* Education is essential to the Restoration Program's success.
* Unless landowners and water users can be interested in participating, it is unlikely the Restoration Program will succeed.
* Communication must reach all levels of the Basin's public, not just "decision-makers."
* Interpretive visitor facilities are needed at well-traveled coastal and inland locations.
* Reliable and timely information about fish and their habitat needs will directly benefit the Basin's land and water managers.
The Klamath River Basin Fisheries Task Force has identified education and communication as essential to the success of the Restoration Program. The Task Force's technical advisors have recommended that education and communication elements be developed for three principal Program audiences: school children; special interest groups, including fishermen; and the general public. This chapter discusses the objectives, methods, priorities, and administrative requirements of each of the proposed Restoration Program education and communication elements.
Soon after its organization in 1987, the Task Force created a four-member subcommittee to prepare an information and education strategy for the Restoration Program. The subcommittee subsequently submitted a draft information and education program for Task Force consideration. That draft program has been reviewed and found to be well thought out. Currently, the development of a curriculum of salmon and steelhead studies for elementary school classes is underway, as is the public communication program.
The subcommittee's program is presented here, in a slightly modified form, as a suitable strategy to guide the Restoration Program's education and communication efforts.
The objective of the education and communication element -- to promote public interest in the Klamath River Basin's anadromous fish, their beneficial use, habitat requirements, and to gain support for the Restoration Program's plans and efforts to restore fish habitat and numbers -- has been adopted by the Task Force as a primary Program goal.
The education and communication element has two distinct components, an education component to be pursued through the public school system and a communication component to reach both general and special interest audiences. Each component, in turn, will involve four core subjects: the environmental requirements of anadromous fish, opportunities for the restoration of the Basin's fish habitats, the beneficial uses that we make of fish, and the conservation measures necessary to protect those beneficial uses.
The education component is directed primarily at the public school system. Many of today's northwestern California school children will become direct beneficiaries of the Restoration Program. A sixth grader introduced to the Klamath River Education Program in 1990 will be 30 years old when the present Restoration Program authorization expires.
An understanding of the life history of anadromous salmonid fish is essential to appreciating their habitat needs or our conservation responsibilities. Therefore, the life history of salmonids and their environmental requirements is the highest priority subject of the school system educational component.
K-12 curricula to cover the core subjects of life history, environmental needs and restoration, and management will be developed for grades 4-6, 7-8, high school, and, finally, kindergarten through grade 3. The curriculum development effort began in late 1989, directed at grades 4-6 and will be completed within five years.
Mentor teachers from school districts within the four Basin counties will be trained in the use of the curriculum materials and methods. Program funds can be used creatively in combination with state environmental education grant funds to enable mentor teachers to travel from their own schools to those of other teachers interested in developing fishery restoration eduction skills. Mentor teachers for grades 4-6 were trained in 1989 and 1990.
Humboldt State University has a docent program in which students in fisheries majors serve as "salmon and steelhead education guides" for school groups visiting the Mad River Hatchery. A memorandum of understanding between the Restoration Program and the University would enable an expansion of this program to the Klamath River Basin. The Humboldt State model could be expanded, as well, to other post-secondary schools in the region.
Video materials conveying information about the Restoration Program and supporting subjects can be developed and distributed to the Basin's schools.
Classroom aquarium projects have proved enormously popular since they were first introduced in the region through a California Department of Education environmental education grant in 1986. With appropriate concern for egg availability and stock transfer protocols, these "hands on" hatching and rearing experiments can teach children a lot about the environmental needs of young salmon and steelhead. The cost per incubation unit and the accompanying materials is about $125.
Many of the schools in the region are located near streams suitable for the "Adopt-a-Steam" program pioneered in the Pacific Northwest. In this program, neighborhood streams become "living classrooms" where, with the help of the curriculum and Restoration Program specialists, children may even have the opportunity to undertake a modest instream restoration or demonstration project. The Klamath Restoration Program could model its program after the Trinity Task Force's pilot project for adopting watersheds. This "adopt-a-watershed" program envisions school children adopting continually larger portions of a watershed as they proceed through higher grade levels at school. In this way, the educational programs for school children would correspond to the "total watershed" approach stressed for the overall restoration project.
The Restoration Program should enable development of a mobile information and education unit similar to the Terwilliger Center's "Nature Van," which brings environmental education materials and exhibits to San Francisco Bay area schools. A trailer or camper unit could contain anadromous fish life history displays, as well as information concerning the history and status of the Basin's fish populations and the uses we have made, and continue to make of them.
Field trip destinations will include damaged habitats and restoration sites.
High school teachers should be kept up to date on the Restoration Program so that they can provide opportunities for especially interested students to observe meetings of the Klamath Fishery Management Council and the Pacific Fishery Management Council, to learn more about the salmon harvest management process.
With cooperation from agencies and business owners, students should visit fish buying stations and processing facilities.
The communication component is directed at both the general public and at special interest audiences. Only through the provision of complete and timely information can we expect the public to contribute its support to the Restoration Program. Said another way, absent complete and timely information we can expect the public interest and support to wither and the Restoration Program to fail.
Information about habitat protection and restoration efforts should be given high priority. Contrary to the common notion that "no news is good news," the public is starved for some good news about environmental stewardship. In fact, there is so much potential interest in fish and wildlife restoration that there is a temptation to count our chicks (actually, our fingerlings) before they hatch. There is increasing concern that the interest in instream structures, for example, can create the public perception that streams can be "fixed" almost as easily as they can be damaged. For this reason, the communication component should draw on equal parts of fisheries and watershed management professionalism and communication polish.
Figure 6-1 -- The Klamath National Forest has developed a self-guided tour of the Kelsey Creek spawning channel in the Scott River drainage.
Presentations to community and special interest groups, explaining the progress of the restoration effort, should be continued. Presentations utilizing a slide/tape "Introduction to the Klamath Restoration Program" began in 1990 and will be continued in the future. Additional slide programs focusing on completed restoration projects will be developed, shown to the public, and continually updated.
Northern California and southern Oregon journalists are interested in fishery matters and have made themselves known to the Task Force and the Restoration Program managers and participants. They deserve good stories. Newspaper and television coverage of live events -- the completion of a fish passage project, the release of fish from a rearing facility, schoolchildren in their "Adopt-a-Stream" classroom -- have infinitely greater appeal than press releases about scheduled meetings or meeting results.
The Restoration Program should build an inventory of high quality photos and other "visual" materials to assist both print and television journalists in creating attractive and informative stories. Television journalists are continually looking for good film of salmon or steelhead leaping cascades, or spawning. Very little of this kind of material is readily available.
Exhibits and displays concerning the Restoration Program should be developed for high traffic areas, including the National Park visitor center near Orick; the Interstate 5 rest stop north of Yreka; the Yreka Creek Greenway visitor center; and the Iron Gate, Mad River, and Prairie Creek hatcheries. Exhibits should be updated regularly, not allowed to "yellow," and should be moved from sites with low seasonal visitation to those with better traffic.
Brochures, pamphlets, and fact sheets concerning the Restoration Program should be developed, as well as a "public summary" of this long-range Plan. Information about the Basin's fisheries and restoration efforts should be distributed at workshops, public meetings, fairs, visitor information and service centers.
A progress "report to the people" should be created during fiscal year 1992-93, after five full years of Restoration Program effort. The report should credit the Program with those accomplishments it can honestly claim, and be forthright about factors that continue to frustrate the Program's objectives. The objective of "adaptive management" is, after all, problem recognition and correction.
Interpretive displays describing the value of salmonids to various user groups and clarifying the difference between smolt and trout are needed in the basin. The public should be informed regularly of the seasons, bag limits, and quotas necessary to achieve the objectives of the Restoration Program. The public should be informed regularly concerning the meetings of the Klamath Fishery Management Council, its plans and the actions it takes on restoration issues.
Life History and Environmental Requirements of Anadromous Fish
Contacts with the media should focus on the life history of the Basin's anadromous fish and emphasize concern for their environmental requirements. Interpretive displays, brochures, and other publications should be developed and placed in high traffic areas to explain the life history and environmental requirements of anadromous fish.
Groups having special interests in the Klamath River Basin Restoration Program can be broadly divided in two: those who are primarily interested in fish and those engaged in land and water uses in the Basin. The cooperation of both groups will be essential to the success of the Program. Both groups deserve timely and accurate information about habitat restoration efforts, the environmental requirements of the fish and the role of harvest management in accomplishing the Restoration Program objectives. Educational programs targeted at these groups will require specific funding.
Special Interest Group Communication Priorities
The coastal fish-interested community includes the commercial fishermen and Indian fishers, and their onshore support businesses and work forces, all of whom are particularly concerned with the interrelationship of harvest management policies to the Restoration Program. This group needs clear and timely information about user group harvests, in-river run estimates, and wild and hatchery escapement data.
The inland fish-interested community consists of anglers and Indian fishers, who have greater contact with habitat problems and habitat restoration efforts. This "up-river" community has been traditionally concerned with the effects of ocean and lower river harvests on escapement to upstream areas. The Restoration Program should strive to provide inland fish interests with timely and accurate information about downstream and ocean harvests to relieve the traditional inter-regional conflicts and to promote basin-wide cooperation.
Land and Water Users
Effective communications with landowner and water user groups will be one of the Restoration Program's most challenging, and fruitful, areas of endeavor. These communications have already begun and have been largely positive. Forest landowners have joined in discussions concerning development of this long range Plan, for example, and planning team members have explained the Restoration Program and the long range planning process at meetings of professional foresters. The local Resource Conservation Districts (RCD) are important partners solving resource problems at the local level. The Klamath River Fishery Resource Office staff interpretive specialist regularly attends RCD meetings, and the Soil Conservation Service supports RCD partnerships as time and budgets allow. This sort of people-to-people contact must be maintained on a priority basis.
Special Interest Group Communication Methods
In addition to the communication methods described above for general audiences, the following additional efforts should prove effective in working with special interest groups.
Video materials are easy to create and can convey a great deal of information quickly to meetings of sportsmen, water managers, stockmen, miners, timberland managers and others. Video presentations are well suited to explaining the life history and environmental requirements of the Basin's anadromous fish.
Field trips can bring biologists, Task Force members, restoration specialists and landowners together to see, first hand, problem sites and examples of effective habitat protection and renewal. University, Department of Forestry and Soil Conservation Service specialists can assist in the development of field trips and can strengthen the cooperative relationship between land and water users and the Restoration Program.
Awards should be made to businesses, landowners or support groups that make special efforts to assist the Restoration Program.
The Restoration Program already has the services of an interpretive specialist. This person will also serve to coordinate communication and education activities throughout the basin. These services should be continued throughout the life of the program.
The development under contract of teachers' guides and student anadromous fish learning activities, begun in 1989 for grades 4 through 6, should be continued until materials are available for all grade levels.
The services of a publications professional will be required for the development of the progress report-to-the-people (fiscal years 1992-93).
Policies for Education and Communication
Objective 6: Promote public interest in the Klamath River Basin's anadromous fish, their beneficial use and habitat requirements and gain support for the Restoration Program's plans and efforts to restore fish habitat and population numbers.
6.1. The Task Force will maintain support for public school programs by:
a. Continuing to develop a curriculum and field activities for schools in the Klamath River Basin and adjacent counties.
b. Encouraging local school districts to make these materials part of the regular curriculum, once the materials are fully developed.
c. Sponsoring workshops and conferences on salmonid conservation to keep teachers interested and updated about the Restoration Program.
d. Budgeting $5,000-10,000 a year for the operation and maintenance of classroom education projects once the current five-year development process is complete. Teachers should be encouraged to submit proposals to continue the development, operation and innovation of the Program, or for special projects.
6.2. The Task Force will support communications with the public by:
a. Supporting 4-H youth education projects involving riparian restoration.
b. Continuing to encourage the development of interpretive programs on the Yurok Reservation near the mouth of the Klamath River, at the Interstate 5 rest stop north of Yreka and within Yreka itself.
c. Assembling a suitable display for county fairs.
d. Working with angler groups, resort owners, guides, and county fish and game advisory committees to promote angler awareness of the Restoration Program's goals and objectives.
e. Cosponsoring workshops and seminars on water conservation with Resource Conservation Districts to assist the agricultural community.
f. Conducting workshops for state, county, and private road maintenance personnel concerning stream protection needs.
g. Setting up meetings between fisheries biologists and miners to explain the environmental requirements of fish and to learn more about mining activities.
h. Joining with the Klamath Basin tribes in sponsoring a conference about the Indian fisheries.
i. Cosponsoring workshops or "tailgate sessions" with foresters, road engineers, timber and equipment operators concerning watershed protection needs.
j. Providing public information services (e.g. Newsletters, Flyers)
for the Klamath Fishery Management Council.
