A Washington state-based conservation organization is asking the federal government to list king salmon in Southeast and Southcentral Alaska under the protection of the Endangered Species Act.
The Wild Fish Conservancy filed a 68-page petition with the National Marine Fisheries Service on January 11. The same organization also filed a lawsuit against the National Marine Fisheries service in 2020 arguing that the agency’s authorization of the Southeast Alaska king salmon troll fishery was in violation of the ESA, and should be permanently shut down. That suit remains in litigation.
KCAW’s Robert Woolsey recently spoke with Nat Herz, an independent reporter with the Northern Journal, to learn more about the Wild Fish Conservancy’s petition to list king salmon as endangered.
Read the full Wild Fish Conservancy Petition to List Alaskan Chinook Salmon under the Endangered Species Act.
HERZ: “It (the petition) could end in 30 days with the National Marine Fishery Service saying, ‘We don’t think that the information that you’ve presented here shows that there’s a significant or imminent risk of extinction.’ And so then it’s actually case closed unless Wild Fish Conservancy, the organization that’s pushing for this, decides it wants to file a lawsuit or some kind of appeal. If they (NOAA Fisheries) actually accept the petition, then that would start a year-long review process. And and then within another year, if they decide that it is merited, they would publish a proposed rule, and request for public comments. And I think there’s some process around designating critical habitats. So I think if there was a listing that was going to happen, it would not be happening for at least two years. But these things very often get bogged down in litigation and appeals. And so I don’t think we have to worry about fishing season getting shut down in Sitka or anywhere else because of this anytime in the near term.
KCAW: “Do you think the ESA listing is connected at all to the lawsuit from the Wild Fish Conservancy, and their long-term strategy of trying to protect the population of Southern Resident killer whales in Puget Sound by ending Southeast commercial trolling for chinook?”
HERZ: “I think that there are some interesting and important questions that are raised by the Wild Fish Conservancy’s activity here. It does feel like in a lot of places, in a lot of ways around the state and particularly in Southcentral and in Southeast Alaska, there are scary things happening in the ocean. And I think they (the Wild Fish Conservancy) are asking questions in really tough ways, through the lawsuit and the Endangered Species Act petition about what kind of steps do we need to take, and can we take, to deal with this? I think the way that they’re going about it, where they don’t really seem to be engaging with stakeholders, and folks that are really connected to and invested in these resources, and these fish in Alaska, is not endearing them to a lot of their stakeholders. My sense is if you went door-to-door and said did a poll on the Wild Fish Conservancy, you probably wouldn’t get a high approval rating. I think, for Alaskans and as an Alaskan to totally understand what their broader strategy is, and are they really trying to engage Alaskans in their work? Or in some ways, are they trying to basically use these sorts of legal levers that are out there because they feel like Alaskans aren’t taking this seriously and aren’t going to be partners in their efforts, even if they’re those efforts they think are necessary.
KCAW: I think that’s an interesting observation because a number of high profile conservation organizations like Salmon State and the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council have come out in opposition to the Wild Fish Conservancy, both the lawsuit and now the ESA petition. In fact, Salmon State took the gloves off and said it’s just an obvious effort by the Wild Fish Conservancy to to sort of stick a knife in the back of Southeast commercial trolling. So it does seem like there’s an odd imbalance if it really is an effort to conserve king salmon, why isn’t the conservation community more aligned?
Response from Salmon State to the Wild Fish Conservancy’s ESA petition for Alaskan chinook salmon:
“With this petition, the Wild Fish Conservancy is doubling down on its attempts to shut down fishing in Alaska without consulting with or speaking to the people they’re sledgehammering. This petition is an extreme attempt to reallocate wild salmon that, once again, fails to consider or address the actual threats to Chinook. Alaskans and others concerned about wild salmon need to be working together to address threats from habitat degradation, to climate change, to hundreds of thousands of Bering Sea salmon bycaught and killed in Seattle-based trawl nets. Instead, the Wild Fish Conservancy is continuing to attack some of the people who care about wild salmon the most — salmon fishermen — and putting all of Alaska in a defensive position that will ultimately make problems worse instead of better.”
The Wild Fish Conservancy is the same organization that has been attempting to shut down trolling — a sustainable, small-boat, community-based Southeast Alaska hook and line fishery.
HERZ: “It feels like at some level when we talk about the threats to this Southern Resident killer whale population that the Wild Fish Conservancy says it wants to protect, and threats to chinook salmon in Southeast Alaska and in Puget Sound, I think a lot of people in the Alaska conservation community are very quick to point the finger at the Puget Sound area. It’s like an urban jungle and what are you guys doing to stop the runoff of these like nasty PCBs and other contaminants you’re getting from car tires that are also linked to decline in the killer whales. And I think you can also look and say, ‘Well, really the biggest problem affecting our entire environment and all of our marine life, whether it’s fish or orcas, is a global warming climate change problem.’ At some level, I can kind of empathize with the approach being taken by the Wild Fish Conservancy here because how do you as a relatively small conservation advocacy group deal with the urbanization of an entire region of your state? And similarly, how do you as a small conservation organization deal with the global problem of climate change? It is much easier and more convenient to point the finger at the people that are pulling the fish one by one out of the ocean even if the science is maybe not conclusive about how much of an impact they’re having. And so this is the kind of thing that we are seeing in broader places beside Alaska as we deal with these bigger environmental issues, and climate change in particular: This kind of blame game and finger pointing, when the real underlying problems might be things that we actually need to come together and cooperate to resolve.”
Nat Herz is an independent reporter with The Northern Journal, who has covered the Wild Fish Conservancy’s troll lawsuit, and now its petition to list Alaskan chinook as endangered. He spoke with KCAW’s Robert Woolsey.
