The Great Salmon Hoax

By James L. Buchal

Fishery agency mismanagement, coupled with natural trends working against salmon, has brought Northwest salmon runs to historic lows. Charged by law to protect salmon, yet promote salmon harvest,... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0966195108
• ISBN13: 9780966195101
• Release Date: December 1997
• Publisher: Iconoclast Publishing Company
• Length: 382 Pages
• Weight: 1.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.3" x 1.3" x 6.3"

Customer Reviews

Mistakes repeated

A great read for anyone interested in issues related to andronomous fish in the Columbia and Snake river system. The author (who is up front about his participation in the conflict) makes a very persuasive case that hatchery management and, to a greater extent, the harvest of adult salmon are the largest manageble factors decreasing salmon returns in the system. The author does a good job of analyzing and explaining scientific data, but the graphs included in the book are of low quality and difficult to interpret.I found Mr. Buchal's arguments persuasive. The whole story of how junk science was used to justify the agenda of an interest group at great expense to both the taxpayers and the salmon is not unlike the story of the great acid rain scare in the northeast. There, forest pathologists have consistently found that acid rain was not causing observed mortality and that other explinations were more persuasive. Among plant pathologists the issue is long dead, but the myth of a massive acid precipitation-caused dieoff of high elevation trees persists in the media and among many politicians as well as (predictably) environmental advocacy organizations.

A must for everyone who cars about our Salmon.

This book is something every person concerned with the plight of salmon should read. Not only is it very correct in finding the fault with our political system but it backs up every quote, statement or fact with an extensive list of references. Its amazing to me how not one person has seemed to point the reason for salmon's decreasing population on overfishing. Even when salmon was placed on the endangered species list, the total fishing harvest of salmon went up. BY ALL MEANS, READ THIS BOOK!

Eye opener of the real reasons salmon are on decline

This book was amazing. I had to read it for a class at school, and it completely changed my mind about dams. The author spent 4 years collecting data from scientific reports about why dams are not the cause of fish mortality. The few times that they are the cause, it's because the "opposition" has not allowed them to install better devices on the dams. This book gives insight into the polotics that are preventing dams from improveing, and actually makes you want to slap environmentalists for the way they have been reacting about dams...lol...and I am an envirionmentalist. He presents data from "the other side" and diggs up the sources that are often very sketchy sources and unscientific. Buchal also shows how if dams are removed...fish won't improve untill something is done about other vital salmon issues. I wrote an 11 page paper on this book easily, and could have written more. If you want to understand where the dam people are comming from and why they are so bitter when dealing with environmentalist, this is also dealt with. Even if you disagree with his ideas, it is a must have in understanding both sides of the salmon controversy. Boy would I like to see an environmental group refute his arguements.

For or Against Dam Breaching

The reviews on the book appear to be a reading of the 'for or against' comments that are appearing all over the country on the very serious matter of 'dam breaching'.This is NOT a 'dam breaching' issue. This is a save our salmon issue. To save Northwest salmon, four large obstacles must be removed...and they aren't dams.Read all of the reviews on this book. Purchase this book and also purchase 'Undue Influence" by Ron Arnold to put everything in perspective.

Must reading to get through the environmental fog

For those old enough to remember the beginnings of the environmental movement, can remember when the movement was relatively honest. No more. It has been fatally corrupted by the political left, and has the aquisition of power as its agenda, not a cleaner better environment. The Northwest Salmon issue is but the latest scandal of the movement and Buchal catches them redhanded in the courts, the media, and government agencies promoting yet again another round of junkscience to attain their goal. This book complements nicely Peter Huber's book Galileo's Revenge---Junkscience in the Courtroom. Further the politics of the Left can be studied in David Horowitz' book The Politics of Bad Faith. Book Review The Great Salmon Hoax An Eyewitness Account of the Collapse of Science and Law And the Triumph of Politics in Salmon Recovery By James L. Buchal Published by Iconoclast Publishing Company Copyright 1997 P.O. Box 677 Aurora, OR 97002-0677 Reviewed by Michael R. Fox Ph.D.If you have the slightest interest in salmon or salmon fishing and how these are being threatened in the Northwest, run, don `t walk, to the nearest bookstore, buy (or order), and read this book. If you never knew before about bureaucratic junkscience and how it is practiced, study this book, it is the perfect place to start. Author Jim Buchal has produced a monumental contribution to the understanding of the myriad bureaucracies, bad science, bad law, bad media analyses and reporting of these of these issues. His book is heavily referenced, an appealing feature to those wishing to verify his findings. Further Jim Buchal is not only a good environmental lawyer, but has a degree in physics as well. More than most advocates this has instilled in him a keen sense of scientific cause and effect, of differences between good and bad science, between good and bad statistics. He knows how to ask the hard questions, which has not endeared him to the bureaucracies nor to the federal judiciaries. The general public has no inkling of these salmon problems, even though they pay for the billion-dollar waste. After nearly two decades the salmon have not benefited. Certainly the salmon issues are complex. But, there is a mindless aspect to the salmon mitigation activities, which seem to call for the spending of more than $450 million per year without much hope for benefiting salmon. Instead, little has been produced except for larger bureaucracies, very questionable science, and threatened salmon runs.Given all of the complexities and often inconsequential side issues, it is difficult to keep in mind that the goal of the salmon activity is, or should be, to restore increased returns of adult salmon, even to the upper reaches of the Columbia/Snake River Basins. The overwhelming biases of the fisheries agencies are that the dams on the Columbia and Snake Rivers are the sole cause of the declines of adult salmon returns. It needs saying that thes