McDonald, Jack

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University of Denver

Water Law Review Volume 3 Issue 2 Article 14 1-1-2000 James Lichatowich, Salmon Without Rivers: A History of the Pacific Salmon Crisis Jack McDonald Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.du.edu/wlr Custom Citation Jack McDonald, James Lichatowich, Salmon Without Rivers: A History of the Pacific Salmon Crisis, 3 U. Denv. Water L. Rev. 401 (2000)(book review). This Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by the University of Denver Sturm College of Law at Digital Commons @ DU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Water Law Review by an authorized editor of Digital Commons @ DU. For more information, please contact jennifer.cox@du.edu,dig-commons@du.edu. BOOK REVIEWJAMES LICHATOWICH, SALMON WITHOUT RIVERS: A HISTORY OF THEPACIFIC SALMON CRISIS, Island Press, Washington, D.C. (1999);317pp; $27.50; ISBN 1559633603, softcover.REVIEWED BY JACK MCDONALDIn 1875, Spencer Baird, the first head of the United States Commissionon Fish and Fisheries, wrote a letter identifying the three major threats tosalmon survival: excessive fishing, dams, and alterations of the physicalhabitat of the streams. Today, we refer to these threats as three of the"four H's" of salmon decline: harvest, hydropower, and habitat. In hisletter, Baird made a pivotal decision, one emblematic of nearly everydecision made in American salmon policy since that time. Rather thanrecommending regulations to reduce the identified causes of salmondecline, Baird chose, instead, to address declining salmon runs using anuntested technical solution, the artificial propagation of salmon. Thissolution is the "fourth H" in the perils of salmon: hatcheries.James Lichatowich's new book Salmon Without Rivers: A History ofthe Pacific Salmon Crisis examines the historical decline of salmon in thePacific Northwest. Not only does the author provide an in-depthassessment of the events and direct causes of salmon decline, but also heexamines the philosophies behind decisions such as Baird's that have hadseemingly everlasting effects on the health of salmon populations. Thepolicy and decision makers in the Northwest have known for over acentury that regional practices would drive salmon runs to ruins.According to some estimates, three billion dollars have been spentattempting to remedy the problem. Despite this huge monetary figure,Lichatowich argues that the same misguided philosophies that created theproblem still dominate today. According to the author, until the regiontranscends its industrial-age mentality, salmon restoration will remainunsuccessful.Baird made a gigantic leap of scientific faith in deciding to use thehatchery solution because he felt harvest and habitat regulations werepolitically untenable. In this decision, Baird avoided making a tough callthat would have displaced existing economic interests. However, he madethe decision with virtually no assurance of its effectiveness. Ultimately,his decision was no decision at all, offering the region a plan where riverscould "sustain" both large salmon runs and unlimited development. Theelements of Baird's decision became the heart of salmon policy decisionsmade by individuals, states, and the federal government for the nextcentury, and continuing largely today.A euphemism for eradicating salmon habitat, "river development"WATER LAW REVIEWimplies a conversion from a natural to an industrial state. Theunwillingness to compromise accelerating river development; the fullthrottle development of hatcheries, a choice driven by an optimisticconfidence in technology and an unwillingness to alter industrial progress;and the dams that use of this alternative allowed, ultimately led to thereality of "salmon without rivers." Salmon production was moved fromthe natural streams to feeding pens; rivers became mere transportationcorridors.A MULTI-DISCIPLINARY INSPECTION OF THE SALMON CRISISThough trained as a biologist, Lichatowich wears numerous differenthats while explaining the decline in the Pacific Northwest salmon runs.The author shines in this book as a historian, mining the past to build aview of regional thinking at key points in the development of salmonpolicies. Much of this way of thinking we recognize today either aspolitical and philosophical movements well known in American history oras embedded present day ideology.The history of the salmon decline is inextricably tied to the economicsituation at the time. Profiteers seeking short-term economic gains intimber, mining, and grazing resources had no great interest in keepingsalmon habitat intact. A laissez-faire political system passed littleregulation and enforced even less. The nearly free wealth of salmon as awild resource inevitably led to over-harvest despite the self-defeatingeconomic hardship on the pursuers. The early twentieth century utilitarianideology favored dams as helping a greater number of people throughpower, irrigation, and navigation over the salmon fishing that the damswould displace.In presenting these driving philosophies in resource management,Lichatowich develops a multi-disciplinary analysis of the salmon crisis.Lichatowich first establishes the ecological history of salmon and its habitatbefore proceeding to the cultural causes of salmon decline. The book'sstructure serves as a metaphor for the solution that Lichatowich advocates:unless the Northwest restructures its resource economy to first consider thenatural system that produced salmon, the species will not survive.Lichatowich then switches hats to anthropologist, describing anindigenous culture that thrived while working within the naturalparameters. Next, he examines the salmon crisis as an economist,comparing the industrial economy that predominates today to a naturaleconomy that must provide a source of values and balance in order torestore salmon. A natural economy relies on interdependence, renewal,dispersal of production, and diversity, as opposed to an industrial economyfavoring individualism, extraction, economies of scale, and a simplifiednatural system. Without balancing industrial economic thinking with thenatural economic system, the timber industry will continue to see economicloss in implementing a tree buffer along streams, and irrigators will seeforgone financial opportunity in instream flows. According toLichatowich, balance is achievable only by acknowledging the naturalworld's intrinsic, non-economic values.Volume 3BOOK REVIEWSALMON WITHOUT RIVERS - ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATIONOf the many culprits in the salmon decline, Lichatowich reserves hisharshest criticism for hatcheries. He faults hatcheries not only for theirresponsibility in ecological damage, but also for the tough choices avoidedand reforms precluded by placing blind faith in the ultimate industrialsolution for declining salmon: growing salmon.Lichatowich chronicles the unwillingness of American salmonmanagers to support the effectiveness of hatcheries with sound science. Ina chapter-long comparison of the Canadian experience in the Fraser RiverBasin, which largely avoided hatcheries, to the Columbia River Basin inthe United States, Lichatowich credits Canada's diligence in pursuingsound science as making the difference in the Fraser's healthy salmon runstoday. The author gives short shrift to the notion that modern hatcherieshave reformed, dismissing the notion with a sweeping statement that thepast speaks for itself. This view might be more credible if the sentimentswere backed by further evidence of the continued failures of modernhatcheries, but the author's skepticism in the principle of artificial salmonpropagation is well grounded throughout the book.Most people place the critical period of salmon's decline at theDepression-era development of the modern hydropower system.Lichatowich spends remarkably little time here. Although the Fraser Riverexperience demonstrated that industrial progress was not inevitable, theAmerican patterhi of complete development with artificial propagation asmitigation was already dead-set, linking hatcheries and dams in apartnership, "forged deep inside the heart of the industrial economy."CHOICES FOR THE FUTUREHas the Northwest learned anything from its past? Is it willing to fusethe natural economy with the industrial economy? The best example of thisstruggle is the region's exploration of removing four mainstream dams onthe lower Snake River.. Ironically, those opposed to dam removal stress acautious approach with no removal before careful scientific study-anapproach not used when the dams were built. Lichatowich gives norecommendation on removal, though he does slyly note that hatcherymanagers on the Lower Snake River admit that even hatchery salmoncannot flourish with the dams in place. The message of this book is thatpolicy decisions, such as dam removal, have become choices betweendevelopment or salmon, rather than development and salmon. All salmonpolicy decisions, including the decision of delay, involve hard choices withreal consequences, for we cannot have salmon without rivers.That the author can take a "feel-good" notion of balancing industrywith nature and ground it in a wide array of scientific and historicalevidence makes his arguments difficult to ignore. Add in a clear andeffective writing style, and the result is an important and readable book foranyone concerned with the fate of Pacific salmon.Issue 2

James Lichatowich, Salmon Without Rivers: A History of the Pacific Salmon Crisis

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James Lichatowich, Salmon Without Rivers: A History of the Pacific Salmon Crisis

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