For the
Yurok, salmon is everything
By Barry Wayne
McCovey, Jr.
I have lived within the
Klamath River system my entire life. I'm not very old,
but I've witnessed and experienced the river for
twenty-four years.
The river is an inherent part
of me, and the lifeblood of my people.
As a Yurok Tribal member and
college student in the fisheries field, I spend my
days working along the Klamath. The carnage I've seen
over the past week and a half is so utterly grotesque
that I cannot sleep at night.
I close my eyes and the
images of dead, rotting fish envelop me. You may have
seen photographs in newspapers or caught a glimpse on
the television, but you cannot begin to imagine the
smell. This smell of death and decay is
impossible to escape. It fills
the air and plays with the mind in ways that I could
never describe. I can't eat because food, no matter
what it is, reminds me of the smell. Perhaps it's
because the rotting fish represent so much of my
people's food gone to waste. The water levels in the
river have never been in such decline. Numerous tribal
and non-tribal elders have assured me of this fact. In
my lifetime, I have never seen the Klamath so
shallow.
Over the past month, the lack
of water has actually stopped the tribal fisheries
program from completing tasks that were routine last
year. There is so little water that people are unable
to safely travel the river by jet boat or by raft.
I've seen rocks that I didn't know existed protruding
from dangerous rapids, making the attempt to count
dead and dying fish a risky endeavor. Yet even in its
shrunken state the river humbles me and demands my
respect. I am fortunate enough to spend time within
its grasp and to be able to know and understand the
power of the Klamath. For me, nothing is
greater.
Civilizations will come and
go, but the river will remain. This I know.
People will try to destroy
it, to use it for hydroelectric power, use it to
irrigate a desert, use it to get votes and push
policies contradictory to natural laws. But the river
will survive. All of the sickness and greed in the
world cannot stop the river from its flow. In the not
so distant future the world's population will surpass
the Earth's carrying capacity. People will starve,
become infected by disease and suffocate just like
that salmon in the Klamath. This insanity will stop,
and the river will rise.
Unfortunately, the chinook,
coho and steelhead salmon will not see the river
rise.
Just like the wild grizzly
and wolf, these fish are being run out of California.
Some would argue there isn't a problem because we can
just grow new fish in the hatchery system, but that
system, like many others in forced management, is
flawed. The hatchery system has created fish of
unknown origin. It is impossible to tell the
difference between a hatchery born fish and native
fish without extensive genetic studies. It is
estimated that only 10 percent to 25 percent of
hatchery chinook are marked for identification, and
estimates of the native fish population estimates are
very difficult to make. Arguments that dismiss the
magnitude and future impact of this fish kill sicken
the spirit. It may as well be said that Yurok people
could just die off because other native and non-native
people could easily replace us and thrive in our
traditional homeland. Native fish, not hatchery fish,
are the only hope for the future of the
species.
Without a doubt, the native
chinook, coho and steel-head are
endangered.
Recent fish kill estimates in
the Klamath have been conservative, but as many as
30,000 chinook, 600 coho and 1,000 steelhead are
likely to be counted among the dead. These numbers may
not sound like much unless you've witnessed the
putrid, decaying fish kill firsthand. Washington
bureaucrats,
like Secretary of Interior
Gale Norton, need to come to the Klamath and walk
along the banks of the river with me. Perhaps a view
of the carnage might lead them to see things
differently. I personally invite officials from the
Bureau of Reclamation and the Department of Interior
to come and cut open the bellies of rotten salmon to
detect their sex. I invite them to hack off fish tails
in an effort to keep them from being recounted. I want
them to realize there is no escaping the
smell.
The Klamath is everything to
me. It is my home, church, garden, highway, counselor,
friend, brother, and provider. Even in its depleted
state, nothing on this planet could equal its beauty
and its power. Secretary Norton has a rare opportunity
to do something great. She has the power to reverse an
incredible injustice. The Yurok people aren't asking
for all of the water in the Klamath, just enough for
our most important resource to survive. Her job is not
easy, and her decisions affect people's livelihoods.
But her decisions also affect generations of Yurok,
Hupa and Karuk tribal peoples. Another fish kill of
this magnitude could bring about extinction. Salmon
are the center of our tribal culture. If they leave
the river system, we don't know what will become of
us.
If farmers growing potatoes
in the Klamath Basin faced crop die-offs, they could
easily recover. The same cannot be said for native
salmon species in the river. Is the federal government
really willing to risk the demise of salmon species
and tribal culture because the irrigation of crops in
the basin is, in their minds, the right thing to do?
Potato crops are not endangered. Farmers are not
endangered.
It is a miracle to me that
chinook, coho and steelhead are still in the river,
and that this kind of fish kill has not happened
before. What is equally miraculous is the fact that
the river still holds such beauty despite the robbery
of its mass and the degradation of its
quality.
But we are running out of
miracles. These stories of survival have all but come
to an end here on the Klamath.
The people of the Klamath,
and our way of life, deserve the same respect given to
the farmers of the upper basin during their so-called
water crisis. The Department of Interior and Secretary
Norton need to understand that this type of ecological
disaster cannot happen again. The time will come when
she will have to decide the fate of the salmon
essential to our survival. For the Yurok, and other
tribal groups impacted by the current situation, this
is not simply a struggle for water rights. It is a
matter of life and death.
- - - - - - - - - -
Barry Wayne McCovey Jr. was
born and raised along the Klamath River on the Yurok
Indian Reservation. He is a college student in the
fisheries field, and works full time as a Technician
for the Yurok Tribal Fisheries Department.
Article copyright Indian
Country Today.
