6 



Mr. Studds. Even closer, believe it or not. 



Mr. Naiman. How is that? 



Mr. Studds. That is much better. 



Mr. Naiman. Much better, OK. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, 

 for inviting me to appear before you and the subcommittee to ad- 

 dress issues concerning the management of watersheds and natu- 

 rally spawning salmon populations in the Pacific Northwest. 



Since time is short, I will get right to the point. Healthy water- 

 sheds are essential to the social, economic, and ecological well- 

 being of all who inhabit the Pacific Northwest. The quality of the 

 Pacific Northwest will be greatly diminished if we do not maintain 

 the biotic integrity of our rivers and streams. 



I would like to leave you with six points. First, that the ecologi- 

 cal health of the Pacific Northwest river and riparian corridors is 

 declining and declining rapidly. In Oregon and Washington alone, 

 we have some 300,000 miles of streams and rivers. I would esti- 

 mate, although there is no hard data on this, that probably around 

 75 to 80 percent of those stream and river miles are not in good 

 condition. 



Second, existing state and Federal land management practices 

 will continue the incremental decline in watershed health and fish 

 populations. Quite simply, the issue is too large and complex for 

 any single institution to handle. Also, the management by system 

 components rather than by a more holistic approach is contribut- 

 ing to this decline. 



Third, effective management requires an ecosystem perspective 

 to restore and maintain the ecological vitality of river systems. 

 This perspective includes all organisms, not just salmon. Today we 

 manage largely for stability from year to year, and we manage by 

 component. Whereas the vitality of our systems tells us that we 

 should manage for connectivity between components, and we 

 should manage for variability over both time and space. Quite 

 simply, our institutional philosophies are almost completely juxta- 

 posed to this need. Fourth, not all parts of the watershed are cre- 

 ated equal. From my point of view, the riparian systems are the 

 heart of the watershed. They comprise only about 10 to 15 percent 

 of our land mass, but if we look at the issues, probably 75 of our 

 problems are associated with waters and the riparian areas. 



Ecologically effective riparian management zones need to extend 

 up the drainage network into nonfish-bearing streams as well as be 

 expanded laterally downstream. This does not exclude some com- 

 modity extraction from the riparian areas as appropriate knowl- 

 edge and technologies are developed. In fact, I think there are some 

 very innovative things we could do in the future to have some com- 

 modity extraction from expanded riparian areas. 



Fifth, there is an urgent need for a Pacific Northwest regional 

 initiative or Center for Watershed Management which will tran- 

 scend political boundaries, institutional structures, and philosophi- 

 cal approaches and disciplines. I propose a Pacific Northwest re- 

 gional initiative for watershed restoration and management. The 

 goal of the initiative would be the development of solutions to our 

 regional watershed problems. 



Now, what would this initiative do? It would conduct basic re- 

 search into watershed science. It would establish a representative 



