1/8/2024 0 Comments Scaffold resource"We are the salmon people or river people," says Aja DeCoteau, executive director of the Portland-based Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, which represents the interests of the four Columbia River treaty tribes - Yakama, Umatilla, Warm Springs and Nez Perce - in policy, advocacy and management of the basin. Hydroelectric dams on the Columbia and its tributaries have curtailed the river's flow, further imperiling salmon's migration from the Pacific upstream to their freshwater spawning grounds, and threatening millenia-old spiritual traditions that bind these communities together. Warming waters linked to climate change endanger the salmon, which need lower temperatures to survive. Yet the river is under threat because of climate change, hydroelectric dams and industrial pollution. For thousands of years, the tribes in this area have relied on Nch'i-Wana, or "the great river," for its salmon and steelhead trout, and its surrounding areas for the fields bearing edible roots, medicinal herbs and berry bushes as well as the deer and elk whose meat and hides are used for food and ritual. It's a spectacular canyon, 80 miles long and up to 4,000 feet deep, with cliffs, ridges, streams and waterfalls. Just below the confluence with the Snake River, the Columbia's largest tributary, the river turns through the Cascade Mountain Range, carving out the Columbia River Gorge. The water, he says, holds the history of the land and his people.įrom its headwaters in British Columbia where the Rocky Mountains crest, the Columbia River flows south into Washington state and then westward and into the Pacific Ocean at its mouth near Astoria, Ore. When he lies on the rocks by the rushing river and closes his eyes, he hears the songs and the voices of his ancestors. The river saved Kiona when he returned from Vietnam with post-war trauma, giving him therapy no hospital could. He finds strength, sanctity, even salvation in that struggle. The fish is fighting you, tearing holes in the net, jerking you off the scaffold." "Fishing is an art and a spiritual practice," says Kiona, a Yakama Nation elder. ![]() Kiona has fished for Chinook salmon for decades on his family's scaffold at the edge of the falls, using a dip net suspended from a 33-foot pole. His silvery ponytail flutters in the wind, and a string of eagle claws adorns his neck. ALONG THE COLUMBIA RIVER - James Kiona stands on a rocky ledge overlooking Lyle Falls where the water froths and rushes through steep canyon walls just before merging with the Columbia River.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |