America's 10 Most Endangered Rivers Named

by Elaine Hopkins

It was named at a Peoria press conference on Monday, held by American Rivers and its affiliate, a downstate Illinois anti-hog factory farm group, FARM, Families Against Rural Messes. Press conferences were held throughout the U.S. to announce the endangered rivers.

Animal manure and other farm runoff pose threats to the Potomac and Pocomoke rivers in Maryland, the Chattahoochee River in the Southeast, and the Kansas River in Kansas, all on the 1998 list, the group said.

"This spectacular stretch of the river is the crown jewel of the Columbia River," said Lorraine Bodi, co-director of American Rivers' Northwest office in Seattle.

Large manure spills into rivers have resulted from other factory hog farms, killing fish and degrading water quality, the group said.

"Factory hog and chicken farms are a growing national blight on our nation's rivers," said Rebecca Wodder, president of American Rivers. "Waste from one of these factory operations is equal to that of a medium-sized city, a city with no sewage-treatment plant."

One river on the list, the Apple River in Illinois, is threatened because Monticello Pork is building a 4,000-hog facility and an 8,000-hog facility in the river's basin. The company will store waste equal that produced by a city of 30,000 people, in deep pits below the buildings.

The Apple River is one of the most pristine rivers in Illinois and is a popular tourist destination. "Adding two huge hog operations in this ecologically fragile area could devastate the river," said Steve Ellis, conservation policy analyst for American Rivers.

Near the Wisconsin border, this river still has trout and smallmouth bass, said John Rutherford, a local official who attended the Peoria press conference. "I can't believe the state just licensed another building," for a nearby hog operation, he said.

The hog farms wanted to locate in Wisconsin, but found state regulations too strict, said Karen Hudson of FARM. "So they slipped south of the border into Illinois" where their waste pit system is not regulated, she said.

"If we'd been in Wisconsin we wouldn't be facing this pig factory situation," Rutherford said. The river also faces threats from siltation, septic systems and chemical runoff from farms and a golf course, he said.

Others on the list of rivers endangered by pollution, commercial development and other threats include the Missouri River in the Midwest, the Lower Snake River in Washington state, Passaic River in New Jersey, Blackfoot River in Montana, Kern River in California, and Pinto Creek in Arizona.

"We continue to abuse our rivers by damming, draining, straightening and polluting them, all the while weakening their ability to sustain fish and wildlife," Wodder said.

As of January, 62 new letters of intent for hog operations with more than 1,000 animals have been filed in Illinois, Hudson said. They will generate 60 million gallons of raw hog waste each year.

The 10 most endangered rivers in the U.S., and the reasons for the designation, according to American Rivers are:

1. Columbia River, Hanford Reach, Washington. Nuclear waste contamination, irrigated agriculture, land transfer.

2. Missouri River, Missouri, Iowa, 5 other states. Channelization, dams.

3. Pocomoke River, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia. Toxic pfisteria, factory poultry farms, nutrient overloading.

4. Kern River, California. Small hydropower dams.

5. Blackfoot River, Montana. Proposed gold mine.

6. Colorado River delta, California, Mexico. Water use, water allocation.

7. Chattahoochee River, Georgia, Alabama Florida. Development, polluted runoff, sewage overflows.

8. Lower Snake River, Washington. Dams.

9. Apple River, Illinois, Wisconsin. Factory hog farms.

10. Pinto Creek, Arizona. Proposed copper mine.