Regarding the article on page A3, Aug. 9, concerning barred owls (tinyurl.com/CO-barred-owls):

Why kill thousands of one species to save another? Why kill the cormorants? Why kill the barred owls? Why kill the chum salmon? We as a human species are subject to misguided failure in our judgements when we decide that one animal must die so another can live; so often we’ve been totally mistaken, as when the recent U.S. Corps of Engineer’s decision to kill some cormorants to save the salmon in our Columbia River by destroying nests, oiling eggs and harassing birds that had taken up residency on Sand Island. Success? No!

The birds then moved their nests to Megler Bridge and nested underneath it. Then, the Corps decided to move the birds and nestlings from under the bridge because they claimed their excrement would destroy the ironwork holding up the bridge; another spurious assumption that is costing taxpayers over multiple years for Oregon DOT workers to clean under the bridge to prevent potential damage. In my opinion, it would take 15,000 years, if ever, for birds to do any measurable damage to such iron structures.

Not long ago, the wildlife people decided to kill all of the chum salmon in Willapa Bay so they could replace them with Chinook salmon, a more delectable-eating fish. The result — many chum were poisoned/exterminated.

The Corps and Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife should stop killing one species to favor another. Leave the barred owls alone! Stop killing the animals and fish you’re supposed to be protecting! Get back into the business of protecting all creatures’ lives.

If you need something important to do to justify your jobs, start by destroying the Snake River dams, that have prevented the annual runs of hundreds of thousands of coho salmon that used to migrate upriver. We used to have 15 million salmon migrate annually before the Corps built the dams on the Columbia and Snake Rivers. Now we have “hatchery salmon,” and not in great quantities, only a few compared to the original native fishery runs. I beg you folks who want to kill one species to advance the lives of another to stop this senseless killing.

Knock down the Columbia and Snake River dams and the millions of salmon will return, I promise you. And, please leave the barred owls to live in peace. Be gentle and kind.

JOE PALIANI

Ocean Park