You can’t tell, other than at the Stronghold, what happened in 1873 because of the tremendous change in the lake.
It’s always possible, in whatever the federal ownership is, to tell that story as part of their history. The refuge does to a limited extent. I think they’re getting a little more spine to tell [the public] what’s really going on, basically because they’re getting a little more political support from the conservation community. You can see the story, but you really have to look for it, I would say. The Lava Beds monument, in discussing how the natives were dislodged when they were, being cut off from the lake. You would ask, “Where’s the lake?” It’s like miles way, well, now they’ve restored this little piece of the lake next to where it was. Similarly, the refuge has this little interpretive thing for a year [now] where you push a button and it shows one quarter of this field–like here’s how many ducks there were in 1950, then next decade a fourth of those are gone, and the next decade of that total is gone and so forth. They have those little interpretive things, but they usually stop short of pointing the finger. Somebody would have to have a very special interest to even ask the question and if you were to walk up to their interpretive people and ask the question, they’d think, “What if this is somebody from the agriculture industry just trying to see what I would say?” You still don’t get the answer.
This little booklet I just mentioned that the refuge came out with actually has a picture showing the dry marsh with the mud cracked and caked during the summer. Why are they doing that now, [since] they didn’t do it before? They’re doing it for two reasons: one is that they know they have more political support from the conservation community, but secondly I also think that even the refuge managers recognize that [they] look pretty dumb when standing here calling this a wildlife refuge and there isn’t any wildlife. At some point they have to say something. Sure it [may be] forces beyond their control, but did you ever say there’s a problem? When I’ve said to the refuge folks, “Okay, here’s 1960 on the Tule Lake National Wildlife Refuge–3.5 million birds during the peak migration and here’s today, less than 200,000. Connect the dots and where does it go? When are you guys going to get excited?” One guy said to me, “I think we’ve got another ten years.” “Well,” I said, “I’ve never seen the agencies want to drop the boom all at once. If you’ve got ten years, you better get started right now because it’ll take you ten years to turn it around at the pace you move when you think you’re in high gear.” I just keep hearing the engine cranking. We haven’t engaged the wheels yet (laughs) .
