Extra credit 1-1.5 page paper (5% weight)
due by 9am Wed March 2nd (late papers not accepted)
Three dams on the Rogue River were proposed after a big flood in 1955;
two were completed and construction on the third one (Elk Creek dam) was
begun in 1986. The very next year, with the dam one-third built,
construction was halted by federal courts on environmental grounds. Over
44% of the total habitat for threatened Coho salmon and steelhead for
the entire Rogue basin remains inundated by the partially completed dam.
The structure currently blocks migrating fish, and they have to be
trapped, trucked around the dam, and released below the dam.
Environmental groups call it the fish killer dam. More than $100 million
has been spent already on building the first 1/3. Rep. Greg Walden
(R-OR) attached a rider to a bill that was then signed by President Bush
preventing the removal of the existing dam to ensure it would be
completed in the future.
Based upon what you now know about stream ecology and analysis of
environmental issues, what questions do you have about the issue as
stated in the above paragraph? What kinds of information and sources of
information would you seek? How would you go about analyzing the problem
and finding a good solution? You do not have to propose a solution, but
talk, instead, about how you would go about finding a solution.