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impacts to watersheds have gone unmeasured and unchecked as many of the 

 multiple jurisdictions overseeing public and private land p»nagement have 

 taken parochial approaches to managing pieces of the whole. We must begin 

 to view watersheds as entire interdependent units, as the fish do, and 

 focus on problem solving using integrated resource management. This means 

 involving federal and state agencies. Tribes, and beneficiaries of our 

 natural resources such as loggers, fishermen, farmers, rafters, and miners. 



It can be argued that the most important terrestrial habitat type 

 contributing to "salmon and steelhead" habitat is coniferous forest. 

 Steelhead trout and all 5 species of salmon use streams flowing through 

 forested areas for spawning, rearing, and adult holding purposes. Thus, 

 the maintenance of healthy forests is an integral element in the proper 

 management of salmon and steelhead trout. 



Prior to the latter half of the nineteenth century, the forest communities 

 of the Pacific Northwest were in a state of dynamic equilibrium. Natural 

 events such as fires, landslides, and erosion have often been important 

 processes in the forest ecosystem. When these natural processes are 

 disrupted, or artificially accelerated, such as occurs during and after 

 poorly managed logging operations, fish habitat is generally impacted and 

 fish production generally decreases. 



Timber harvest operations have created deviations from the normal 

 functioning of forest ecosystems. Logging activities such as the 

 construction of roads and skid trails, and not the actual cutting of 

 timber, are most resp>onsible for increasing the sediment load into 

 receiving streeims. Often those streams are unable to assimilate this 

 increased sediment load. The result is that stream habitat quality and 

 quantity has decreased, at least from the salmon and steelhead perspective, 

 contributing to the decline in salmon and steelhead production in the 

 Pacific Northwest. 



