The Dungeness Valley on the North Olympic Peninsula and the Klamath Basin in southern Oregon bear a striking resemblance.

Both have depressed salmon populations, an agriculture community dependent on irrigation, Indian tribes asserting prior water claims and competing water demands.

This year, both are suffering from an historic drought.

But that's where the similarities stop.

In the Klamath Basin this summer, the federal government has shut off water to irrigators in an effort to protect threatened populations of native fish.

This step has caused a deep rift in that community. Irrigation head gates have been vandalized, and the entire area has become a focal point for supporters and opponents of the Endangered Species Act.

In the Dungeness Valley, on the other hand, while the same ingredients for strife exist, so does one vital difference: cooperation between neighbors.

In September of 1987, water disputes in the Dungeness were similar to the farmers versus fish arguments now heard in the Klamath Basin.

Biologists measuring flows in the Dungeness at that time found that 82 percent of the river water was being withdrawn.

Passage for pink salmon was impossible in some places, and 100 pinks were actually netted up, driven upstream in a tank truck and released.

Fast forward to September 2001, a year with a similar drought, and note that only 33 percent of the water was being taken for irrigation.

No court decisions, ESA rule or federal agency action made this difference. Progress is directly due to a decade of hard work by local leaders to resolve competing water use issues.

Instead of arguments of rights and numbers, the affected groups have focused on tangible needs, and by working together have found many practical solutions to better water management.

In addition to the Jamestown S'Klallam tribe - which has an interest in restoring salmon runs on the Dungeness - anglers, irrigators, riverside property owners, conservation groups and state and local governments have taken some important steps in the Dungeness Valley to protect fish and provide water for farmers.

The tribe and the farming community together have worked to increase the efficiency of the irrigation system.

More than $1.5 million in grant funds earmarked for rural development and salmon recovery has been brought in by the tribe to pay for lining of irrigation channels to stop water leakage and upgrading fish screens at headgates to prevent young salmon from being drawn down irrigation ditches.

Many farmers have found that they now have a more reliable water supply than they did when a great deal more water was withdrawn from the river.

Habitat restoration projects in the river and along the stream banks by the tribe and the Clallam Conservation District have complemented improvements to the irrigation system, making less water go further for salmon habitat.

Although it has taken many years, we have found cooperation easier than fighting each other.

As Mike Jeldness, the coordinator of the Dungeness River Agriculture Water Users Association recently said, "We've made much more progress working together and leaving the lawyers out of it."

Similarly, Jamestown S'Klallam tribal leaders have long expressed a preference for spending money to fix problems rather than paying attorney bills.

We embarked on the path of cooperation before Dungeness chinook and other runs were place on the endangered species list because it seemed like the right thing to do.

Although court rulings, state water law and even the Endangered Species Act itself may change, the cooperation that enables salmon and farming to survive in the Dungeness Valley still seems like the way to go.

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