Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
I'm Caleen Sisk. I'm the Chief of the Winnemem Wintu Tribe
of the McCloud River. We've been here for ever and ever, andÉ
we have survived the Shasta Dam. We have also survived the blockage
of our salmon. And now that there's an opportunity
to bring the salmon back, we would like to be involved
with that operation. And so far, we have been
knocking on the door at NOAA, and also at the Bureau of Reclamation,
in an effort to have a seat at the table, to discuss some very important ideas
that we have -- and opportunities that we have --
as tribal people, and that have a traditional knowledge of
our salmon in these rivers. One thing that we know is that
they are natural. These are natural fish to these rivers,
and they know what to do. So, if we let them, they will do what
they need to do without us in the way. What we need to do is design a
fish passage -- which is totally possible --
without trucking them, every yearÉ and spending a million dollars
every year, in a ridiculous program that doesn't work.
I mean, that's why we're discussing this now, is that hatcheries
are not doing the jobÉ that they had thought that it would do.
And having these two projects separated -- the Shasta Dam raise
and the fish passage -- is almost incongruent and is
a little bit in conflict of interest of both projects.
What we're proposing is is thatÉ back in 1872 they created the
first fish hatchery, on the McCloud River, on the West Coast.
And during that time they started to catch up with the knowledge that
the Winnemem people already had about the salmon.
And in that big idea at that particular time, they sent
salmon around the world, from the McCloud River's fish hatchery.
Because there was a decline of salmon in other parts of the United States.
But they also sent them to New Zealand. And in New Zealand the conditions
were pretty much the same as the McCloud River.
And they are thriving there. What we would like to do is bring
back those salmon -- which we have an agreement with the Maori tribal
people there -- as the brood stock for the McCloud River, and
replant them, rather than taking the hatchery salmon in the Sacramento
River that do have diseases. Because these salmon in New
Zealand are disease-free, and they are the DNA from the McCloud River --
the upper river. And there is a viable fish passage
from the Shasta Lake, that would be viable to come down
Dry Creek, into Little Cow Creek, and into the Sacramento RiverÉ
without costing what they're talking about now.
And we have to have a viable population that has the memory
to re-inhabit the high country. And the fish in New Zealand are
those fish. And so now, we are trying
to get at the table. And uh, it's been rather difficult.
But we're theÉ senior water right holders. We're the ones who have suffered
the loss of the salmon the most. We're the ones that don't benefit
economically even if they come back. But, traditionally and spiritually and
culturally, we gain what we have lost. The fishÉ are climate changers.
They're the ones who clean the river. They're the ones who bring the
nutrients up from the ocean. And they're the ones that take it
back out to the ocean. And these are the scientific parts
that are missing from the studies on "How do we fix fish?", that are,
like, thousands and millions of dollars. And we're thinking that, you know
what, if you left that salmon go in those tributaries, they're going to
find what they need to eat. They're going to go and they're
going to grow upÉ and they're going to do
what they're supposed to do, because the Creator made them that way.
This country up here needs the wild Chinook salmon back.
If the soils are going to get betterÉ the trees are going to get betterÉ
the grasses are going to get betterÉ the tributaries are going to get better...
It's because those fish need to come back.
And we need to bring the best brood stock back to the high country.
And that brood stock are the ones that are in New ZealandÉ
and now we have an obligation to return that salmon
to the very people who it was taken from.
No one asked us about these things before.
But now we're trying to have a voice. There are many governmental
departments -- like NOAA, and Fish and Wildlife, and the
Bureau of Reclamation -- that are setting up all these
separate projectsÉ when the Shasta Dam should be
calculating in its project, a fish wayÉ a fish passage way.
PG and E should be calculating in its project a fish passageway,
and not passing that on to the public. That's their responsibilities
for blocking those passages in the first placeÉ
with this idea that these hatcheries would do the job.
And now that they know that they're not doing the job,
they're still responsible in the mitigation for changing
and correcting those situationsÉ so that the fish
can swim up to where they are hatched,
and swim out to the ocean. There are not many states in the
United States that have the option to spawn salmonÉ
to be a salmon state. You knowÉ
Ohio can't be a salmon state. These other states in the mid-west,
they cannot be a salmon state. California is a natural salmon state!
We have the biggest estuary on the West coast.
And it's a shame if we lose thisÉ to whatÉ?
Watermelons in the desert? If you know of anybody
who can help usÉ get on the teamÉ
get in these meetingsÉ get these connections for the testingÉ
the right testing to be doneÉ because traditional knowledge
also has a place in this plan to return our fish.
Thank you.