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<br />We discovered the value of genetic diversity many <br />years later, almost too late to rescue the formerly <br />"trash" - now endangered - squawfish from extinc- <br />tion. To solve that problem we had to halt further <br />water development. And now, Dale Pontius and <br />Robert Wigington tell us, the flaw in our multiple <br />plans to deal with endangered fish species is that they <br />lack coordination. They say that we have failed to rec- <br />oncile planning for the recovery of the bonytail and <br />razorback suckers in the lower basin, the endangered <br />species recovery program for squawfish in the San <br />Juan, and the programs to recover squawfish, bonytail, <br />and humpbacks in the upper basin. They argue, logi- <br />cally, for a range-wide recovery program and point out <br />that it should relate to other non-endangered species <br />as well. And, at risk of adding unnecessary complica- <br />tion, I'm tempted to ask, "What about the endangered <br />totuaba down in the delta? <br /> <br />Jim Dyer stresses the importance of basin-wide plan- <br />ning so that we can better understand and cope with <br />the costs of energy, labor, and environmental mitiga- <br />tion. He makes the case that true efficiency will elude <br />us until we are willing to look more holistically at all <br />these issues with a long-term vision. <br /> <br />Our failure to look broadly at solving problems is <br />shown in the realm of Indian water rights issues as <br />well. We have quantified the rights of some tribes, <br />thinking that perhaps we have "solved" the problem. <br />Of course we did not, since the tribes were left without <br />means of using any "wet water:' Paper rights have pro- <br />vided little more than theoretical satisfaction. <br />Furthermore, the quantifications that were made were <br />based on erroneous and inadequate claims of irrigable <br />acreage that were made by the federal government on <br />the tribes' behalf. And over a dozen tribes have not <br />even had their rights quantified. <br /> <br />12 <br /> <br />MAKING COMMITMENTS WITHOUT ENOUGH <br />INFORMATION <br /> <br />The second theme through the history of the Colorado <br />River Basin is a serious dearth of reliable information. <br />The most notorious example was the compact itself, <br />which allocated the consumptive use of the river on the <br />assumption that there was 16 to 17 million acre feet a <br />year available. In fact, we now know that the long-term <br />average flow is only about 13.5 million acre feet - an <br />error of 1.5 to 3.5 million acre feet per year. <br /> <br />The story of the Colorado River is often told as if the <br />discovery of a salinity problem was a surprise. If we <br />had asked, we surely could have anticipated the salinity <br />problem. Ancient Sumeria, Mesopotamia, and other <br />civilizations of the arid world had experience the perils <br />of irrigation and drainage and salt build-up. But we <br />proceeded with development, casting a blind eye <br />towards such consequences. <br /> <br />From John Wesley Powell's early warnings about the <br />limits of aridity, the need for cooperative institutions, <br />for land tenure that reflected the capacity to produce, <br />we have ignored science and warnings to shape our <br />human institutions to reflect physical reality whenever <br />the warnings conflicted with our goals. Carothers and <br />House write of how science was used in the develop- <br />ment of the Colorado River to remove obstacles to <br />development decisions that had already been made. <br />Scientists were asked specific questions and to solve <br />particular problems, but not to predict the short and <br />long-term consequences of development decisions <br />already made. <br /> <br />Even as we accept the need to consider and accommo- <br />date the interrelationship of natural resources, we <br />move ahead with sometimes shaky factual bases. <br />