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Crisis on the Klamath River: Please help preserve and restore this critical ribbon of life!

The Klamath River flows for hundreds of miles like a ribbon of life from the desert of the Modoc Plateau through the rainforests of the Siskiyou Mountains. The river provides drinking water, fish, whitewater recreation, swimming, outstanding scenery and countless other benefits to tens of thousands of people every year. But now, sadly, the river is in trouble and needs your help!

As you may have heard, there has been a "water war" in the Klamath Basin between farmers and ranchers, Native American tribes, conservationists, commercial anglers and others. The farmers and ranchers receive government subsidized water from the river and are an extremely powerful special interest group. President Bush has sided with the farmers and ranchers and has cut off the water that fish downstream need to survive. In the last week, biologists have documented nearly 13,000 dead salmon in the lower 40 miles of the Klamath River. It is estimated that over 30,000 salmon, many of them federally listed endangered Coho, are dead upstream and that tens of thousands more will die within the next three months. Biologists attribute these deaths to low river flows, high water temperatures and the fish's inability to combat waterborne diseases because of these two factors. This is far too high a price to pay for government-subsidized beef, potatoes and alfalfa that are produced in abundance elsewhere.

We need your help to convince President Bush to give the Klamath its water back!

WHAT YOU CAN DO*

Please write to:

Secretary Gale Norton
Department of Interior
1849 C Street, NW
Washington, DC 20240
Fax: 202-208-6956

and

Senator Dianne Feinstein
U.S. Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510
Fax: 202-228-3954

Request that:

1. A "pulse flow" of cold water be released from Trinity Reservoir to provide immediate help for the fish.

2. Flows from Iron Gate Dam on the Klamath River be permanently brought up to a minimum of 1,300 cubic feet of water per second.

3. Over the long term, the river should be managed under a "Hardy Phase II" flow regime (the level required to sustain healthy fish populations in the river, as determined by scientists with the California Department of Fish and Game).

4. A voluntary program be established and aggressively funded and promoted to buy the water rights of farmers and ranchers who are willing to give them up.

* The effort to restore the Klamath is being lead by Representative Mike Thompson (D-Napa). After contacting Secretary Norton and Senator Feinstein, it would be wonderful if you could also thank Mr. Thompson for his hard work by calling 202-225-3311.