Save Salmon From Deadly Rising Temperatures

Target: Idaho Governor Brad Little

Goal: Protect the salmon habitat in a major Idaho stream.

As climate change ravages on, US salmon increasingly find their journey home to spawn more difficult. All over the western United States salmon habitats are shrinking rapidly and a new study by the University of Idaho finds that Bear Valley Creek, a significant salmon stream in central Idaho, is no exception.

Researchers have found that the rising temperatures and lower levels of water brought on by climate change have significantly contributed to the shrinking of salmon habitats. In Bear Valley Creek, salmon could lose up to half of their habitat by 2040. But this isn’t just a future problem, salmon in Bear Valley Creek already lost 23% of their spawning habitat and 20% of the off-channel stream areas where juvenile salmon grow between 1957 and 2016 – according to the University of Idaho.

Salmon require very particular environmental conditions to reproduce. The University of Idaho writes these requirements are, “… up to six square meters of riverbed real estate to lay eggs; the gravel must be just right, the water must be cold and rushing, there must be calm side streams for fingerlings to grow. And of course, there must be enough water flowing in the streams to let the salmon arrive in the first place.” Each of these requirements for salmon reproduction are threatened in the Bear Valley Creek area. The University of Idaho’s news site reports that Ecohydraulics Professor Daniele Tonina cautions that “Chinook salmon serve as a useful ‘indicators of enormous ecosystem change,’ but ‘every single species will be affected by these changes.’” So, these threats are dire for salmon, but they also spell out trouble for other cold-water fish like trout. Sign below to demand Idaho’s governor take immediate action to protect the fragile salmon habitats at risk in his state.

PETITION LETTER:

Dear Governor Little,

Salmon in the state of Idaho are facing severe threats because of climate change. A recent study by the University of Idaho finds that salmon in the Bear Valley Creek already lost 23% of their habitat area because of rising temperatures and lower water levels between 1957 and 2016. This in itself is an emergency, but the study finds these salmon could lose up to half of their habitat by 2040.

The report also found that it isn’t just salmon at risk. Professor Tonina at the University of Idaho reports that these salmon studies are useful “indicators of enormous ecosystem change” occurring in these locations and that such changes will affect “every single species” present in these areas.

Please increase your state’s efforts to combat environmental destruction and take immediate action to protect the already diminishing Bear Valley Creek area from the continuing effects of climate change.

Sincerely,

[Your Name Here]

Photo Credit: Ryan Hagerty, USFWS