If so, is this species really endangered? Some thread was noting record high levels of salmon this year.
No "endangered" coho salmon. However, without even checking, I suspect farmers in the Klamath Basin are an "endangered species".
A whopper of a coho (salmon) run! (Oregon/Washington)
From: An FR thread posted somewhere else? - More info than in snip below
THE TRUTH ABOUT SALMON IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST
I. MYTH– Northwest salmon are threatened or endangered.
FACT – There are six species of salmon or steelhead in the Northwest (pink, coho, chinook, chum, sockeye, and steelhead), and not one of those species is in danger of becoming extinct. In fact, contrary to common perception, none of those species is even listed for protection under the Endangered Species Act. These species are abundant in the wild, and we can produce as many more salmon as we want in hatcheries.BACKGROUND -- The National Marine Fisheries Service has arbitrarily divided these species into Evolutionarily Significant Units and then listed these ESUs for protection under the ESA. For example, all chinook salmon that spawn in rivers and streams leading into Puget Sound are considered "Puget Sound chinook" which are listed as threatened. But chinook that spawn in rivers and streams that feed into the Columbia River are divided into at least eight different ESUs, some of which are listed and some which are not. NMFS has further divided some ESUs into smaller units, or populations, to cast the broadest possible net of control over local resources.
REALITY CHECK --State and federal fisheries biologists estimate the spring run of returning chinook salmon on the Columbia River alone will exceed 440,000 this year – more than anytime since counting began in 1938! About 90,000 of these fish are believed to be "wild" salmon. Tribal fishermen this year are being allowed to catch more than 53,000 chinook, including more than 10,000 "wild" salmon that are listed under the ESA. The record run convinced the Washington state Department of Fish and Wildlife to authorize the first sport fishery for chinook on the lower Snake River – above the dams – in more than 30 years.
The National Marine Fisheries Service, the Department of Commerce agency that is charged with protecting salmon under the Endangered Species Act, is also responsible for authorizing and managing the commercial harvest of salmon. For 2001, NMFS more than tripled the allowable commercial harvest of coho salmon off the Columbia River from 20,000 last year to 63,000 this year. The ocean sport-fishing harvest for the same region was increased from 40,000 to 112,500. The tribal gill-net harvest for chinook salmon on the Columbia River was set at 53,000. This spring there were more than 500 gill-nets stretched across the Columbia River.
The term ESU is not applied to any other species except Pacific salmon. The term was invented by the National Marine Fisheries Service to apply solely to its efforts to list individual runs of the same species of salmon. The concept of the ESU is applied differently to different populations of salmon to meet the needs of federal regulators and was never submitted for peer review to determine if there is any scientific justification for the artificial distinction between stocks.
Despite claims by the National Marine Fisheries Service that ESUs exhibit evolutionary adaptations to specific rivers or streams (or stretches of rivers or streams) developed over centuries, if not millennia, a University of Washington study published last summer showed that salmon imported from one region can adapt to individualized habitat conditions in as little as 13 generations. In other words, a new "evolutionarily significant unit" can "evolve" in about 40 years!
Salmon are the only "species" listed for protection under the ESA that can be caught legally and sold commercially. This year’s catch of spring-run chinook was so plentiful that commercial buyers were offering tribal fishermen just 50 cents per pound, while fresh chinook were being sold from pick-up trucks along the Columbia River for $2 a pound.
Chinook salmon range from Northern California to Alaska. They are the largest of the Pacific salmon and are also known as king salmon or tyee salmon. Chinook fry spend one to 18 months in freshwater before migrating to the sea where they live an average of four to five years before returning to spawn. They generally return to the same rivers and streams where they hatched, but salmon are a colonizing fish and can wander widely, taking advantage of new habitat, and salmon from one "ESU" often end up fertilizing eggs from another.
This is the flaw in their logic.
The express purpose of those land trusts is to exclude people (except for the "special" people).
My prayers for success are with this brave woman.
May she succeed, and may this suit be the first of many.