Sea lion management

To The Eagle,

For decades, the debate over salmon recovery in the Columbia River Basin has centered on dams, fish ladders, and hatchery reforms. Yet the most important battleground in this struggle lies far downstream, in the places we seldom measure and rarely manage: the confluence zones where tributaries like the Cowlitz, Kalama, Lewis, Willamette, and Sandy meet the Columbia. These are the frontlines of the river, and we are ignoring them at our peril.

Historically, these junctions served as natural rest stops for migrating salmon—safe water where fish paused to orient themselves before pushing inland. Today, they have become concentrated hunting grounds for rebounding populations of California and Steller sea lions. Observers regularly document dozens, sometimes hundreds, of sea lions packed into just a few hundred yards of water, consuming thousands of salmon and steelhead each week during peak runs. Nothing in the river’s natural past resembles this level of predation pressure.

And yet, while we count salmon meticulously at Bonneville Dam and other upriver structures, we maintain no reliable accounting of losses in these downstream choke points. Cameras and ladders tell us how many fish reach the dams, not how many never make it that far. The result is a data blind spot big enough to sink recovery efforts. Policymakers continue to focus on what can be easily measured, not on what is actually killing salmon.

The states of Oregon and Washington already practice adaptive wildlife management on land, balancing deer, elk, and waterfowl populations with proven tools. Yet, in the lower Columbia, we rely almost solely on observation while an unregulated apex predator dominates the river mouths. Limited removal programs at Bonneville Dam and Willamette Falls have shown that when managers act decisively, predation drops and fish runs stabilize. Extending similar efforts to tributary confluences would protect tens of thousands of salmon before they ever reach the dams.

If we want a future with wild salmon, we must acknowledge where the battle is truly being lost. The Columbia doesn’t need more monitoring; it needs management where the fish are actually dying. That begins at the confluences, one junction at a time.

Scott Cooper

Rainier, Ore.