What's the Problem?

The front page of the Oregonian this morning carries a story about sea lions. Specifically, about how a group of sea lions are camping out at the bottom of Bonneville Dam and feasting on the salmon that are trying to head back up the river to spawn.

The salmon are “trying” to get back up the river, but it is HARD WORK because there is a damn dam in the way! It slows them down and makes them easy pickings for the sea lions.

People have tried everything – noise, rubber bullets, sea lion relocation -- to get the sea lions to stop eating the salmon. They have failed.
They have failed because this is what sea lions do -- they eat salmon. The sea lions have found the best, most conducive environment in which to pursue their work.

Humans have done the same thing. Anglers camp out on the same area to catch the same salmon. At times, the sea lions have become aggressive – one even jumped into a boat to retrieve “the one that got away” and had to be beaten off by the frightened fisherman.

So now, humans want to kill them.
Humans want to kill them because the sea lions are killing the salmon. Only that’s not what the sea lions are doing. The sea lions are eating the salmon because that’s what sea lions do!

The problem is that the salmon are endangered. Salmon are endangered, in part, because the dam makes it too damn hard for the salmon to get back up the river to spawn. Salmon are endangered because their habitat is being destroyed. Salmon are endangered because they have been over fished.

Anglers are mad because they cannot go over the predetermined catch limit. They have to put certain salmon back in the river. They are mad because no such restrictions have been placed on the sea lions.
The article outlines a proposal to restrict the sea lions to a limit of 1% of the run. If the sea lions “over fish” they will be subjected to fines ranging from hazing (which thus far has not worked) to death.

To me, it makes more sense to say that the fisher folk must stop fishing. Humans caused the salmon to become endangered in the first place. Anglers might say that that is not fair – they’ve already been restricted enough. Why should today’s anglers be forced to pay the price for the misdeeds of their forefathers?

Because, they were your forefathers, not the sea lions’.

The sea lions are simply reacting to a situation that was caused by humans. How is it fair to penalize them? How is it right to murder an animal for doing what it was born to do?

I think the sea lions are not the problem. The sea lions are a simply a symptom. It is the problem that needs fixing, not the sea lions.
I do not have a solution to the problem, so perhaps I shouldn’t be ranting.
I just know that fixing the symptom never really fixes anything.