Spilyay Tymoo, Warm Springs, Oregon
September 7, 2022
Record fish numbers at Round Butte
Reintroducing salmon and
steelhead to an area where
they were cut off for more
than five decades is hard
work.
It takes collaboration with
many partners, a commit-
ment to sound science,
and—more than anything—
patience.
This summer, the Con-
federated Tribes Power &
Water Enterprises and PGE
biologists are thrilled to be
seeing some big results.
More than 700 adult
spring Chinook salmon have
been released above Round
Butte Dam: That is the high-
est number since the reintro-
duction effort began in 2010.
These results are likely re-
lated to improving ocean
conditions, as well as an im-
portant adaptive manage-
ment changes that the tribes
and PGE have pushed for
over many years.
We’ve been working with
the Oregon Department of
Fish and Wildlife to screen
returning fish for disease,
making it safer to release
hatchery fish above the
New net in lake shows signs of success
From W.S. Power & Water
and Portland General Electric
From W.S. Power & Water
and Portland General Electric
Courtesy WSP@W/PGE
Fish handling at the Pelton-Round Butte facility.
project.
This change has allowed
us to release excess
broodstock—fish not
needed for spawning at the
hatchery—into the upper
basin, in addition to known
origin fish—fish that origi-
nated in the Upper
Deschutes basin and
passed through the selec-
tive water withdrawl tower
as juveniles.
With so many adults in
the upper basin, we have al-
ready documented natural
spawning upstream of the
project, producing the next
generation of ocean-going
salmon.
We also initiated a com-
prehensive redd count pro-
gram in the Metolius and
Whychus Creek and will be
surveying the tributaries,
alongside partners from the
Oregon Department of Fish
and Wildlife, U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service, and local
environmental organizations,
to learn more about fish
spawning behavior.
Additionally, we’ve tagged
100 of the adult fish with
radio tags, allowing PGE bi-
ologists to track their move-
ments and learn more about
their habits as they head up-
stream.
These returns aren’t just
good news for today, but will
also have long-lasting posi-
tive impacts for years to
come.
In 2024, we hope to see
an influx of young fish, the
offspring of these adults,
heading toward the ocean
through the selective water
withdrawal tower.
Record numbers of juve-
nile steelhead were collected
this year at the Warm Springs
Power & Water and PGE se-
lective water withdrawal
tower.
For the past decade, the
partners have been working
to improve fish collection at
the selective water withdrawal.
Generating power at night
Courtesy
Klamath sucker fish facing better chance of survival.
fornia during the next five
years.
All of the projects are
dedicated to restoring fish
populations and habitats, es-
pecially endangered Lost
River and shortnose sucker
fish and coho and chinook
salmon.
Fourteen of the projects
will help Oregon.
Nearly half of the money
this year, $10 million, will go
to the Klamath Falls Na-
tional Fish Hatchery to breed
60,000 sucker fish annually.
The fish are native to Up-
per Klamath Lake and are
Yurok Tribe studies Klamath Chinook die-off
In late August and early
this month, dozens of dead
Chinook Salmon were ob-
ser ved along a 40-mile
stretch of the Lower Kla-
math River.
The Yurok Tribe’s Fisher-
ies Department had deter-
mined the fish suffocated
due to a pathogenic bacteria
known as gill rot.
Tribal fisheries staff have
also noticed salmon with Ich
Cascades
E a s t Tr a n s i t
Route
20
serves travel-
ers between
Warm Springs
and Madras.
Yo u c a n f i n d
the schedule
at the Cas-
cades
East
t r a n s i t
website, where
you can also
download their
real-time app:
cascadeseast
transit.com/
routes-sched-
ules/warm-
springs-ma-
dras-route-20/
infections, a parasitic ciliate
often germinated by poor
water quality and tempera-
ture changes.
The area where the dead
fish were found, from Blakes
Riffle to Weitchpec, has
warmer than average waters
due to the reservoirs behind
four dams.
Due to warmer waters and
flag ging fish health, the
Yurok Tribe called for addi-
tional water to be released
from the Lewiston Reservoir
in Trinity County with the
aim to cool down the river
and reduce fish congrega-
tions.
Whether the diseases will
result in a massive fish kill
remains unclear, but the
Yurok, Hoopa Valley and
Karuk Tribes are all working
on solutions to diminishing
fish health.
when fish are most active and
acclimating fish in the upper
basin have both helped, but
there is still work to do. Af-
ter visiting our peers at
PacifiCorp, Puget Sound En-
ergy and Tacoma Power, we
learned they had all seen ma-
jor improvements in juvenile
fish passage by adding a lead
net.
A lead net is a single panel
of netting that extends into
the reservoir, bisecting the
fish entrance and creating a
‘wall’ that guides fish toward
the collector entrance.
This past February we in-
stalled our own lead net at
the SWW, and our early re-
sults indicate that it’s work-
ing.
From 2010 to 2021, our
average reservoir passage
efficiency (the metric we use
to measure fish collection)
for steelhead has hovered
around 10-15 percent.
Tribal leaders praise Snake River dams report
The governor of Wash-
ington state, Jay Inslee, and
U.S. Sen. Patty Murray just
released a long-anticipated
report on breaching the
dams along the lower Snake
River.
Echoing an earlier draft,
they said that taking out the
dams is ultimately the best
chance for threatened and
endangered salmon. But they
also detailed the enormous
impacts dam removal would
have on clean energy, trans-
portation and the broader
economy.
They said now is not the
right time to breach the
Big win for endangered Klamath Basin fish
Endangered suckers and
salmon in the Klamath Basin
face a greater shot at survival
thanks to federal funds re-
cently awarded.
Oregon’s U.S. Senators
Jeff Merkley and Ron
Wyden announced the first
33 Klamath Basin restora-
tion projects to receive funds
totaling more than $26 mil-
lion this year.
The money is part of
$162 million from the 2021
Bipartisan Infrastructure
Law for improving the ail-
ing health of the Klamath
Basin in Oregon and Cali-
Page 5
vital to the Klamath Tribes,
but their populations have
plummeted due to drought,
over-irrigation, pollution and
habitat loss.
The Klamath Tribes will
receive more than $1 million
to breed and monitor more
Lost River suckers and to
restore some of their spawn-
ing sites.
They’ll also receive nearly
$1 million more to grow their
own chinook salmon fishery.
The Klamath Tribes have not
had access to native Klamath
River salmon fisheries for
more than a 100 years.
Courtesy CRITFC
Lower Snake River dam may be breached.
dams, but that the option
should continue to be on the
table.
The Yakama Nation
praised Inslee and Murray
for “championing a compre-
hensive approach to Colum-
bia Basin salmon recovery,”
said Jeremy Takala, chairman
of the Fish and Wildlife Com-
mittee for the Yakama Na-
tion.
Federal energy agency wants
lower Klamath dams gone
The Federal Energy Regu-
latory Commission has is-
sued a final Environmental
Impact Statement recom-
mending the removal of the
four lower Klamath River
dams along the border of
Oregon and California. The
dam removal would be one
of the largest in U.S. history,
second to the removal of the
Elwha Dam on Washington’s
Olympic Peninsula.
“Restoring the impounded
reaches to a free-flowing
river would have significant
beneficial effect on restoring
salmon runs, access to tra-
ditional foods, Tribal cultural
practices, and a characteris-
tic fluvial landscape,” read
the environmental impact
statement.
Additionally, dam re-
moval is expected to im-
prove water quality and fish-
eries along with terrestrial
and aquatic resources used
by nearby tribes. “These
benefits would aid in the con-
tinuation and restoration of
tribal practices and tradi-
tions that have been ad-
versely affected.”
States close salmon fishing below Bonneville Dam
With Chinook salmon
catches trending well above
expectation, fishery manag-
ers from the states of Or-
egon and Washington an-
nounced last week that they
were closing the season
along the lower Columbia
River from Bonneville Dam
to Buoy 10, including the
Camas Slough. This was a
state action, and not tribal
regulation.
Fishery managers with
the Oregon Department of
Fish and Wildlife and Wash-
ington Department of Fish
and Wildlife agreed to close
salmon fishing downstream
of Bonneville Dam after
preliminary data showed im-
pacts to Lower Columbia
River “tule” Chinook—
which are listed as threat-
ened under the Endangered
Species Act—were much
higher than anticipated.
“This closure is a big deal
and a decision not taken
lightly, but we’ve got to do this
to ensure fisheries remain
within their conservation lim-
its on these listed runs of
fish,” said Tucker Jones, Or-
egon Fish and Wildlife Ocean
Salmon and Columbia River
program manager. “It kills us
to have to close fishing before
Labor Day weekend.”