Lawsuit will seek return of water pumped to Rogue Basin

GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) -- Environmentalists warned the federal government on Thursday they are going to court to restore water to salmon in the Klamath Basin that is now pumped over the Cascade Range to irrigate valuable pear orchards in the Rogue Valley.

The move represents an escalation in the legal battles over sharing water between fish and farms in the Klamath River Basin, with environmentalists sympathetic to Indian tribes and fishing downstream making a new demand for water controlled by farming in the upper basin.

"Our goal is to restore a fishery to the Klamath River, restore the health of the aquatic ecosystem of the Klamath-Trinity river basin, and have that be a part of normal life for people who live downstream," said Tim McKay, director of the Northcoast Environmental Center in Arcata, Calif.

The center joined with the Oregon Natural Resources Council in filing a 60-day notice of intent to sue the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, demanding that it consult with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service over environmental impacts of the Rogue Basin Project on endangered suckers and threatened coho salmon.

Built in the 1950s, the Rogue Basin Project pumps about 30,000 acre feet of water a year, enough for about 300,000 people, from creeks that run into Upper Klamath Lake and the Klamath River across the Cascade Range into reservoirs for irrigation serving pear orchards and other crops around Medford.

Among them are the orchards of Bear Creek Corp., one of the region's leading employers and producer of Royal Riviera pears shipped around the world in gift baskets sold by mail-order pioneer Harry and David.

"The water is absolutely critical to pear orchards," said Ron Meyer, a pear grower and president of the Talent Irrigation District, which gets the bulk of the diverted water. "Even though pear growing is not the bulk of the acreage in agriculture here ... it produces more value than all the rest of agriculture put together."

Though restoring the water to the Klamath River would reduce pressure on Klamath farmers to share irrigation water with fish, Dan Keppen of the Klamath Water Users Association said farmers opposed the idea.

"Every new litigation is going further to divide camps and keep us from sitting down and tackling the problem," said Keppen.

The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation regional office in Boise, Idaho, did not immediately return a telephone call for comment on the litigation. Typically, the federal government does not comment on pending lawsuits.

Jim McCarthy of the Oregon Natural Resources Council said the bureau began consultations required by the Endangered Species Act two years ago with Fish and Wildlife, but talks broke down and the bureau has yet to finish a biological assessment of the situation.

The water battles in the Klamath Basin reached a peak in 2001, when federal marshals were called in to guard irrigation headgates closed to conserve water for endangered Lost River and shortnosed suckers in Upper Klamath Lake and threatened coho salmon in the Klamath River.

Last fall, after the government restored full irrigation to the Klamath Reclamation Project, 33,000 salmon died in the lower reaches of the Klamath River. The California Department of Fish and Game blamed the fish kill in part on low and warm water left after upstream irrigation.

The Rogue Basin Project takes a third of the water from Jenny Creek, which flows through the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument into the Klamath River at Iron Gate Dam. It also taps water from Fourmile Creek, which flows through the Upper Klamath National Wildlife Refuge into Upper Klamath Lake.

About 24,000 acre feet of water from Jenny Creek is diverted into Hyatt and Howard Prairie lakes, which are the sites of popular resorts, campgrounds and sport fishing. It then flows through the Green Springs Power Plant before going into Emigrant Lake outside Ashland, a popular destination for camping and water sports.

About 6,000 acre feet of water is diverted from Fourmile Creek into Fish Lake, another boating and fishing resort, which serves as a reservoir for irrigation in the Rogue Valley.

Well, folks, here it is...it has finally...literally...come to my back yard! I'm billed $185.00 per year for this water for one acre, whether I use it or not...whether I get it or NOT. Do you think my hard headed neighbors will believe there is a problem now??? No, probably not.

Here's the irony of this situation. A couple months ago the eco's announced adding a fuzzy little weed to the endangered list. I'll find the name of this plant momentarily. This thing grows all over my property...but it won't when I can't get water to it. Such a deal!!!

I held a theory when we were fighting the Klamath Falls situation that our neighboring valley wasn't attacked because of Bear Creek Orchards...owned by the Japanese, because they are typically big contributors to the enviro causes. I guess they forgot to send their bribe in this year!

EBUCK, what ticks me off the most is that if ANYONE should be able to see the tragedy of what is happening to the small rural property owner in this country, it should be the "Indian tribes". They seek to do to us exactly what was done to them. A bunch of outsiders show up and decide what is best for you to do on your land.

On top of that we deal with the unrestricted migration of illegals. A neighbor of 30 years died last year. Her relatives sold the place, it WAS beautiful, to a guy who hires illegals to ...get this...plant trees, and moved in a dozen with their herd of goats (living on the front porch), plywood shacks and destroyed the place. That is the 3rd property in my once wonderful neighborhood that they bought out. Now, I ask you, what do you think my property is worth????Willing seller???? I couldn't give it away...and can't grow anything when they take this water!

Here's some background on the Klamath Tribe. I'm still looking for that statement from their website about anyone can be "invited" into the tribe.

The Klamath were first contacted by Whites in 1826. Since there were few fur-bearing animals in the area, Whites remained uninterested in the Klamath for some time. It is reported that even by the middle of the nineteenth century, there was only one gun among the Klamath. In 1864, the Klamath ceded most of their land to the U.S. Government and, with the Modoc and Paiute, were placed on the Klamath Reservation. Due to extensive intermarriage and migration, the Klamath constituted an "ethnic minority in the communities where they resided, even within the reservation." There were 2,118 members of the Klamath tribe in 1955, and 40 percent of them lived off the reservation. As of 1963, 70 percent of the members were less than one-half Indian, and less than one-sixth were full-bloods (Clifton and Levine 1963: 6).

In 1954, the membership voted for termination of federal administration of the reservation. Stern feels that as a result of this termination, the Klamath have become virtually extinct as a people. The cultural position of the Klamath was the subject of much debate among the authors of the 1930s, when tracing origins and the diffusion of cultural elements was a primary concern of anthropologists. This debate never resulted in any definitive conclusions. It is sufficient to know that features from cultures in the Great Basin, the Plateau, the Northwest Coast, and California were present in Klamath culture. The Klamath derived most of their subsistence from rivers and marshes. Fish was the staple of their diet, and pond lily seeds were also important. Roots were gathered to some extent. Deer and other game were of minor dietary importance. Permanent settlements of earth and mat lodges were located on the banks of rivers. These settlements were occupied during the winter months. They ranged in size from "several score" to one or two lodges. In the early spring, the people left the villages for fish runs. In the summer, small bands of two or three families occupied the prairies to collect roots and berries and other edible plants. Toward the end of the summer the pond lily seeds ripened, and the people gathered together at the marshes to harvest them. They returned to the same winter villages year after year. In spite of the fact that the environment had relatively abundant foodstuffs, the population was not very large. It has been estimated that aboriginally the Klamath numbered between 800 and 1,400. There were five or six geographical divisions of the Klamath. The largest one was in the vicinity of Klamath Marsh. Other groups lived in the vicinity of Agency Lake, the lower Williamson River, Pelican Bay, Klamath Falls, and the Sprague River Valley. There was some tendency toward endogamy within these divisions, but there was no political unity. On the reservation, these divisions completely disappeared. Warfare, feuds, and slave raiding took place between the subdivisions of the Klamath and with non-Klamath. Most reports state that the Klamath conducted slave raids yearly against the Achomawi and other Pit River Indians. Kroeber (1953: 319-320), however, felt that these reports were very exaggerated. Headmanship of the villages was weakly developed, and some settlements did not even have chiefs. The chiefs were people who had acquired prestige through warfare, were wealthy, were good speakers, and had had some spirit experiences. Most of Spier's (1930) informants indicated that shamans were of greater importance to the community than chiefs. Every Klamath sought spiritual power in vision quests, which took place at life crises such as puberty and mourning. The spirits were ill-defined, but primarily took the form of nature spirits or anthropomorphic beings.

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