FEATURED ACTION: 
Key Issue: Steelhead Habitat
The Wild Olympic Marches Forward
On June 21, 2012, Senator Patty Murray and Congressman Norm Dicks introduced historic legislation to establish new Wilderness and Wild and Scenic River protections on the Olympic Peninsula. If passed, the bill would protect the first new Wilderness designations on Olympic National Forest in nearly 30 years and the first ever Wild and Scenic River designations on the Olympic Peninsula.
Searsville Dam: Time for Stanford to Walk the Walk
The San Francisquito Creek watershed in California’s Bay Area runs through Stanford University’s campus on its way to San Francisco Bay. Historically it was home to healthy runs of steelhead (in addition to salmon). However, this ecosystem was drastically changed when the Spring Valley Water Company erected the Searsville Dam in 1892 to create an impoundment for potable water storage.
Historical Abundance of Puget Sound steelhead
The Puget Sound steelhead , Oncorhynchus mykiss, was listed as threatened under the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) in 2007, prompting the initiation of recovery planning. Recovery planning requires, ultimately, the identification of conditions under which the “evolutionary significant unit” (ESU) can be considered to have been recovered and subsequently removed from the list of threatened and endangered species (“de-listed”).
Tell Stanford University to remove Searsville Dam
Tell Stanford Provost and Acting President John Etchemendy that you support the responsible removal of Searsville Dam in Palo Alto, California and help to return wild steelhead to their historic spawning habitat in the Corte Madera Creek.
Recommended Reading: Six books about wild steelhead management in Pacific Northwest
We recommend the following six books to help you get started in understanding the plight of wild steelhead and salmon in the Pacific Northwest and the complicated nature of their management.
Pass Creek and North Umpqua River Basin, Oregon (1968)
Provides a penetrating account of a once-rich steelhead trout stream threatened by careless logging practices. Focusing on Oregon’s North Umpqua River Basin, the film portrays the impact of clearcut logging on the small tributary streams where most of the river’s steelhead are spawned and reared. The subtle interdependence of land and water and the disruption of the aquatic environment caused by stream-clogging debris and warming water are dramatically presented. Hal Riney and Dick Snider, advertising executives and fishermen, produced the film and donated it to Oregon State University. It was widely distributed and viewed in Oregon and throughout the United States through the 1970s and was influential in changing logging practices in the Northwest.
