Fish Love Messiness On Rivers

To: Jack Rowe

Date: Tue, 19 Mar 2013 09:55:14 -07

From: Dianna Blazo

Good Morning,

Sent this out to  the Curry Pilot newspaper this morning. A slight rebuttal to carl page. I hope it is under or close to, the 250 word limit.

HI,

Here is a letter that will, maybe, help people to understand that nature is not broken, so don't try and fix it.

LAND SLIDES ARE GOOD, (FOR THE FISH)

Recent scientific studies (on line ahead of print in the journal GEOLOGY) have proven the benefits of land slides for the health of a river and the fish. http://uonews.uoregon.edu/archive/news-release/2013/2/large-ancient-landslides-delivered-preferred-upstream-habitats-coho-salm  This research tells us if you introduce variable geology, big landslides, messiness that happens in the world, fish appear to love that. They seem to respond to the heterogeneity that is so inherent in most real landscapes. Nature is messy, and the fish have adapted to that. The massive land slides that occurred several years ago were due to massive rains more than man himself.

Higher water temperatures in the Chetco can come from nature itself. Mt. Emily, a dead volcano, but still with heat radiating from it into the Chetco and the wide shallow river that absorbs more heat than a narrow river would.

If a species is "endangered or threatened" before the intervention of man, maybe they were meant to die out and let another species start. How many times have we read about an imported species that took over and destroyed native species.Not just fish either, Scotch Broom as an example.  Leave nature alone and she will take care of things herself.

There used to be great salmon runs on the Chetco, but they are dwindling. I think they started falling off when the extreme environmentalists began trying to "fix a river that Mother Nature says wasn't broken". Some people feel the need to interfere with other peoples' businesses, jobs and lives. No one is against conservation, we are all just tired of the extreme environmentalists policies.

Dianna Blazo

Brookings, OR