»age2ThalN D E P E N D E N T, June 8,1994
».INDEPENDENT
Serving the upper Nehalem River valley. Published
twice monthly on the second and fourth Wednesdays of
each month, by Public Opinion Laboratory Ltd., 1206
S ta te A ve nu e, V e rn on ia , OR 97064, as a fre e
new spaper. E d itors and P ublishers, Dirk & Noni
Andersen, (503) 429-9410.
Have we neglected
lessons of D-Day?
Monday, June 6, was the fiftieth anniversary of D-
Day, the start of the final effort to eliminate Nazism
from the democratic countries of Europe.
Monday, June 6, there was also a council meeting
in Vernonia. One topic of discussion was Nazi graffiti
in town.
The coincidence was both distressing and thought-
provoking.
The distress was caused by renewed awareness
that, not only has Nazism not been eliminated, it sur
vives in the Nazi wanna-be’s of our own community.
The coincidence was thought-provoking because
of concern whether we, as a nation and as individu
als, have become so complacent about those truly
heroic efforts of fifty years ago that we have failed to
pass on to younger generations the lessons learned
at that time.
Regardless of the reasons, our community can nei
ther ignore nor tolerate such behavior. It must not be
excused as childishness or the misdirected rebel
liousness of youth.
The responsible parties must be found and, while
they must be required to make amends to |hose
whose property they have abused, their sentence
also needs to include thorough education about the
m ost a b h orre n t b ehavior in the history of
mankind—behavior that was presented as being both
appropriate and necessary for the good of a “superior
race”.
Well, there’s nothing superior about Nazism, white
power, racism or any of the other movements that
can build themselves up only by destroying others.
We must not forget the hard-earned lessons of fifty
years ago. We must not forget the shock of the GIs
who liberated the death camps. We must not forget
the nausea we felt at the pictures of corpses piled like
cord wood, corpses of old people, women and chil
dren slain by men of a “superior race”. We must not
forget all the brave men who died in that battle
against evil.
There is no way to equate vandalism and Nazism
but, among the things we must not forget, is that
many of the leading Nazis started out by painting
graffiti on walls, passing out pamphlets, breaking win
dows and bullying a few people here and a few peo
ple there. Incidentally, they did most of those things in
gangs because they somehow lost their “superiority”
when they were alone.
Memorial Day and the anniversary of D-Day are
just a few days past. If we really mean to honor the
many good people who lost their lives fighting the evil
of Nazism, then we cannot ignore those who promote
and glorify that same evil.
We must remember the lessons of fifty years ago.
But remembering is not enough; we must also teach
our children what we learned. If we do anything less,
we are honoring neither the past nor the future.
•) •
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By Dale Webb, member
Izaak Walton League, Nehalem Valley Chapter
In this issue I will touch on several different
topics to try and keep everybody up to speed
on what’s going on in our area.
To start with, our chapter will again be de
ploying Hobo-temp monitors in the Nehalem
River and Rock Creek to keep track of stream
temperatures. It is vitally important that they
are not disturbed. These $100 dollar instru
ments look like fist-sized, white plastic con
tainers made of two pieces; one piece has a
ring with a large hole, which is used to attach
a piece of nylon rope and a weight. Each of
th e se un its has been spray painted ligh t
brown and has a number on the cap. If you
a ccid e n tly fin d one of the se instrum ents,
please place it back in the stream exactly as
you found it or return it to me. Even if it has
been damaged, we can retrieve the data from
the unit as long as we can recover the storage
chip. These devices provided an interesting
picture of both river systems last year, a year
with a wet, early summer. They showed that
the Nehalem River reached its top tempera
ture somewhere around the Clear Creek area
then, basically, maintained that temperature
the rest of the way down to the ocean. Last
year the high temperature was 74 degrees. By
the way, Clear Creek runs cool into the Ne
halem but lacks enough volume to cool the
river.
On the wildlife front, it looks like another
major battle is brewing with the Saddle Moun
tain elk. A copy of the proposed management
objectives for the Columbia region, says of the
Saddle Mountain unit: "Our population bench
mark for the unit is 7,800 elk, and for the past
five years we have estimated we are fifteen
percent (on the average) above that level. Our
proposal is to maintain our current benchmark
by increasing antlerless harvest and trapping
elk on agricultural lands. We will also maintain
overall population control hunts in areas that
allow hunter access."
What this proposal means to the elk popu
lation is 1100 fewer animals! This is very up
setting news to a bull hunter, since harvest
levels have already fallen by more than fifty
percent from the harvest in the 1970s. The
third year of the 3-point season has never
even been approached since THEY (ODF&W)
killed off 2,000 cow elk in 1980. Data show the
bull harvest has fallen dramatically ever since
THEY started killing off the cows. THEY will
give all kinds of other excuses, but the fact re
main^: No Cows = No Bulls.
A graphic example of this equation can be
seen in the Tioga unit in southern Oregon. It is
a mirror image of the Saddle Mountain unit in
size, land practices, stable populations and
hunter numbers. It was odd to find that the
Tioga unit hardly missed a beat when switch
ing from spike hunting to the 3-point rule,
while the Saddle Mountain unit’s bull harvest
has fallen by more than half. Was the Tioga
elk herd expanding? Not according to its biolo
gists. Then what is the difference? The an
swer is about 2,000 dead cow elk in one year,
followed by many more years of excessive
cow harvests. Our assistant district biologist
even made the argument that “look at our cow
hunter success rates; they haven’t fallen off.”
That’s true, they haven’t fallen off, and fo r
most hunters it doesn’t make a difference if a
herd contains 10 cows or 20 cows, because
they can take an animal and go home. Elk run
in herds and herds are easy to find, so hunter
success isn’t going to fall off until elk popula
tions are seriously depleted. But there is a big
difference between an elk herd with 10 cows
and one with 20 cows!!!
Another serious issue in Oregon is the ini
tiative petition that would ban the use of dogs
and bait to hunt bears and ban the use of
dogs to hunt cougar. Personally, I don’t have a
desire to take a cougar, but I respect the right
to do so and the only effective cougar hunting
method is with dogs. Hound hunting is a re
spectable sport that, like most hunting sports,
can be tainted by a few bad apples. That’s no
excuse to punish all bear and cougar hunters.
Bear and cougar populations in the state are
actually increasing and there is no threat to
the health of these populations. The people
who sponsored this petition would do better to
ban the unlimited harvest of bears by the tim
ber industry.
Speaking of bears, it has been rumored
that a black bear has been visiting the Vernon
ia Lake area. If so, this is a first since I’ve
been alive.