to be able to continue their lifestyle. A couple of chiefs were principal negotiators with the tribe. Governor Isaac Stevens and Superintendent Joe Palmer negotiated for the US. We had Chief Looking Glass, known as “Apash Waykaikt” or Flint Necklace (from whom I descend); a principal negotiating chief; and Chief Joseph, who you may be familiar with, and Chief Timothy.
During the treaty negotiations, it was recognized that rivers within Nez Perce country contained the best fisheries on the Snake River. The US negotiator tried to assure Chief Looking Glass that if you enter into this treaty; if you see the lands, here’s what you will be able to do. Chief Looking Glass is told that
–he can graze cattle outside the reservation on land not claimed by settlers;
–he can catch fish on any of the fishing stations; and
–he can get roots and berries from lands occupied by settlers.
The key assurance was we could continue to fish at any of our traditional places.
Around the time of the Treaty Making, Chief Looking Glass said our children’s children and those yet unborn — the future generations, even though confined on a reservation, continued to need their ancestral homelands and the basic rights to survive in the face of the white man’s encroaching rule. Since time immemorial, our ancestral lands provided our needs and could continue to do so only if our rights to hunt, fish and gather berries remained intact. We knew change was coming -probably in ways adverse to the people then and to generations yet to come. We wanted to make sure we reserved our ability to fish and hunt in all the areas we used during aboriginal times.
One key thing during the treaty negotiations was Article Three of the fishing clause incorporated into the treaty. Without that, it’s highly doubtful our tribal leaders would have ceded our lands in that 1855 treaty. The principal provision, with respect to fishing, is Article Three, stating we retain exclusive rights to taking fish in all streams running through and bordering said reservation – and at our usual fishing places for common citizens of the territory.
Since 1855, when the treaties were signed, there were probably about 17 million salmon returning annually to the Columbia Basin: including Chinook salmon, steelhead, sockeye and coho salmon. Then from mid-1800s to 2010, there was a significant decline of fish from an estimated 17 million to about 1.7 million in 2010.
To show what that means in terms of the Nez Perce people, here’s one of the branches of my family tree. In the early 1800s when Lewis and Clark came through, they met Wercum in a village near here. His son was a Nez Perce principal in negotiating the 1855 Treaty, and his son was Tookwatima, whose daughter was Pianahawpuwit. Her son was James Oatman, whose daughter was Lotus — my grandma. That shows that in the few generations from the 1855 US-Nez Perce Treaty to now, our lifestyle changed dramatically. We suddenly no longer had the abundance of fish we used to have. We could no longer use our usual accustomed fishing places to catch fish to meet our needs.
It hasn’t been until about the last 10 years that we’ve had strong enough salmon runs for low-to-moderate fishing opportunities within our lands. There have been many causes of the salmon’s decline, including logging, agriculture, farming, mining, commercial fishing – and development and operation of the hydroelectric dams. But to return to the salmon life cycle. As I mentioned, adults return upstream to deposit their eggs in redds. (aka, salmon’s rounded gravel nests). The eggs hatch out, become fry, and grow into the smelt stage before they migrate out into the ocean. When they leave their natal streams here, they face the Lower Granite dam on the Snake River, the uppermost 8 main-stem dams; several lower dams, and then Bonneville Dam the last dam on the Columbia. If they survive, they enter the ocean to mature to adults that come back along the same route. In 1-2 years after being in the ocean, they swim back up the Columbia and Snake Rivers, passing through Bonneville and Lower Granite Dams, to complete their life cycle.
All Snake River salmonid populations are listed as endangered or extirpated. We have 32 Spring Chinook populations. One population in the Clearwater was extirpated, but due to our work and that which others have done, we’ve reintroduced Spring Chinook. There’s a sport Chinook season now in the Clearwater River.
We have one fall Chinook population. There used to be three, but the Hell’s Canyon dams blocked all the Upper Snake areas that had pretty robust fall Chinook populations. They’re no longer there. Here we have 24 steelhead populations and one Sockeye population. We had a co-population similar to Clearwater’s spring Chinook, but it was extirpated. We’ve reintroduced a Coho salmon project and in recently about 1,000 adults come back. So it’s a growing program, as with the fall Chinook that were down to very low numbers in the ’80s and ’90s.
In one year, we built 78 natural areas for fall Chinook above the Lower Granite dam. We’ve had recent runs of 50 to 60 thousand adults due to our fall Chinook program and another program collaborative with State and Federal agencies. Lamprey fish are basically on life support. We have less than 100 , and at times there are less than 20 lamprey at Lower Granite dam. Those fish are in bad shape and we’re trying to see what we can do to prevent them going extinct.
NEZ PERCE FISHERIES DEPARTMENT
We’re probably one of the largest tribal fisheries program in the US, in terms of staff and our annual funding. We get about $21 million a year to do management restoration activities to manage fish. Our Fisheries Department has 7 divisions: Administration (where I work), Research, Habitat and Watershed, Conservation Enforcement, Resident Fish, and Harvest and Production divisions. We have about 173 employees: 123 on full time and 50 seasonal. About half are Nez Perce, 3% other tribes, and nd 46% non-union employees. We have offices throughout our territories and our main office here in Lapwai. We also have a satellite compound at our Sweetwater Offices, plus offices further up on the Clearwater at Orphino, and offices in McCall, Idaho. and Joseph, Oregon. We don’t have offices in Tuccannon or Southeast Washington, but we do some work over there.
The purpose of the Fisheries Department is to recover and restore all native populations and all species of anadromous fish in the Nez Perce territory. Our focus is to provide technical, scientific and policy support for Treaty rights protection.
-We provide anadromous and fish recovery and restoration actions.
-We expand harvest opportunities for tribal members and the regional community.
-We restore and recover watersheds for a healthy environment.
-We monitor and evaluate our production, habitat and harvests.
-We engage in applied sciences.
For production, we use supplement fish numbers in our rivers. The department releases over 8 million fish annually which is about 1/3 of fish released in the Snake River Basin. In doing so we try to put fish in all rivers and streams where they can return to spawn. The focus is to restore the runs and have a harvest.
A tribal staff works at our Nez Perce tribal hatchery. Now they are fertilizing eggs. they will then incubate. Our research division monitors our restoration activities and the salmon runs, noting how the runs are doing and how our activities affect the runs. They operate traps and video weirs. They count redds (aka, salmon’s rounded gravel nests) and often snorkel streams to target annual numbers of fish in and fish out in a stream or river. And then they note how many juveniles those fish produce and how many leave the system. So we’re accounting what these anadromous fish do out there.
The resident fish are primarily responsible for studying opportunities for resident fish in local tribal ponds and if there are any harvest opportunities occurring in area creeks and streams. So, we don’t actively manage our fisheries, streams and rivers; but tribal members harvest cutthroat trout, rainbow trout, whitefish, other fish species like that.
My division’s responsibility is to help the tribe manage fisheries in the Columbia River as well as in our Snake River Basin. We help authorize the tribe’s harvest plans, by analyzing the current run of fish, how many are coming back and how many we think can harvest. We monitor fisheries and try to shape them to meet the needs of tribal members and their families. We also close the fishing when necessary to protect the biological needs and requirements of the fish.
To monitor watershed habitats, we employ a ridge-top to ridge-top philosophy to protect and restore watersheds’ rearing and spawning habitats – and water quality. Our underground work involves conducting road inventories. We remove and replace culverts; decommission roads; catalog streams; plant riparian vegetation; stabilize stream bases; and reconfigure stream channels. On paper, we coordinate fish-friendly activities of others on different lands. We also help secure conservation easements for certain properties we think would be beneficial for returning fish.
DEEP RESPECT for a PEACEFUL LIFE
We use a holistic approach to protect and restore resources and habitat that fits with the peace to our Nez Perce way of life and belief system. We have utmost respect for the Creator, for all species and for past, present and future generations. We know that native fish populations thrive best under the natural or normative conditions to which they are best adapted. Natural ecosystems will continue to be increasingly stressed and altered by human activities and population levels. When natural conditions aren’t achievable, altered ecosystems should function to at least adequately maintain the fish, as well as harvest opportunities for the Nez Perce people and others.
We also see that a species’ entire life cycle must be successfully carried out from eggs to adulthood in order to survive. A failure to serve a species’ needs at any life history stage can lead to extirpation of population. So, we try to achieve and maintain fish abundance in tributary-specific areas at levels sufficient to support populations persistent harvest and ecological processes. We want to achieve and maintain diverse and productive ecosystems for species composition and productivity consistent with historic conditions. We want to achieve and maintain historically utilized tributaries in a bridge-top to bridge-top watershed restoration focused on rearing and spawning habitat and production of water quality. We want to protect and provide for water flows and quality and monitor passages for upstream and downstream monitoring.
Basically, we help guide activities on the landscape by using the same important biological and management-type principals we use here to shape the work that we do out there. From our policy perspective, it’s extremely important to share policies within agencies helping to protect our treaty resources and investments, such as the US Army Corps of Engineers. The Corps services their land within Nez Perce country and try to ensure their policies and work they do doesn’t compromise fish populations or habitats since it would ultimately affect our tribal members who fish out there. We work closely with them and a wide variety of other folks. We do inter-tribal work and have discussions with other tribes in the Columbia River Basin, focusing on habitat and fish restoration. We try to educate other stakeholders in the area, by providing presentations and work jobs, explaining the tribe’s treaty rights, and natural resources, and what’s important to protect and maintain certain areas, certain populations. We coordinate activities with federal and state agencies. We comment on federal, state, private proposals and projects such as timber sales. We try to appeal what we consider detrimental project proposals that could have a very negative, detrimental effect on fish and water. At times, we litigate in court to protect those interests we have in various areas and fish populations.
RIGHTS for FISH, PEOPLE and a WAY of LIFE
Here is a June 1980 news article from the Tribune about my dad being arrested for going out to fish during the time when Idaho said there were fish coming back, but the State didn’t want the tribe to go out and catch fish. Then tribal members stood up for their right to catch these fish. Across time, our people have stood up and done what they think is right for the fish, themselves and their way of life.
It’s important to understand the many issues we’re faced with. In many areas roads were put in place – often high-density roads. We do a lot of our own farming, agriculture, ranching and coal here, and our own road developments. We have our work; and we also work cooperatively with private landowners, the Forest Service and State agencies to identify and prioritize certain areas that need us to go in and repair.
Some activities we’re involved in is watershed assessment. We do road and trail improvement and decommissioning. Our fish passage improvements are principally replacing culverts that impair or block fish passage at certain life stages. We also do riparian restoration and fencing; offsite livestock water systems; stream channel restoration and bank stabilization projects. It’s basic watershed monitoring of water quality, vegetation, so forth. We also conduct wheat inventory and treatment and use GPS, GIS inventories and mapping. We do public outreach and education and some trail maintenance in certain areas.
The partners we work with – to name a few:
US Forest Service
Private timber companies
State departments
Soil Conservation Districts
Private landowners
Local non-profit groups
Local school districts
Local universities.
The partnership that’s allowed us to do such great habitat restoration is with the US Forest Service. The Forest Service also helps us address treaty and trust obligations between the US government and Nez Perce, per our 1855 Treaty. We coordinate our activities on Forest Service lands with them. We enter into funding and master participating agreements with them as our respective authorities to identify and prioritize areas for restoration activities. Likewise, we check and identify our road systems to see if the Forest Service deposits too much sediment into streams that could affect fish – or trap and suffocate their eggs. If young fish don’t get oxygen, they can’t survive. Or maybe a road might erode to a point where it sloughs off into the river, creating a blockage stopping even adult fish. There’s a wide variety and different degrees of impacts roads could cause. So we identify roads to be decommissioned or removed.
There is a large set of culprits that block fish. We identify those and get the funding for reparation. Through our agreements, we can match and combine our resources; create cost shares, and such. We use our varied staffs to address different stages of the work so that we’re able to go out to remove whatever we did to affect those fish.
This map in front of us locates things we do to protect fish and people’s rights. The Lapwai Creek is just outside of our door. Big Canyon Creek is up on the Clearwater River. When we do our inventories — we walk the land and produce these maps. Red areas are impassable or locked. Green areas are those the fish can access. Then we identify what may be causing a passage to be blocked and identify where that occurs. Then we decide how to correct for that. We do this watershed by watershed throughout our country, working with our partners to do this work.
Our Road Survey Assessment with its many squiggly lines shows a high density of roads. So, we’ll go there and identify those causing the most impact and repair or remove those roads – perhaps cleaning out a pipe placed under the road. If a pipe’s diameter has become clogged – perhaps with trapped flood residue – then it may not be passable or usable by any fish, aquatic animals or organisms. Another detriment to local species could have occurred due to logging and road development debris deposited into a river or stream channel. Such are the problems we look for as we go out to do inventories for issues we need to take care of.
AT THE FISH HATCHERY
THE HATCHERY
JOE OATMAN When we feed our fish, we condition them. We have 2 buckets set up at feedings. We don’t look over to watch them, waiting for them to eat. If we did, they’d think that we’re a predator. Nor do we want them begging to “Feed us!”
NWNL Joe, why is this tank darker?
JOE OATMAN Some hatcheries are fortunate to have lighting systems that mimic sunrise, sunset and diurnal temperatures. We have diurnal temperature fluctuations in our incubators. We have a diurnal timer for times when our incubators’ temperatures hit the coldest temperature, even if in the middle of the night.
NWNL Do you regulate the lights?
JOE OATMAN We do dim lights, but we don’t have a timer. This hatchery was designed to have all those features for a $32 million dollar facility. Our agency that controls the purse strings cut that budget in half to $17 million. So, we have a hatchery but not all the bells and whistles to make this a state-of-the-art hatchery.
NWNL Is there hope for more funding?
JOE OATMAN Given the successes of our program; we have scientific reviews every 5 years. Based on our high numbers of returning adult fish, there is a possibility for Phase 2 and 3 of this hatchery. Additional plans will expand this building out to the other side of the wall to a flat area with room for future expansion.
NWNL Do other hatcheries visit to see what you’ve accomplished?
JOE OATMAN Yes, other tribes came here a year ago before their facility was built.
I’ve given a lot of tours to a lot of other agencies.… Bonneville Power Authority funded our program, so they’ve come, as have other hatcheries; some of US Fish and Wildlife Service folks, Idaho Power and some state people.
NWNL Cross pollination of ideas will hopefully help.
JOE OATMAN In the hatchery business, we ask, ‘Why reinvent the wheel?’ Not all hatcheries are the same. Up in Orphino, Dworshak Dam and Clearwater Hatcheries are right across from each other, but with totally different programs, rearing techniques and protocols. One of my favorite things is to tour the hatcheries, because I see how they do things. They may have a better idea of doing something than I’ve thought of. I’m happy to adopt some of their ideas, and vice versa. People come here and say ‘Oh, you guys do that?’ So, why reinvent the wheel when we can adapt others’ ideas?
You may have noticed a couple tanks filled up all the way. Every morning, we broom the tanks, clean them out, and pick out any moths. Then we them refill before doing a first feeding. and we turn the lights on dim because the best times for fish are early morning and late afternoon. Fish don’t like bright lights. They tend to feed better when it’s dimly lit in here.
NWNL That probably is an adaption to natural shade of trees….
JOE OATMAN All our ponds have natural rock substrate, and all of our rearing containers are dark in color – either dark green, or darker colors. So, since they can change their skin color to match their environment, when our fish get released to the natural environment of the rivers and streams, they don’t stand out like bright shiny nickels and dimes, to get picked off by predators. Studies show they feel safer with darker coloration that camouflages them.
Many hatcheries have painted their raceways camouflage or darker colors, including Dworshak.
NWNL When do you release these fish?
JOE OATMAN These fish are components of our spring Chinook program. Two other hatcheries for our Spring Chinook program are on 2 tributaries of the Clearwater, way up in the mountains. We’ll haul fish out to those sites about the first week of September, since in summertime, those stream temperatures get way too warm.
MINING SPILL in NEWSOM CREEK
JOE OATMAN Unfortunately, the Newsom Creek tributary of the South Fork of Clearwater River, near Elk City was annihilated by dredging back in the 1900s.
NWNL Why? Dredging for what?
JOE OATMAN Gold. A large dredge the size of a steamboat went right up the valley, dredging the entire stream. You can still see a lot of piles of dredging deposits. Our tribe’s Watershed and Habitat Department will go in soon for a major stream rehab to restore Newsom’s stream channel and riparian area. There’s hardly any riparian area left. It’s all rock. There’s no more soil or anything on the side. There are very few trees, so direct sunlight onto that salmon stream, makes that water hot. Thus, we won’t haul our juvenile fish out there until the 1st week of September when that stream’s temperatures start cooling.
NWNL Might you have to wait until later?
JOE OATMAN I hope not. We’ve timed it to happen at the mouth of that stream. Our research folks have a screw trap and an adult salmon weir because we’ve been releasing adult fish there from this program for the last 12 years. The adult fish there, will let us know when the stream temperatures start to cool enough – then we’ll take our fish up there.
NWNL So they know if there’s a warm thermal block they don’t want to pass through, and they’ll just stop?
JOE OATMAN Oh yeah. They’re about 7 miles downstream from our facility, so they’re actually warmer than the water temperature at our facility. They’ll let us know when they start seeing cooling trends in the water temperature – usually, it’s right around the first week of September.
WATER FLOW INCREASES for SALMON
NWNL I hear you have extra water this season… Does that change anything?
JOE OATMAN We had good snow pack this year in the Clearwater area. Two of our facilities – one south of Lewiston called Sweetwater Springs- operate off of a spring. For the past couple of years, the aquifer has been so low that we’ve supplemented our fish production. When the fish got bigger, before we transferred them out, we had to supplement them with oxygen because we were pulling out as much water as we could from that spring to raise our fish. This year, we had lots of water, that was one positive thing.
NWNL Is the aquifer measured up here? Does the state do any measurements?
JOE OATMAN We monitor our production wells all of the time via the computer. It shows how much water we’re pulling out.
NWNL I live in San Francisco, and California’s having a rather major drought this year. Our aquifers are completely dry, and we can’t get any decent water from them. Some reservoirs are down to 2, 3, 4, or 5% capacity.
JOE OATMAN Here we are also, but we don’t have that type of demand like California. Southern Idaho might have different issue with the Snake River aquifer above the Snake River plane between Boise and Pocatello. There’s a lot of agriculture and fish farming there, and drought is more prevalent there, given its greater demand and lack of our mountain streams.
Yet, water flow is an issue, regarding salmon migration, due to the many dams we have between here and the lower Columbia. Dworshak Dam, here in Orofino, must spill water in summer months to aid in migrations of salmon and steelhead juvenile migrations – also adult spring and summer Chinook migrations. – and often the fall Chinook. Usually, they continue their spill until end of August or September. Otherwise, the Clearwater gets much too warm, and the Lower Snake reservoir high temperatures are lethal to juvenile salmon. Also, adult migrating fall Chinook salmon especially, hit thermal blocks when reservoirs get too hot. If the water’s too hot, fish won’t migrate and so they die.
LAMPREY & DAMS
NWNL What about the eel-like migratory lamprey, also indigenous to this region?
JOE OATMAN You just missed them by a couple of weeks. We did have lamprey here. They just out-planted them about two weeks ago. We are now building a permanent lamprey building.
NWNL Where are the recent changes fish ladders happening? Will they be effective for lamprey?
JOE OATMAN I hope so. They’re trying out various baffles to aid lamprey fish get around some velocity barriers.
NWNL Is velocity the problem? I’ve heard that since lamprey can’t go around 90º corners, folks are rounding some of the corners for the lamprey. Is it the velocity of water going around corners that keeps them from attaching?
JOE OATMAN Yup. When water comes down and goes around a 90º corner, it must go around at its highest speed. Another issue is lamprey aren’t strong swimmers. Thus, they have a sucker mouth to get around high-velocity areas like rapids and waterfalls.
NWNL Is is the structure of their mouth that hinders their efforts around 90º corners?
JOE OATMAN It could be. They’re not strong swimmers. They’re not built for swimming around high velocity areas, but they seem to cope because they’ve been around since before the dinosaurs.
NWNL I hear terrible numbers about the lamprey. Tell me more about lamprey….
JOE OATMAN Their declining numbers are just one aspect of the lamprey story. In the ‘80s and ‘90s, folks built diversion screens for salmon smolts heading to the ocean. They put screen panels in front of the backs of dams to divert juvenile salmons from the turbines. Those screens might divert a fish, but juvenile lamprey migrating down to the ocean hit those screens and are injured. Often they die.
Maybe there could be suction or something else to divert lamprey ammocoetes [juvenile larval-stage lamprey], smolts and juvenile fish. Too many get stuck like a dart. I’ve seen screens up just covered in dead lamprey juveniles.
UNDERSTANDING THE LAMPREY
NWNL Can you share the lamprey story? So many know about salmon; but have never heard of lamprey. If they have heard from them, probably all those few folks know is that lamprey are migratory.
JOE OATMAN The lamprey is an anadromous fish, like salmon or steelheads. It builds a nest [aka, “redd”} just like a salmon or steelhead: by using their mouth, they pick small rocks out of the way to create a nest. They deposit their eggs in the redd and then the ammocoetes larvae hatch– wormlike, blind and filter-feeding. They will live in the sand, silt and for 5 to 6 years. During that time, they filter feed what they eat; and in so doing, they’re cleansing the stream.
People think of lamprey as being parasites and pests, but pacific lamprey are a major contributor to a healthy ecosystem. Not only do they clean the stream when they’re juveniles, but they’re a nutritious food source for other fish. When they come back as adults, they are 2 ½ to 3′ in length, and only 2″ in diameter, yet the caloric value of an adult lamprey is 5 times that of an adult salmon. When they come upriver, like salmon, they spawn, die, decompose and then all those nutrients are dispersed into the environment. Like their value in the river, a lamprey carcass has 5 times the nutrients of a salmon carcass.
Historically, there were millions of lamprey coming up the Columbia River, then up the Snake and finally up the tributary streams to spawn. Much of those migration numbers has been lost. People now consider them to be parasites, latching onto and killing fish. Pacific lamprey are not that at all.
NWNL And the riparian vegetation is probably weaker because those riverside ecosystems don’t receive the nutrients of the millions of lamprey and salmon carcasses.
JOE OATMAN Yes, our environment now lacks those contributions due to the loss of salmon, steelhead – and lamprey as well.
NWNL Are lamprey eaten like American eels on the East Coast?
JOE OATMAN Yes. After cutting them into sections, they are grilled on a barbeque. The official way was they were skewered like a shish kabob on stakes stuck into the ground over the fire. The taste is different than American eels. It’s an acquired taste. They’re oily, but that’s why they’re so much higher in nutrients than salmon.
NWNL It’s a good oil!
FUKASHIMA'S RADIOACTIVITY in IDAHO FISH?
NWNL Have you studied the presence of heavy metals in fish here? I know Washington State has been having a problem.
JOE OATMAN We haven’t done any studies I’m aware of; but I know that they are doing them on the Columbia and other places. My brother did one for his master’s degree on sockeye salmon in Alaska. The stream where he was stationed had a sockeye salmon – a staple for the Sitka Tribe. There was an abandoned gold mine. He traced elements in the bones of those Sockeye, due to the gold mining.
NWNL It will be interesting when you get around to studying and restoring the stream that was dredged all those years ago – and then monitor the fish for a couple of years and see what they’re picking up from some of the tailings. There could be mercury, which unfortunately would limit the amount of fish people should eat. The salmon diet is traditional for local indigenous communities, and there is concern that today they eat far more salmon than they should due to new pollutants in our rivers.
JOE OATMAN The newest concern is over what some of our fishermen in the Pacific Ocean have been bringing affected by the “hot” zones from Fukushima coming across the ocean from Japan. Our salmon travel way up past the Aleutian Islands to Russia and south – and then they come all the way back. Our concern is what are they swimming through and picking up before they come back up here?
NWNL I know that you have a lot of biologists – are they studying that?
JOE OATMAN Give us a Geiger counter – so when we trap our fish here at the hatchery, we can check for “hot” fish.
NWNL I think you could get a grant for that… and that would be a huge contribution to the general public’s safety.
JOE OATMAN I don’t know if radioactivity tied to Fukushima is in our fish. But I know that last year, a fish that returned to Idaho had something with Japanese written on it inside of its lungs.
GLOBAL & NEZ PERCE WATER ISSUES
NWNL We are a global world, and people don’t seem to understand that. My colleague Alison Jones, NWNL Founding Director, has studied watersheds in Africa and North America. She’s already documented the Columbia River Basin main stem, and now we’re finishing NWNL documentation of the Columbia’s Snake River. She’s photographed and interviewed stewards and scientists, such as yourself, from source to sea (British Columbia to the Pacific) and many tributaries. She was on the Olympic Peninsula to witness the Elwha Dam breaching, and she has studied large rivers in Africa. She did all this to compare global watershed values, threats and solutions. Her NWNL project’s goal is to promote the value of water, water usage, and the need for the water of people, world-wide species and global ecosystems. Her “Aha!” moment occurred as she looked out of her right seat in a small Cessna flying low over Africa. She realized, “Where there’s no water, there’s no life.”
JOE OATMAN Yes! Part of our traditional beliefs and religion are that water is the most important thing. Water is the first thing we consume at traditional dinners and ceremonies. Then water’s the last thing that’s consumed. Because without water, as NWNL claims, there’s no life. All the traditional foods we eat are tied to water: plants, berries, salmon, elk, buffalo, deer….
NWNL You’re a very good spokesman, exemplifying that Nez Perce value.
DAILY HATCHERY OPERATIONS & CARE
NWNL Why do your hatchery fish channels have the different designs?
JOE OATMAN We have plants overhanging sides of our ponds, for overhead and in-stream cover, logs on the banks, and so forth. The elevation increases the water flow which exercises our fish by forcing them to swim and become used to currents. We utilize rock substrate for cover, and to allow them to feed on bugs and such. We don’t raise them in a slow-moving ponds or raceways. Circular tank rearing is one of my favorites because the fish are constantly swimming upstream so that when we release them, they’re physically fit and likely to better survive. Oxygen is evenly disbursed. The drain’s in the center of the tank, so it’s a gradual whirlpool – like a vortex. Thus, oxygen is always evenly distributed.
NWNL What about your lamprey hatcheries?
JOE OATMAN You can compare them to a waterpark’s lazy pool where kids float around on inner tubes. It might be oval shaped with a fast-enough current to carry a twig flow around the pool.
NWNL I heard there was a forest fire up on the hill that caused this facility to be built.
JOE OATMAN Yeah, that was three or four years ago and destroyed a cover of trees., that led us to build this facility. The fire was started by somebody pulling a trailer with a flat tire and the rim sent off sparks that lit the hillside on fire. It wasn’t a major fire, but for several years after that, I’d hear trees fall and rocks come down.
NWNL Did consequent silt cover eggs of the lamprey?
JOE OATMAN No, the lamprey spawn way up the tributaries.
NWNL Your road construction must help prevent silt and mud from going into the river.
JOE OATMAN — and into spawning areas as well. In our 5-ft deep Chinook acclimation ponds, we have 250,000 to 500,000 fish. We raise these fish here until the 2nd week of June when they are probably 3-1/2 inches and already marked.
DAM REMOVAL CHANCE?
NWNL Do you think there’s hope for getting rid of the dams? I hear the Nez Perce have wanted the dams removed since 1999.
JOE OATMAN I went to hearings and visited dams, but I was a little too young to remember the Snake River around Lewiston before the dam operations in ’74. I was only 3 years old then. It would be nice to see the dams down. I’ve only seen old pictures of the Snake before the reservoir began inundating everything around it.
They drew The Lower Granite reservoir way down to mud flats in 1992 to see what would happen. It would have been nice if that had been permanent. A lot of us complained about the mud and silt because every year, they had to come up and dredge the river for barging.
NWNL Maybe they can benefit from the facts that barge shipping is down; dams need repair; and there are huge costs to the Power Authority for operations and the paltry amount of electricity provided by the dams.
JOE OATMAN Yes – and the benefits of wind power is now impacting the hydro business.
NWNL Are people getting hopeful?
JOE OATMAN I don’t know. This region is really conservative and Republican-driven. There’s almost a militia-type attitude if we even mention removing dams – or anything they’ve known for the last 40, 50 years. Unfortunately, we face a use-and -take mentality. The logging, mining, grazing, and “Don’t tread on me” attitude is strong here.
In the ‘90s when forests were re-considered for logging, all districts had a quota for how many feet of lumber they could be removed. Even my boss, a wildlife biologist, was a “timber beast.” We’d mark off riparian areas blocking streams for proposed timber cuts. Our instructions were: “Stay 50′ above the stream and mark your line.” I saw and marked a huge 600-year-old cedar tree within the 50-yard stretch to save it. A guy there got mad at me, saying, “You know how many more feet that they could get out of that tree?” That was the mentality in the early ‘90’s.
But that mentality changed when Clinton came into office. The US Forest Service began re-looking at habitat issues. We started seeing a downhill trend in logging in this area. As a kid, I’d see logging trucks going up and down this highway all day long hauling trees to become pot ash and paper more recently. Every town had a big lumber mill. Then, in the ‘90s, they started curtailing logging, and mills started shutting down.
NWNL Has that changed in following administrations?
JOE OATMAN In Idaho the Republican party is pushing for more development. In our legislature they are pushing for more road building and seeking access to our wilderness areas. We’re now starting to see more development. On the fringe of the Frank Church Wilderness they want to do major mining. Midas Gold, near Yellow Pine severely impacted the environment of an entire mountaintop to get tungston and antimony from the World War II Stibnite Mine.
Our Republican government in this state is all for getting our National Forests under their management. There’s a big controversy now as land exchange is occurring now. A private timber company wants to swap with the US Forest Service. They’ve done that up there before.
NWNL Ah, the issue of clear cuts and setting up swaps!
JOE OATMAN Yes, that is happening. The State government wants tax revenue from private ownership in our National Forest lands. They want to swap those lands over to State control so the State can log the Hell out of it. The State property you see here isn’t well managed, thus significant timber harvesting is already going on.
I also saw that before, when I worked for the US Forest Service. I saw things they weren’t supposed to do – including logging within riparian zones, crossing the creeks, and taking trees across the creek when not allowed.
NWNL Joe, you shoulder a heavy burden. I thank you for taking time to share your perspectives with No Water No Life. We all appreciate your efforts – and the efforts of the entire Nez Perce Nation. Best of luck in your efforts to protect the waters, salmon, lamprey and all other species and resources of the Snake River Basin.
Posted by NWNL on October 31, 2024.
Transcription edited and condensed for clarity by Alison M. Jones.
All images © Alison M. Jones, unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved.