ver the years Larry Stevens has contributed many articles to the BQR discussing a variety of subjects. Not all of them have met with universal acceptance‹in fact, a few have drawn heavy fire. In the following pages we present two viewpoints that came in response to pieces by Larry discussing the role of science in Grand Canyon, and the downstream ramifications of draining Lake Powell. A clarification from Larry Stevens follows. Christa

esearch of any kind can be a benefit. Endangered species come to mind. I used to help a friend, Chuck Minkley, with fish research on the Little Colorado River in the early ¹80s. He was the best of the first of the Humpback Chub researchers and his teams acquired a lot of the currently used information. Those thirty-day Minkley projects were all done without benefit of a river trip. Everyone hiked in and out. And so that project felt pretty good to me. These days, a single unsuspecting chub could get shocked, snagged, tagged, and otherwise violated four times in a single day by four different research groups. I wonder what they do with those Willow Flycatchers.

Whether you are pro-dam or not, the sword of research is double-edged. Sometimes it is useful, sometimes mischievous. I tend to think of it as a sort of intellectual war, with research being the mercenary for either side. For the research project, it is often not a matter of doing right or wrong for Grand Canyon. It¹s a matter of who is buying the groceries and what do they want done. The two sides line up against each other and hire the best, most prestigious research personnel they can get in order to sway opinion in their favor. Unfortunately, the entities lined up against positive change seem to have infinite capital.

Do you suppose wapa cares about split-twig anything? Or how about the Los Angeles Water Board‹they won¹t be hosting their company picnic at Toroweap I¹ll bet. It¹s just politics: petty, grinding politics at its most absurd. Organizations like these are masters at relentless research-project delay tactics. It¹s a cheap way to buy time. And all the while the river corridor loses a little more. If we are going to hire the government to do research aimed at derailing change, why not be fair about it and also hire them to fully explore the viability of dam de-commission? At the very least, as taxpayers, we should seek to eliminate the kind of waste and unfairness we are seeing with politically motivated research projects. No matter what is studied, proposed, or actually done to mitigate damage from the dam, the irrefutable fact is that the deterioration of Grand Canyon will continue so long as the dam remains. In many ways I have said this all before, with photography, writing, and talking. And I will keep on saying it until the lake is gone. That elegant ocean of concrete below the Carl Hayden Visitor Center is the great destroyer. It was a bastard child born of greed and avarice and has no rightful place in a world society. It is a vulgar misfit and should be put out of its misery. Let appropriate research lead the way.

Bruce W. McElya

arry Stevens¹ A Butt Pygmy¹s Rebuttal (bqr Fall 1997) conjured up an old TV commercial: Remember the one where a robed and crowned woman portraying Mother Nature is handed a muffin slathered with Brand X margarine? It tastes so good, she thinks it¹s butter. After being informed of the deception, she sternly proclaims: ³It¹s not nice to fool Mother Nature,² as thunder rolls at the sweep of her arm.

To be credible, a scientist in the (battle) field of biology must first be able to distinguish between natural ecosystems and manufactured ones. This should actually be easier than telling butter from margarine. But in attempting to bestow divinity upon concrete, Stevens fails this simplest of tests. What he alludes to as ³environmental gains² from Glen Canyon Dam are in reality limited, short-term social benefits.

Although I am personally repulsed by the crass categorizations of science, as an advocate for wildlands and ecosystems I rely largely on science to support my cause. I have come to respect it, and to embrace the adage that science is a journey to truth. The masquerade of economics and/or ³human benefit² as biological science confuses biology with socio-economics. Promoters of contrivances and manipulations based on bias are not scientists. But the root problem is billing as ³science² the twelve ³gains² that the dam and other ecological manipulation of the river ecosystem have ³created.² Indeed, these are technically scientific observations, but they tell us nothing of what the Grand Canyon¹s river ecosystem is truly like, and what it needs to survive. These are purely socioeconomic judgments, not scientific hypotheses.

Stevens concedes that this soul-less constipatory plug destroyed Glen Canyon, but the nature of his lament over this loss reveals the philosophical motivation behind his pseudo-science: the fact that an incredible ecosystem was drowned isn¹t the concern. That we lost what ³should have been one of the world¹s great scenic parks,² is. Biological science should represent our best definition of ecological reality, not a manipulated recipe wherein naturalness and perceived ³improvements² that humanity has judgmentally imposed upon the Earth can be mixed to produce a desired product. In some places human manipulation can and should be a part of the landscape. But let¹s be frank about what was made ³better² and for whom, especially in Grand Canyon.

Moreover, the 35 years that Glen Canyon Dam has bottled the Colorado River does not even represent the drawing of a single breath in the context of this river¹s long life. To pass the dam off as a static reality that cannot or should not be reversed is to regard as sacred the works of humanity, subjugating the natural world and justifying its manipulation. The proposal to remove Glen Canyon Dam is far more reasonable than was the proposal to build it, whether using a social, economic, or ecological measuring stick. To present the alleged and narrowly defined human ³benefits² of Glen Canyon Dam as a mitigating component of the dam¹s ecological consequences is like saying it¹s okay that we broke someone¹s leg because the designer cast we fitted them with is attractive. Stevens sees the Grand Canyon as an impressive chasm to which we can apply window dressing and cute accouterments to ³correct² its worldly imperfections as if it were a polyester Christmas tree begging for ornaments. He judgmentally refers to the pre-dam Colorado River as ³sterile,² (this is a desert, not a rainforest) while raving about the dam¹s creation of a ³more productive river.² And just what is more productive? The ³trophy² trout fishery, and ³more² of everything from vegetation to birds. Is this how ³science² measures ecological integrity? Let us hope that the biological architects and purveyors of the theme park mentality have a small following. Let us hope that their rebuilding of Grand Canyon is not upon us, wherein we can expect proposals from masons to build the walls higher, and zoo keepers to introduce hippopotamus. The latter proposal would be little more of a ³benefit² justifiable by biological science than any other introduced, exotic species. It would be no less a Frankensteinean manipulation, nor a de facto defining of the Canyon¹s ecological purpose as an amusement park. It is the incumbent responsibility of a biological scientist to understand that ecosystems are dynamic, and what we judgmentally perceive as ³flaws² are integral, necessary components. It is further critical for humans to approach the natural world with the understanding that perfection embodies what we might perceive as imperfection. Not only is it not nice to fool Mother Nature, it isn¹t possible. Butter might not be the perfect food, but it¹s real. And we¹ll all be a lot better off in the long run if we let it be butter. But to let the Grand Canyon be the Grand Canyon will take more than the patience of the ages, it will require humility.

Ric Bailey

Science, Values, and Vision for the Colorado River

wish we lived in a world where big problems could be solved with simple solutions. I¹ve tried to explain, obviously unsuccessfully to some, that decisions as large as the construction of Glen Canyon Dam involve irreversible trade-offs. Regrettably, the dam eliminated Glen Canyon, and transformed the flood-prone, sediment-laden, and seasonally warm Colorado River in Grand Canyon into a regulated river, one with far greater native biodiversity and biological productivity than existed there in the pre-dam past. Although several vertebrate species (especially fish) have been extirpated, the river corridor has become a refuge for numerous aquatic and terrestrial species, some of which are federally endangered, and most of which deserve more protection than they get. There is little doubt about these ecological changes, as they have been the focus of intensive scientific study by a wide array of scientists for the past two decades. In addition, there have been widespread introductions of non-native fish, fish parasites and plant species, and a considerable percentage of the Upper Basin¹s flow has been abstracted through trans-basin diversion projects. These irreversible changes mean to me that removal of the Glen Canyon Dam will not restore the Colorado River in Grand Canyon to its pristine (pre-1880) condition.

This is not a justification for past actions, nor an endorsement of present-day poor judgment; rather, it is a wake-up call for increased participation in the now extremely public process of river management, and a call for improved long-range planning and implementation of appropriate actions. But how and what? Speaking as an ox and a moron, I recognize an oxymoron when I see one, and ³ecosystem management² is clearly one such conundrum. Ecosystems are too complicated for humans to understand, much less manage. Sure we can grapple with issues of water and sand in Grand Canyon, but the living world is just too humblingly intricate a web of interactions to direct through human design, for some weird set of changing values. And you know that we will be hated by future generations for what we have done to the Earth. But because we are responsible for these ecological changes, we must try to do the best job of stewardship possible for the future, recognizing our limitations and the large potential for errors in judgment. This is the spirit of adaptive management, recognizing that we can¹t know enough about ecosystems to manage wisely, but are intelligent enough to plan on continued learning through the scientific method, and working cooperatively towards the best possible future for the earth and humanity.

Management of the Colorado River suffers strongly from strabismus: one eye is focused on ecological integrity while the other is trained on economic exploitation. Therefore, since the 1996 Record of Decision, the solution has been to manage democratically by committee. Gcrg holds a chair on the Adaptive Management Work Group (amwg) and its information support team, the Technical Work Group (twg). Gcrg is one of several ³potentially environmental² voices among the 27-member amwg, which is a Federal Advisory Committee. The amwg advises the Secretary of the Interior on how to manage Glen Canyon Dam, based on the legislation of the 1992 Grand Canyon Protection Act, the 1995­96 Environmental Impact Statement and Record of Decision, the ³Law of the River,² and the status of ecosystem resources. Like the previous Glen Canyon Environmental Studies Program but with more reliance on a competitive, peer-reviewed approach, the Grand Canyon Monitoring and Research Center coordinates scientific monitoring of Colorado River ecosystem resources, providing that information to all stakeholders. ³Potentially environmental² voices comprise more than half of the amwg, but although virtually all meetings are open to the public, few members of the public attend or even write letters to the chairs of these committees. Is the committee approach working well? Ask your gcrg representative.

As far as science being used as a delay tactic to maintain the status quo, I think it is important to distinguish between scientific progress and management process. I certainly acknowledge that it has taken several decades to gain predictive power in understanding the interactions between flow and sediment downstream from Glen Canyon Dam. But we are not yet close to understanding most of the biological complexities in Grand Canyon, except perhaps for trout in the Glen Canyon reach. More research and monitoring, and a more rigorous discussion of values, are required to arrive at the point where we can be comfortable that we know how to manage the river¹s aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems adequately.

At its heart, the river corridor in Grand Canyon is extraordinarily altered. As an ecologist concerned with conservation biology, I fully appreciate the importance of Wilderness designation as a long-term landscape protection strategy in Grand Canyon. That designation should apply to ecosystems (such as the Canyon¹s tributaries, deserts and the rim ecosystems) that are still primarily affected by natural forces and largely pristine. But the Colorado River ecosystem has been inalterably transformed by human actions. This does not mean the river is not worthy of reverence, protection and a commitment to hard work for appropriate management. But perhaps additional special legislation is required for suitable protection of this odd couplet of wilderness and modified river ecosystem in Grand Canyon National Park. I¹ve had the phenomenal privilege of spending more than 3,000 days in Grand Canyon over the past three decades, as a river and trail guide, a park ranger, and a scientist. Each day there has been an inspiration. I do not pretend to know it because it¹s so much larger than human awareness. Also, I can¹t pretend to know how other people see it. My experience and bent is quite different from most people¹s, and I recognize that my values are not necessarily common values. But the assignment of values‹not just agency policy, but the public¹s actual vision of this river of the future‹requires additional, rigorous debate. The consensus achieved needs to stand for a long time, perhaps the Twenty-first Century, certainly for a much longer period than the normal three to five year planning horizon. In some ways the critical editorials about my vision indicate that there is enough energy among us to support such a debate.

I do worry every day as to what is best for the river and the Canyon. As a scientist, I continually grapple with my own biases and ignorance in understanding the nature of nature in a human-dominated ecosystem. I try to communicate what I learn to others, particularly to my peers in the scientific community, to river guides and to other interpreters who reach the public directly, and to managers who have to decide how to proceed with their impossible task. Some of the information is non-intuitive, and some of it is controversial. The largest lessons, those about perception and assumption, are inevitably humbling: the Grand Canyon wears many veils, and has many tricks up her many sleeves. I don¹t know any other solution to overcoming one¹s personal limitations than to keep trying to see clearly. My New Year¹s wish is that we all use the Canyon¹s foremost gift - inspiration‹to rededicate our lives to working for the best future of our fellow humans and the biological integrity of our planet.

Larry Stevens