Smoke Signals 5
Tribe BuiBds New FosDn Weir Dm YamhiDD Rover
The Natural Resources Department is bringing fish back up the South Yamhill with an unfolding plan that at
this time includes the mother of all fish weirs.
NOVEMBER 1, 2006
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Tribal Engineer Eric Scott (I) discusses design issues with Herman Zamorra, Construction Foreman for Gelco
Construction, the subcontractor responsible for pouring the concrete footing for the fish weir. Tribal Fish & Wildlife
Coordinator Kelly Dirksen is in the background.
By Ron Karten
For the last three years, the Trib
al Natural Resources Department
has put up temporary fish traps,
called weirs, to count the number
of steelhead and coho swimming up
the south fork of the Yamhill River
to spawn. The wire weirs sit in a
jumble today beside the Yamhill,
watching as the big one is built and
soon will work in their stead.
In the old days, the fish were
plentiful here, according to Tribal
Elders.
Tribal Elder Dean Mercier used to
come out to the South Yamhill after
school on Fridays and over the week
end would catch enough trout for the
neighborhood. In the 1960s, after the
state built the fish ladder at Oregon
City, he said, steelhead trout started
to appear and traveled as far as five
miles above the current weir site.
That was the first time he'd seen
Chinook salmon in the river, too.
Tribal Elder Dale Langley also
used to fish the creek regularly.
We used to catch cutthroat out of
there. In the fall, I know damn well
there was steelhead, but we had the
old willow pole with the string tied
on it, and they'd break the line. I
caught one about 18 inches long. I
think (Tribal Elder, now passed on)
Orville Leno, he caught a couple."
Langley is vice chair of the Fish &
Wildlife Committee.
Today, the Tribe is involved in a
number of efforts to bring the fish
back.
One is this effort to build a weir
that can withstand the twin chal
lenges of high water and debris
flowing down the creek. If success
ful, it will enable the department to
measure the size of the fish, deter
mine the gender and species, said
Natural Resources Fish & Wildlife
Coordinator Kelly Dirksen.
Tribal staffers will implant trans
mitters in some fish to track migration
above the weir. Seeing where they
go "will allow us to target habitat im
provement projects," said Dirksen.
The farthest up this fork of the
Yamhill that fish have been found
is six miles, said Dirksen, to where
the west and north forks split.
"They're using more of the creek
than we thought."
"The long term goal is "to get
catchable steelhead on the reserva
tion," he said. It will require a fish
development plan, and along the
way, establishment of a hatchery.
"The weir will give us information
to develop that plan."
Tribal Engineer Eric Scott de
signed the weir. He included "a
pivot on the bottom to allow the weir
to adjust to different stages of the
river," he said. The weir also will
adjust to catch different fish sizes,
and to allow debris that stacks up in
the mesh to be cleared away.
Round Valley LLC, the Trib-ally-owned
construction company
is the general Contractor on the
job, and Gelco Construction is the
subcontractor for the concrete pour.
In mid-October, the company had
diverted the creek with culverts to
drain sections where concrete foot
ings would be poured.
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Tribal member Tim George, with Round Valley Construction, takes some measurements for the next phase of the job.