Court says green groups may appeal coho ruling.

Byline: BILL BISHOP The Register-Guard

Eight environmental and fishing groups won the right Friday to appeal a federal court ruling that removed Oregon coast coho salmon from Endangered Species Act protections.

U.S. District Judge Michael Hogan ruled Sept. 13 that the National Marine Fisheries Service erred when it gave threatened species protection only to wild fish.

The judge said the agency is not allowed to distinguish between wild and hatchery fish to determine if a species deserves protection because both share the same habitat, the same genetic makeup and have no special traits that distinguish one from the other.

The fisheries service announced last week that it would not appeal the September ruling.

Hogan then decided Friday to allow the environmental groups to appeal his September ruling to a panel of three judges on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Hogan's ruling will not affect state fishing regulations, but environmentalists fear it will give a green light to timber sales in federal forests on watersheds that sustain coho spawning streams, a spokesman for the environmental and fishing groups said.

"Wild coho are still threatened," said Doug Heiken, acting conservation director of the Oregon National Resources Council. "Artificially boosting their numbers with thousands of genetically inferior hatchery fish is not a recipe for salmon recovery."

Heiken also criticized the fisheries services for giving up the legal fight to preserve federal Endangered Species Act protection for wild fish.

Many of the groups involved in Friday's court action had filed petitions that led to the 1998 threatened species listing for Oregon coast coho salmon.

Fisheries service spokesman Brian Gorman said the agency chose not to appeal Hogan's ruling because it prefers to conduct a biological survey of all 26 protected salmon and steelhead runs on the West Coast while also developing a hatchery policy with input from many interest groups. An appeal would leave the decisions to a three-judge appeals court panel.

Hogan's ruling affects only one run, Gorman said.

A ruling by the appeals court could affect all 26 protected runs in Oregon, California, Washington and Idaho, he said.

The agency is going ahead with its survey and planning for a comprehensive hatchery policy for all threatened runs, he said. Both should be finished in about a year, he said.