U.S. Water News Online
PORTLAND, Ore. -- A federal judge has reaffirmed that the water rights of the Klamath Tribes stretch back to time immemorial, and backed their right to claim water to support food gathering.
The ruling by U.S. District Judge Owen M. Panner in Portland did not appear to have an immediate effect on the ongoing battle over water for fish and farms in the Klamath Basin, said tribal attorney Carl Ullman.
However, it reaffirms that the tribes have the oldest water right in the basin at a time when that was being challenged under a formal adjudication process to sort out competing claims for water, Ullman said.
And it confirms that the tribes have the right to water to support gathering, such as seeds from the wocus plant in basin marshes, as well as hunting and fishing, he said.
Last summer, the federal government was forced to shut off irrigation water to most of the Klamath Reclamation Project to maintain reserves for fish, including endangered Lost River suckers and shortnosed suckers which are sacred to the Klamath Tribes.
``This is an important decision for the tribes,'' said tribal chairman Allen Foreman. ``It is vital to protecting the tribes' treaty resources,'' such as hunting, fishing and gathering.
The tribes have maintained that the federal government has a responsibility to leave enough water in marshes and lakes to support fishing, hunting and gathering guaranteed by treaty.
The ruling came in a case known as United States vs. Adair, which was originally filed on behalf of the tribes in 1975 to guarantee water for a marsh on the Klamath Forest National Wildlife Refuge.
The marsh was part of a reservation taken away from the tribes in the 1950s. However, the tribes retained the right to hunt, fish, and gather plants on the old reservation lands.
The seeds of a marsh plant called wocus, which resembles a water lilly, were a food staple of the Klamath people. The wocus population has declined along with water quality and quantity as agriculture has taken the place of gathering in the basin.
``The ruling makes it clear that the right to water to protect treaty resources, including fish, is senior to all the rights in the basin,'' said Ullman. ``What it does not do is address the quantification question, which the federal courts have never been directly involved in.''
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