Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Dams I hate Dworshak/The Dalles

I might hate dworshak dam more than anything. I hate dworshak as much as I hate open cage fish farming, and arguably more than sport harvest of wild steelhead. That's saying something. Reading about it today, and it really started sinking in. In 1972, in the supposed age of reason, the industrial revolution, as modern medicine and science were advancing at record speed the Army Corp knowingly chose to extirpate the greatest race of summer steelhead in the continuous USA for fucking pennies on the dollar. Classic example of government subsidizing the senseless destruction of our natural resources. If I could go back in time I'd go George Hayduke on that construction site until they carted me off to prison goddammit.

They sold it like it was the best thing since sliced bread. We'll make a world class fishery with the hatchery production, yeah right. We'll have this beautiful lake, bogus. Shits probably full of walleye, bass and other trash from the midwest. Meanwhile that sweet little river that was once home to 30 lb summer runs with an appetite for dryflies sits under 200 feet of impounded water.


The Dalles is a whole 'nother box of rocks and is a striking reminder of the long standing policy of cultural genocide directed at Native American tribes in the Pacific Northwest. In 1957 water rising behind the dam covered Celilo Falls, a place where Native American tribes from all over the region had been fishing, gathering and trading for thousands of years. The falls were holy grounds, destroryed by our country's insatiable industrial appetite and our unwillingness to consider the spiritual, and natural values that made Celilo special. We should've been celebrating Celilo, the magnificent fish annually passed through its heavy rapids, and the rich cultural traditions they supported. Instead we entombed it behind an monolithic industrial hydrodamn. If there is a real-life death star, its The Dalles, and Richard Nixon is Vader (for alot of reasons).

All that is to say, both are fucking wastes, of some of the most magnificent fish, culture and natural history in our region. I hope we've learned our lessons from that wasteful era when the Bureau of Rec The Nation, and the Army Corpse of Engineers ran amok on every wild river this side of the mississippi. Sometimes I worry though. In all likelihood we'll never see those dams removed but on the off chance we do I plan to make pilgrimage to those hallowed grounds, where I will get down on my hands and knees and beg the river gods to forgive my people for our foolishness. The next century is uncertain for wild salmon and our culture but one thing is certain, there is only one right path for both, and it doesnt involve any more dams nor the mentality that led to their justification.

First and only on the Clearwater

8 comments:

  1. interesting post - the video is really moving it shows the true cost of power doesn't it? a lot of people think just because it's hydro-electric then it must be green. cheers, Michelle http://michellelouie.com

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  2. One of my friends participated in a big bridge protest in California a few decades ago... Not that it did any good.

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  3. well said. 'nuff said. will we ever learn?
    sam
    www.headwatersofhistory.com

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  4. I forgot to mention in my earlier comment that Canada is allowing rivers and lakes to be used as tailings ponds for mines. See my blog post http://tinyurl.com/yzndbep Jan 25th regarding the destruction of several fishing lakes in north central BC. If you like it please pass it on or copy it for your own blog. The fish will thank you! http://michellelouie.com

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  5. Haveing lived in Orofino I've come to know the reasons for the easy sell of Dworshak, it's the area people. Fuckers wouldn't know how to breath if it didn't come natural. Rome was burning and only one of them said "I smell smoke"

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  6. Dworshak was criminal, pure and simple. My home river is the North Fork of the Clearwater. Fortunately, "only" twenty miles or so got inundated. But you are correct, the reservoir is full of bass. Now I like bass as much as the next guy, but to trade the steelhead and the health of the watershed for an impoundment fishery? Not a day goes by in the fall when I don't feel the pangs of sadness looking at the most beautiful river in North Idaho without her steelhead. coho51 is absolutely correct concerning the people around here. Not all of them of course, but a significant majority. What really gets to me, is that there was no real reason for that dam. NONE! The corp had money and went looking for a project to spend it on in order to assure future funding. Simple as that. The same can be said of the four lower Snake River dams as well.--AJ

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  7. If there ever was a crime against nature Dworshak is it. Dude, they use to have 30 lb. steelies run up that river now there's not even one. All I can do is shake my head and hope I never see something like that happen again. The 4 snake river dams should go away also.

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