The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced this week that results of a recent status review indicate that Endangered Species Act listing of the Yellowstone cutthroat trout, found in Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Utah and Nevada, is not warranted.
Steelhead are spawning in the new artificial stream channels at the Oregon Hatchery Research Center in the Alsea River basin, and researchers have begun studying how the fish choose mates and where they prefer to spawn – key factors in preserving fish runs.
This week, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began installing permanent barriers at Bonneville Lock and Dam to keep sea lions from entering fish ladders — a key element in a new strategy to cut down mammals’ predation on migrating adult salmon.
President Bush’s proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2007 includes $578 million for “Columbia River Federal Basinwide Salmon Funding” – an increase of $19 million over FY 2006’s enacted budget of $559 million.
Three Idaho irrigation districts have asked a U.S. District Court judge to put an end to all Columbia River mainstem salmon and steelhead fishing and to strike down a federal salmon protection plan that calls for flows from Upper Snake River storage projects.
A preliminary set of “terms and conditions” submitted last week by NOAA Fisheries would require the owners of the Snake River’s Hells Canyon Complex of hydro projects to make flow manipulations and do habitat work for the benefit of salmon and other species, but would not require fish ladders to provide access to historic spawning grounds.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council entered the New Year with a revised power plan in place, but with much work to do balancing power requirements with actions outlined in subbasin plans adopted recently as part of its Columbia Basin fish and wildlife program.
More than a million fertilized white sturgeon eggs were released into the Kootenai River’s braided, canyon reaches upstream of Bonners Ferry, Idaho this past summer as a strategy to revive flagging wild populations.
The Bush Administration announced this week that NOAA Fisheries will soon launch a collaborative review of how harvest and hatcheries are affecting the recovery of Pacific Northwest salmon and steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act.
The Bush Administration’s announcement of a major new initiative to reform salmon and steelhead hatchery and harvest practices in the Columbia Basin elicited both support and concerns.
Concerns about the run size and about potential impacts on federally protected spring chinook salmon prompted Oregon and Washington fishery managers Thursday to limit the time and range of Columbia River mainstem sport fishers this spring.
An independent scientific panel’s review of fish data collected during last year’s court ordered summer spill operations at Columbia/Snake River hydro projects points out “potential” benefits and drawbacks of the practice.
NOAA Fisheries Service chose to follow the advice of the state of Oregon this week in announcing that it feels the Oregon coast coho “evolutionarily significant unit” — a collection of wild and hatchery populations — is robust enough that it does not warrant listing under the Endangered Species Act.
The heads of the Oregon and Washington departments of fish and wildlife hope to reconcile within the next week the states’ differences over how the mainstem Columbia River harvest of spring chinook salmon will be allocated this year between sport and commercial fishers.
A U.S./Canada scientific panel says there is no ready, or inexpensive, cure for problems that have beset the north Pacific’s coded-wire tag program for monitoring ocean fishing’s impacts on individual stocks of fish.
Last year proved to be “a pretty typical migration” for Columbia/Snake river juvenile spring chinook salmon and steelhead in terms of timing and survival but the jury’s still out on Snake River fall chinook, which rushed toward the ocean a bit earlier than normal.
The Kootenai Tribe of Idaho, Idaho Department of Fish and Game, and federal agencies start a new chapter in efforts to conserve and recover Kootenai River white sturgeon.
The process for revising the federal government’s Columbia River hydrosystem salmon protection plan are described in a set of documents filed Tuesday with the U.S. District Court in Portland.
The Bonneville Power Administration’s 2005 annual report shows the agency earned just over $126 million in modified net revenues, the highest since prior to the West Coast energy crisis of 2000-2001.
Resident rainbow trout populations were out, then potentially brought back in, and ultimately left out of 10 West Coast steelhead listings announced Dec. 23 by NOAA Fisheries Service.
The federal agency charged with guarding the health of Columbia River basin salmon and steelhead populations this week noted 2005’s returns have been relatively strong despite what appears to be reduced ocean productivity to nourish those fishes to maturity.
Hatchery-born salmon still are not getting a fair shake in Endangered Species Act decisions, according to a complaint filed Tuesday that challenges 16 ESA listings of West Coast salmon made by NOAA Fisheries.
The fall chinook salmon return to the mouth of the Columbia River next year is expected to dip below 500,000 for the first time since 2000, according to a preliminary forecast issued this week by the Oregon and Washington departments of fish and wildlife.
Comments received from NOAA Fisheries and the Bonneville Power Administration faults the 2005 draft version of the Fish Passage Center’s smolt survival study as incomplete in its analysis.
A Seattle-based federal judge last week denied a request from federal attorneys to dismiss a lawsuit that takes to task NOAA Fisheries newly devised strategy for determining the significance of hatchery salmon and steelhead in making Endangered Species Act listing determinations.
A truckload of documents filed with the U.S. District Court last week seek to discredit a previously submitted Columbia River hydrosystem operations plan for the spring and summer of 2006, and substitute plans that federal agencies and others say will provide more benefits for salmon and cost less to implement.
Idaho Republican Sen. Larry Craig says he claimed a victory for science and thriftiness Monday when the 2006 Energy and Water appropriations bill cleared Congress containing language he had inserted to cut funding for the Fish Passage Center.
Under an alternative offered for comment last week by NOAA Fisheries, 10 stocks of West Coast steelhead would be listed under the Endangered Species Act without their rainbow trout cousins.
A request filed this week in U.S. District Court would in many respects change the federal government’s plan for operating the federal Columbia River basin hydrosystem to benefit fish, power generation, navigation and irrigation.
A federal report issued this week notes high rates of survival for juvenile salmon migrants through Columbia and Snake river hydro projects during this past summer’s court-ordered spill program, but says the uncertainty remains over whether spill should be the preferred fish passage tool during the warmest of months.
One angler earned $39,620 this year fishing for northern pikeminnows with a hook and line. His closest rival reeled in $38,084 during the five-month season.
A joint 11-page report released last week by two independent science panels chides Columbia Basin fishery experts and policy makers for failing thus far to develop a plan for evaluating critical uncertainties — including possible negative effects — associated with supplementing natural spawning salmon and steelhead populations with hatchery fish.
Actions ranging from the installation of a new fish passage device at Ice Harbor Dam to restoration and protection of habitat are described in federal agencies’ fourth annual report on efforts to improve survival of Columbia River basin salmon and steelhead stocks.
A trio of Northwest congressmen exploring options to improve Columbia River adult salmon survival returned again and again to the topic of harvest during discussions with constituents this week in Vancouver, Wash.
The Fish Passage Center has released the annual 2005 “final draft” of the “Comparative Survival Study” that looks at smolt-to-adult return (SAR) data from electronically marked (PIT-tagged) Columbia River spring/summer chinook and summer steelhead during the years 1994 to 2003.
The future of Columbia/Snake river salmon restoration efforts drew comments ranging from gentle encouragement to threats Wednesday during closing exchanges at a Boise conference.
Idaho’s governor this week said regional interests needed to put the spurs to the federal government to produce a realistic salmon recovery plan and rein in commercial fishing practices that he says are blunting recovery efforts.
The Columbia River Compact on Monday gave non-Indian commercial gillnetters the green light to pursue another slice of their allowed “impacts” on the river’s upriver bright fall chinook salmon run.
After reaching agreement on a variety of vexing issues, a Northwest Power and Conservation Council committee this week moved forward a proposed process for reviewing and selecting Columbia Basin fish and wildlife projects for funding.
Tribal and non-Indian commercial fishers were given more harvest opportunities on the mainstem Columbia River while sport fishers were shut down because a successful season has resulted in the catch of more than their share of “upriver bright” fall chinook salmon.
Harmful algal blooms that have closed shellfish harvests in the Pacific Northwest and caused “red tides” elsewhere appear to be increasing, scientists say, and the likely suspects are global climate change and increased human impact in coastal zones.
White sturgeon are almost exclusively the victims of the so-called “ghost nets” that shroud the bottom of the Columbia River’s Bonneville, The Dalles and John Day dam reservoirs.
Both tribal and non-Indian commercial fishers are bumping up against their limits following outings this past week, meaning they will soon join lower Columbia River sport anglers in abstaining from further harvest of returning fall chinook salmon.
The Fish Passage Center this week released a “preliminary analysis” concluding that survival levels of juvenile salmon migrating “in-river” through the lower Snake River this summer were “the highest recorded in recent years.”
Current efforts to save wild salmon in the Pacific Northwest and California almost certainly will fail.
That’s the grim conclusion of 33 salmon scientists, policy analysts and wild salmon advocates participating in a year-long initiative to create policy options that would sustain wild runs of salmon in the West.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials say they will provide the construction costs if other entities pay ongoing operations and maintenance and monitoring expenses that are necessary to eliminate costly March spill that is intended to flush hatchery-produced tule fall chinook salmon through Bonneville Dam.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced Sept. 1 that it is initiating a status review of the Yellowstone cutthroat trout to determine whether to propose listing the species as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act.
Dozens of innovative water transactions are set to play out in the Columbia Basin as the driest time of the year descends on the region’s tributaries. Imperiled salmon must navigate these often isolated streams where water shortages escape the notice of population centers.
Veteran Columbia River basin fish biologist Bruce Suzumoto will assume the daunting task of balancing hydrosystem and power needs with those of imperiled fish when he takes over Oct. 17 as assistant regional administrator for NOAA Fisheries’ Hydropower Division.
Fishing for fall chinook on the lower Columbia River mainstem has remained slow for both sport and commercial anglers but, with a return to the river’s mouth of 671,400 adults anticipated, officials expect the dam to burst soon.
A decision about when to start refilling reservoir levels behind federal lower Snake River dams will wait until next week, and may have to be decided at a higher policy level, after members of the Technical Management Team failed Wednesday to reach consensus.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Pacific Region Fisheries Program has begun a three-year review of the Columbia River Basin salmon hatcheries it owns or operates with the aim of producing recommendations about how they might best be run to achieve Endangered Species Act recovery goals while providing sustainable fisheries.
With water temperatures at unusually high levels in the lower Columbia River, it appears that spawning-minded adult fall chinook salmon are biding their time in the Pacific Ocean.
A series of “scoping” meetings are planned later this month to discuss the potential hatchery project that the Bonneville Power Administration has proposed for funding on the Columbia River in central Washington.
As the court-ordered summer spill for fish continues this month at four federal Lower Snake River dams and McNary Dam on the Columbia River, researchers are continuing efforts to learn more about the fish most impacted by that spill — subyearling Snake River fall chinook.
Non-native commercial fishers have harvested nearly 3,000 chinook and 1,000 sturgeon over the past week in the lower Columbia River, roughly half their allocation for the “early August” season.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council on Wednesday recommended $157.2 million in Columbia River Fish and Wildlife Program project spending during fiscal year 2006.
Two sockeye salmon have returned to their spawning grounds in the shadows of the Sawtooth Mountains.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Tuesday ruled that a lower court’s order to spill water for fish passage during late summer at five federal Columbia Basin mainstem dams did not abuse the court’s discretion and was “well-grounded in governing statute.”
In the wake of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals’ ruling upholding a lower court order requiring spill at Snake and lower Columbia River dams this summer, federal officials, who argued vigorously against the spill, say they will continue pursuing a consensus approach to hydro operations, as well as region-wide recovery plans.
New salmon rules go into effect for the lower Columbia River Aug. 1, when the fall salmon season gets under way from Buoy 10 upstream to Bonneville Dam.
Knowledge about the effects of harvests on naturally spawning Columbia River salmon and steelhead populations has advanced notably but the region still lacks the data and tools necessary to determine whether recovery efforts are hindered by carefully managed fisheries.
Idaho Republican U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo says a key fish restoration effort in the upper Columbia Basin is an example of how collaboration can serve as an alternative to listings and litigation under the Endangered Species act.
A staff-generated proposal for Fiscal Year 2006 fish and wildlife project funding, and for the treatment of related issues, won favor neither in committee nor before the full Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
Recent, relatively bountiful run sizes have helped fuel the West Coast economy to the tune of about $142 million in personal income, according to a study conducted by a panel of eight independent economists at the request of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
Commercial and sport fishing continues up and down the Columbia River mainstem even as passing numbers of adult summer chinook and sockeye salmon — mostly bound for central Washington lakes, river reaches and hatcheries — start to dwindle.
Salmon managers in Idaho are concerned they might miss brood stock goals at hatcheries in the Clearwater River Basin.
Debate continued this week over the value of summertime spill for Columbia Basin salmon and steelhead, this time with parties filing briefs with a federal appellate court.
A fish species declared officially extinct in Washington’s Okanogan River subbasin returned recently to provide table fare for tribal members’ first-salmon ceremony for the first time in four-score years.
Oregon on Tuesday voted with “reluctance” in favor of Washington fishery officials’ proposal to allow sport anglers to keep both marked and unmarked chinook salmon that are forging their way up the Columbia River mainstem during July.
The Columbia River Compact on Thursday gave approval for a tribal commercial gill-net fishery next week in the Columbia River mainstem reservoirs between Bonneville and McNary dams.
NOAA Fisheries on Thursday issued the final policy it will use when considering the status of hatchery produced fish in the agency’s determination of whether particular fish stocks will require protection under the Endangered Species Act.
The first non-tribal commercial fisheries in 40 years that specifically target Upper Columbia summer chinook salmon were approved this week by the Columbia River Compact.
Fish hatcheries in the Columbia River Basin need clearly defined goals, better integration with wild fish production and better coordination among the numerous fish-production programs, according to a report approved by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week for transmission to Congress.
Long-familiar personalities moved to the background this week with the appointment of six new members to the Independent Scientific Review Panel — the largest turnover in the nine-year history of the group that reviews fish and wildlife projects as well as offering advice on other issues to the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
Members of Congress heard two contrasting views on salmon recovery, dam breaching and the Endangered Species Act Monday ( June 6) but also said they saw and heard room for compromise.
A relatively thin but steady stream of salmon passing the Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam has pushed up the overall forecast of the 2005 upriver spring chinook adult return and allowed on June 4 the reopening of a mainstem sport fishery that has been closed since late April.
A federal salmon protection plan thrown recently into legal limbo by a federal judge was ripped again last week, this time in a report released by fishery managers and scientists.
Endangered Species Act listing determinations due next week for 27 West Coast salmon and steelhead stocks will likely be delayed, according to officials for the federal agency carrying out the status reviews.
Tribal interests and hydropower customer representatives were alternately elated and deflated by the news that basic elements of the federal government’s Columbia/Snake salmon protection plan had been deemed by a judge as “arbitrary and capricious” and illegal under the Endangered Species Act.
Fishery managers released the first hatchery-reared fall chinook salmon into the Grande Ronde River Monday and Tuesday with the hope they’ll both help recover the threatened species and, eventually, contribute to fisheries.
Utility interests and fish advocates used Monday’s final Power Function Review meeting to continue to pull the Bonneville Administration either way on the fish and wildlife spending scale.
Libby Dam releases started ramping up late Wednesday under a plan with different aproaches toward helping endangered white sturgeon in the lower Kootenai River.
Higher counts of upriver spring chinook at Bonneville Dam have pushed up estimates of those runs’ adult return and allowed Washington and Oregon state fisheries managers to open sport fishing for steelhead and shad on portions of the lower Columbia River beginning Sunday, May 22.
Federal dam operators have agreed to commence daytime spill at the Columbia River’s John Day Dam for up to seven days as a “limited one-time agreement for the benefit of fish,” according to the head of the Corps of Engineers’ Reservoir Control Center.
The Bonneville Power Administration’s suggested fiscal year 2007-2009 funding level for the Columbia River fish and wildlife program drew a mixed reaction during Northwest Power and Conservation Council discussions this week.
Fisheries experts continue to be confounded about the dismal Columbia/Snake upriver spring chinook salmon return that was predicted to be the fourth largest since 1979 with a total of more than a quarter million adult fish but will likely be about one-third that number.
A draft “closeout” letter and report released this week by the Bonneville Power Administration identifies potential net cost savings of up to $80 million per year for the fiscal year 2007-2009 rate period.
Treaty fishers have pulled in their nets and the state of Idaho has ended prematurely a sport fishing season on the lower Snake River because a projected upriver spring chinook salmon bounty has, at least through midweek, failed to materialize.
A program that pays recreational anglers to harvest northern pikeminnow from portions of the Columbia River system begins May 2.
During a daylong hearing Wednesday U.S. District Court Judge James Redden gave no hints of his leanings as attorneys for federal, state, and tribal governments, utilities, irrigators and river users debated the merits of the federal government’s Columbia/Snake hydrosystem salmon protection plan.
Despite an upriver spring chinook run that has recently begun to show signs of life, Oregon and Washington fish managers this week left the closure in place on both sport and commercial fisheries on the Columbia River mainstem and in off-channel “select areas.”
The University of Washington Alaska Salmon Program, the world’s longest-running effort to monitor salmon and their ecosystems, has received nearly $2.4 million from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation to expand its sampling scope and sophistication.
A continued scarcity of upriver spring chinook salmon at Bonneville Dam has forced Oregon and Washington to close Columbia River mainstem and side-channel sport fisheries to prevent further “impacts” on federally protected stocks within the salmon run.
NOAA Fisheries this week released a draft interim salmon recovery plan for the Lower Columbia River Subbasin that the agency says is the Northwest’s first comprehensive science-based recovery plan for salmon and steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act.
Despite year-to-date upriver spring chinook counts at Bonneville Dam that are the lowest on record, Oregon and Washington managers decided Wednesday to give sport anglers at least one more week of fishing on the Columbia River mainstem.
The lower Columbia River commercial fleet has been docked until fishery managers see evidence that the anticipated upriver spring chinook salmon run is somewhere close to forecasts.
With less than two months remaining before they intend to issue a “closeout” letter detailing expected costs for the 2007-2009 rate period, Bonneville Power Administration officials continued this week to take input on fish and wildlife expenditures that, at least for now, are estimated at $691.6 million per year.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Marine Fisheries Service has accepted a Washington state citizen’s petition to list Puget Sound steelhead under the federal Endangered Species Act, saying that the petition describes significant short- and long-term downward trends for steelhead in a wide range of rivers emptying into the sound.
Three of ten hydropower projects recognized by the National Hydropower Association for “outstanding environmental stewardship efforts” are in the Columbia River Basin.
The Nez Perce Tribal Executive Council Tuesday (March 29) voted to accept the terms of the proposed settlement of the Tribe’s water right claims included in the Snake River Basin Adjudication.
Oregon and Washington fishery managers this week OK’d a second 8-hour commercial fishery on the lower Columbia River mainstem while acknowledging a growing concern that the upriver spring chinook salmon run may not be as big as anticipated.
For the first time in nearly thirty years, anglers in Idaho may have the chance to fish for chinook salmon on the Upper Salmon River.
U.S. Justice Department attorneys last week asked Oregon’s U.S. District Court to reject legal requests from a coalition of fishing and conservation groups, from the state of Oregon and from two irrigation associations to have the 10-year federal Columbia River hydrosystem salmon protection plan declared illegal.
The goal of resurrecting tribal spring and summer/fall chinook salmon fisheries, and creating recreational opportunities, in Washington’s Okanogan subbasin and other waters of the Colville Reservation moved into the realm of possibility Tuesday.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week adopted four subbasin management plans despite a failure to win the endorsement of local county governments that have expressed concern about certain elements of the fish and wildlife management strategies and the overall planning process.
The increased presence of sport-only winter steelhead and a continued scarcity of targeted Columbia River basin spring chinook salmon this week prompted the commercial fleet to “take the day off” to await better fishing conditions.
While Idaho’s big game animals have enjoyed an extremely mild winter, record low snow pack and eventual spring runoff mean trouble for Idaho’s migrating salmon and steelhead smolts.
The Columbia River basin spring chinook salmon run has only just begun, but the few being caught in lower river fishers’ nets are bringing high value.
A fight within a legal fight has emerged with one party claiming a federal Columbia River salmon protection plan puts too little blame on the hydrosystem while another faults the plan because it lumps too much responsibility for fish mortality on the dams’ operations.
The findings from four years of research were released this week, offering recommendations on how Portland’s Willamette River reaches might be made more hospitable for juvenile salmon and steelhead that dally there and grow as they make their way from the spawning grounds to the ocean.
With an ample supply of marine prey fish available, salmon consumption in the Columbia River estuary by the world’s largest Caspian tern colony last spring and summer dropped to an all-time low since research on the birds’ diet began in 1997.
Commercial fishers in their first outing of the year saw hints of what is expected to be an overall spring chinook salmon return to the Columbia River of more than 370,000 adult fish.
Despite continuing legal threats hovering in the background, federal “action” agencies have begun to push for rapid implementation of actions they say will raise salmon survival through the Columbia River hydrosystem, and beyond, and foreclose the possibility that certain of fish stocks will become extinct.
Twenty-five locally developed subbasin management plans were adopted Thursday by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council as amendments to its Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program.
The Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission Friday (Feb. 11) directed
Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife Director Lindsay Ball to manage
the incidental loss of wild steelhead to less than 2 percent of the run
during the Columbia River commercial spring chinook fishery.
Biologists anticipate that the Columbia River Basin will enjoy another robust run of fall chinook salmon this year, fortified by what is anticipated to be the fourth-largest “upriver bright” return since 1964.
The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife will have more flexibility in managing the commercial fishery for spring chinook salmon that gets under way later this month or in early March on the Columbia River following a relaxing of the state’s policy incidental impacts on protected winter steelhead.
Spending what is necessary to restore Columbia River basin salmon and steelhead runs would produce a $550 million annual economic boon, according to scenarios detailed in a report prepared by Boise economist Don Reading.
Letters, e-mails and phone calls are flooding in to Oregon and Washington fish and wildlife commissions, in large part protesting a proposal to relax limits on the incidental take of protected wild winter steelhead during the commercial harvest of hatchery-produced spring chinook salmon in the lower Columbia River.
More than 80 interested sport, recreational and tribal fishers turned out Jan. 28 to hear Oregon and Washington officials’ management strategy for maximizing the Columbia River mainstem harvest of hatchery-produced spring chinook salmon while minimizing the impacts on the wild portions of the 2005 run that are listed under the Endangered Species Act.
Fully implementing newly created subbasin goals and objectives over a 10-year span would require more than a doubling of the amount of money now being spent through the Columbia River Basin fish and wildlife plan, according to estimates compiled by a resource managers work group.
A better-than-average return of steelhead — the ocean-going rainbow trout — resulted in moderate to high success among Idaho anglers during the 2004 fall season.
State scientists believe that Oregon coastal coho are on the road to meeting the restoration goals of the Oregon Plan for Salmon and Watersheds, Gov. Ted Kulongoski’s office announced this week.
Sport anglers attending a Wednesday public meeting told Washington officials that too many uncertainties remain, and recovery is too far in the future, to allow any increased commercial fishery impacts on lower Columbia River basin winter steelhead stocks that are listed under the Endangered Species Act.
Some sea lions are, quite simply, incorrigible, state and federal officials Thursday told a group of sport and commercial fishers who have become disgruntled about the pinnipeds’ growing presence in the lower Columbia River and their voracious appetite for salmon and steelhead.
Swelling numbers of non-native American shad in the Columbia/Snake river mainstem are likely having an impact on salmon, other fish species and the ecosystem generally, but little is known about the magnitude, or even the direction, of that change, according to a U.S. Geological Survey researcher.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today (Jan. 14) released a plan for dispersing two thirds of the world’s largest Caspian tern colony from the mouth of the Columbia River to seven alternate sites in Washington, Oregon and California.
In an effort to expand fishing opportunities for hatchery spring chinook, Washington and Oregon fish managers are seeking greater flexibility in determining limits on wild steelhead inadvertently caught during salmon fisheries in the Columbia River.
The Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission supports options to extend 2005 Columbia River spring chinook season into May
The Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission Friday (Jan. 7) supported restricting either the bag limit or the number of open fishing days each week for Columbia River spring chinook in the area immediately below Bonneville Dam in an effort to extend the 2005 recreational season into May and to spread the allowable harvest to all parts of the river.
U.S. District Court Judge Michael Hogan on Tuesday said he agreed with the legal contention that the federal government violated the Endangered Species Act when it failed to consider hatchery fish in its assessment of coho in southern Oregon and northern California rivers.
Bull trout are a threatened and protected species in Idaho and killing one can cost you, as one Boise man found out recently.
Rob Walton, NOAA Fisheries assistant regional administrator for salmon recovery, says his agency is stepping up efforts to gain the aid and advice of others in the region toward the goal of completing draft salmon recovery plans in each of six domains by December.
A Columbia Basin Fish and Wildlife Authority member work group has set about the task of “sizing” the ratepayer-funded fish and wildlife program so that it can offer its views on funding needs for the years beyond fiscal 2006.
For the past few years Idaho Fish and Game has been working to slow the impact of non-native rainbow trout on native Yellowstone cutthroat trout in the South Fork Snake River below Palisades Dam. Now anglers are lending a hand.
Eleven fishing and conservation groups said this week that the Bonneville Power Administration, U.S. Corps of Engineers and Bureau of Reclamation will be targeted with a lawsuit if the agencies implement their newly developed “Updated Proposed Action” for the operation of 14 Columbia Basin federally hydro projects.
Northwest Power and Conservation Council and Bonneville Power Administration staff and others are looking at past and potential demands in an attempt to determine Columbia River Fish and Wildlife program funding needs in the future.
The 2005 Columbia River upriver spring chinook run is expected to be up slightly, staunching a trend that has seen adult returns to the river mouth slip each year since 2001’s record.
After several years of talk and negotiations, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) is preparing to transfer the operations responsibility for its Klickitat River hatchery to the Yakama Indian Nation.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week reached a long-sought goal by adopting as amendments to its Columbia River Fish and Wildlife program 23 individual subbasin management plans that will ultimately help the panel identify spending priorities.
Washington Gov. Gary Locke, together with the Lower Columbia Fish Recovery Board (LCFRB) and the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, this week presented to the federal government the first locally developed regional salmon recovery plan for Washington state during an event in Vancouver.
Some young Snake River fall chinook salmon may be making the best of a dam-caused situation, effectively shifting the timing of their migration to the ocean and thus creating a second distinct life history type within the same fish stock.
Grant County Public Utility District set minimum winter river flows through Hanford Reach at 65,000 cubic feet per second and will maintain the 65 kcfs as the minimum flow level for the next six months until fall chinook incubation is complete and salmon fry emerge from the gravel.
The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission has adopted permanent rules restricting importation of deer and elk into Washington state that are harvested from states and Canadian provinces where chronic wasting disease (CWD) has been found in wild populations.
Columbia River basin residents with a stake in the region’s salmon restoration effort remained at opposite poles regarding the value of a new federal plan to assure that hydrosystem operations do not push fish stocks to extinction.
Federal officials on Tuesday announced a package of Columbia/Snake river hydrosystem operations and off-site fish mitigation actions that they feel will both ward off the extinction of protected salmon and steelhead and parry potential legal thrusts like those that forced a December 2000 strategy to be rewritten.
A relicensing plan for four Lewis River dams that will re-open up to 174 miles of potential Columbia River Basin salmon habitat was signed this week by negotiators representing utilities, tribes, federal and state resource agencies, three counties and environmental groups.
The $388 billion domestic spending bill for Fiscal Year 2005 approved by Congress Nov. 20 includes tens of millions of dollars for efforts related to Columbia River Basin fish and wildlife mitigation.
A room full of scientists called together to consider the potential effects on salmon of reduced Columbia River summertime flow augmentation came away with new information, and more questions than answers.
It was a big run in 2004 for yearling spring chinook and steelhead juveniles migrating out of the Snake River system. However, due to poor in-river conditions with low flows and little spill provided at dams during the spring, most of the spring juvenile fish were transported by barge to below Bonneville Dam.
The first thing NOAA Fisheries will get when it releases its new hatchery policy next year is a lawsuit, according to the Pacific Legal Foundation, which has sent the agency a 60-day notice that it will sue if the policy continues to distinguish between hatchery and naturally spawning fish.
NOAA Fisheries officials say they are preparing an Environmental Impact Statement for the funding and operation of Columbia River hatcheries supported through the Mitchell Act.
A group of state, federal and tribal officials that convened occasionally to troubleshoot during the development of 59 Columbia River basin “subbasin plans” was called together again last to offer advice on how and when the fish and wildlife goals of those plans should be implemented.
Volunteers and Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife staff successfully collected 107 adult steelhead in the lower Grande Ronde River at Troy in the second year of a hatchery management project.
The group charged with setting spending priorities for fish passage improvements at federal mainstem hydro projects was asked last week whether they might want to put the Columbia River’s McNary Dam ahead of the Snake’s Little Goose facility for installation of so-called “removable spillway weirs” – a new surface bypass technology.
Ranging from lengthy, detailed critiques to succinct post cards, tens of thousands of comments have poured in regarding agencies’ plans to operate the federal Columbia River hydrosystem while protecting salmon and steelhead stocks listed under the Endangered Species Act.
Greg Delwiche, a 20-year veteran of Columbia River energy and natural resource management, is the new vice president of Environment, Fish and Wildlife of the Bonneville Power Administration, the agency announced this week.
Northwest salmon fishing tribes gave higher marks this year to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for keeping pool fluctuations to a minimum at three lower Columbia River dam reservoirs during the eight weeks of treaty gillnet fishing between August and October.
More than 300 spring Chinook salmon carcasses will be returned after hatchery spawning to southeast Washington’s Tucannon River on October 29 to enhance the waterway for fish in the future.
A group of experts from four western states and British Columbia are going to spend the next year producing what they say will be one of the most blunt, honest evaluations ever done on the status of wild salmon in the Pacific Northwest and what it would actually take to save them.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council on Wednesday voted to release for public review and comment 29 locally produced “subbasin plan” recommendations as draft amendments to the Council’s fish and wildlife program.
Despite a fiscal wariness about large looming one-time and long-term costs, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week moved a $26 million expansion of the Northeast Oregon Hatchery program closer to reality.
More than $8.3 million has been spent in the last 10 years on lamprey research and restoration – the subject next week at the first Columbia River Basin Pacific Lamprey Summit at Portland State University.
Tribal gill-netters on Wednesday began 3 ½ days of fishing on the Columbia River mainstem above Bonneville Dam to cap what has been one of the more prolonged fall seasons in recent memories.
The Bonneville Power Administration said this week that there was a record catch of northern pikeminnow this year, saving 2.5-3.5 million juvenile salmon.
Oregon and Washington managers on Oct. 1 set the terms for what well could be the final Columbia River mainstem tribal and non-Indian commercial fishing outings of the season targeting, primarily, fall chinook and coho salmon.
Federal officials this week released a draft document intended to help the public better understand the “relationship and differences” between actions proposed in NOAA Fisheries’ new draft biological opinion for the federal hydropower system and the 2000 BiOp.
A larger than anticipated Columbia/Snake River fall chinook salmon return — and one that is showing a fat “tail” — allowed fishery managers this week to expand both sport and commercial opportunities on the Columbia mainstem.
The leaders of 400 salmon- and outdoor recreation-based businesses from 35 states this week signed a letter to Congress that chastises the federal government for its approach to protecting and enhancing Columbia River basin salmon and steelhead populations and asks help in refocusing the strategy.
A panel discussion Thursday focused on what might be done in the coming years and decades to maintain that buffer that Columbia River basin salmon populations will inevitably need when “ocean conditions” worsen and creeping global warming brings negative changes to their freshwater home as well.
Columbia River mainstem fishery managers could say mission accomplished Monday after deciding that sport fishing for fall chinook salmon will remain open through Sept. 30 on the lower Columbia River.
A good news/bad news scenario played out this week for lower Columbia River mainstem gill-netters who hauled in more fall chinook than expected but were forced off the water in order to preserve a sliver of their harvest share for later in the season.
The Columbia River mainstem over the next week will see some of its heaviest fishing action in recent memory, with recreational fishers lining the banks and commercial and sport boats afloat up and downriver, all buoyed by a fall chinook salmon run that is proving to be bigger than anticipated.
A “supplemental” biological assessment of the effects of Libby Dam operations on Kootenai River white sturgeon urges a focus on artificial production and research in the near future rather than major changes in spawning and rearing flows as a means of sustaining and recovering the beleaguered stock.
NOAA Fisheries this week released its report to Congress detailing the 3,213 projects undertaken since 2000 through the federal Pacific Coastal Salmon Recovery Fund.
Shooting California and ring-billed gulls in Mid-Columbia reservoirs as a means of reducing the species’ consumption of migrating salmon may be doing more harm than good, according to the results of a three-year study funded by the Chelan County Public Utility District.
As conservationists and tribes criticized the draft biological opinion released by NOAA Fisheries this week, states were cautious while awaiting staff reviews and utilities were optimistic that the plan will consider the cost of operations to the Northwest federal hydroelectric system.
Federal agencies released draft documents Thursday that officials say will shore up Columbia River basin salmon protection efforts biologically and legally, and do it in a manner that potentially reduces the cost to the federal hydropower system.
The jury is still out on the 2004 sockeye return to central Idaho’s Stanley Basin, though it is already better than the dismal 2003 run when only three fish managed the 900 miles from the Pacific Ocean up the Columbia, Snake and Salmon rivers.
NOAA Fisheries and federal “action” agencies said Tuesday that fish protection measures — past and future — at Columbia/Snake River dams and “offsite” have removed the stigma that salmon and steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act are jeopardized by hydrosystem operations.
Four Columbia River treaty tribes, with the aid of a federal grant, will explore the potential for siting a commercial fish processing center along the Columbia River with the goal of enhancing their share in the market place.
Dave Allen, regional director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Pacific Region, this week highlighted the approval of more than $2.2 million in grants to private landowners, conservation organizations and Native American tribes in Oregon, Washington and Idaho for conservation projects to benefit endangered, threatened and at-risk species and other wildlife.
Large numbers of non-native American shad appear to be filling a food niche in the Lower Columbia River that allows aquatic predators to grow faster and, ultimately, take a bigger bite out of salmon populations that fish managers and others are trying to rebuild.
Tribal and non-tribal Columbia River mainstem commercial fishers are hoping that the past few days of changed weather will trigger the spawning urges of fall chinook that have begun to enter the river but have yet to surge upstream en masse.
NOAA Fisheries announced Tuesday that it will accept until Oct. 20 public comment on its proposed hatchery listing policy and on proposed listing determinations for West Coast salmon and steelhead.
The Montana delegation on Thursday suggested that, in the future, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s fish and wildlife program should in some way share the financial risk when costly measures are taken in the federal hydrosystem in response to NPCC requests.
The Columbia River Compact on Wednesday decided to call off a Thursday/Friday commercial fishery on the lower Columbia River mainstem after a review of the first three days’ fishing showed “impacts” were climbing faster than anticipated.
A District of Columbia-based U.S. District Court judge in a Tuesday order dismissed most of the legal arguments underpinning a challenge to four West Coast salmon listings but delayed, at the federal government’s request, consideration of whether the listings violate the Endangered Species Act.
Idaho’s congressional delegation introduced bills in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives in late July that would move forward a $193 million framework agreement signed in May by the Nez Perce Tribe, the state of Idaho and the federal government. The agreement would resolve many of the longstanding water issues of the Snake River Adjudication.
Adjustments the last two weeks to flow and the temperature of the water released from Dworshak Dam successfully cooled the Snake River at Lower Granite Dam during a two-week hot spell.
The turning of the calendar page means that sport boats will be bobbing at the Columbia River mouth’s Buoy 10 in pursuit of coho and fall chinook salmon and that gill nets will soon be deployed in the lower mainstem with a fresh harvest allotment to fill.
With hotter than normal weather and rising tailwater temperatures at Lower Granite Dam, the Technical Management Team increased the amount of water released from Dworshak Dam on Friday, July 23.
A Northwest Power and Conservation Council issue paper on Columbia River basin hatchery management was sent out this week in search of answers about how artificial production should be used in the future to meet both harvest and conservation needs.
Tribal gill netters ventured out on the mainstem Columbia in pursuit of “summer” chinook salmon and sockeye this week and next despite the recognition that their harvest to-date has already far surpassed their allowed “impact” on the Snake River-bound portion of the chinook run.
When fall salmon fishing gets under way Aug. 1 in the lower Columbia River, anglers below Bonneville Dam will face a tighter chinook bag limit intended to keep the season running through December without interruption.
An agreement among 22 organizations that took 19 months of negotiations will result in the reintroduction of threatened summer steelhead and spring chinook salmon to 226 miles of habitat upstream of the Pelton/Round Butte complex of dams on the Deschutes River.
A U.S. Army Corps of Engineers decision this week to reduce summer spill as a means of fish passage at Columbia/Snake river hydroelectric projects in August is been followed, as promised, by a flurry of legal activity aimed at reversing the decision.
A newly revised forecast says that the 2004 sockeye return to the mouth of the Columbia River will total 119,000 fish — the largest return 17 years.
The modified summer spill program proposed by the Bonneville Power Administration and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on June 24 received NOAA Fisheries approval last week in a July 1 findings letter.
The Technical Management Team this week approved summer operations at Dworshak Dam on the North Fork of the Clearwater River that will save 200,000 acre feet of Dworshak’s stored water in order to augment and cool flows at Lower Granite Dam on the Snake River through mid-September.
The Bonneville Power Administration and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers delivered a summer spill plan to NOAA Fisheries Thursday, June 24, that includes a slightly smaller reduction in spill and a $3 million reduction in revenue benefits for BPA’s customers.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on Monday signed off on three “habitat conservation plans” that two Mid-Columbia public utilities say provide the highest level of fish protection ever established for a hydropower system while still providing certainty for continued hydroelectric generation.
Steady counts of summer chinook salmon at Bonneville Dam have given fishery officials the confidence to approve tribal commercial gill net fisheries in the mainstem Columbia River targeting the so-called “June hogs” for only the second summer since 1965.
Claiming the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has illegally denied Endangered Species Act protection for Columbia River and southwestern Washington populations of the coastal cutthroat trout under the Endangered Species Act, conservation groups this week filed a formal 60-day notice of intent to sue the agency.
The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife announced today (June 23) it
will euthanize approximately 50,000 rainbow trout being held at Leaburg
Hatchery during the next few days because they have contracted or been
exposed to an incurable disease. Healthy fish will be released ahead of
schedule to prevent them from also contracting the infection.
The “Status of Fisheries of the United States” report, released this week by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), shows progress was made in 2003 to address excessive fishing rates and rebuild fish stocks to healthy levels.
The Columbia River Compact on Monday approved a proposal that will allow, beginning Thursday, June 17, tribal platform and hook-and-line fishers to sell chinook salmon and steelhead caught in the Columbia River mainstem reservoirs between Bonneville and McNary dams.
The salmon stock that has literally been at the eye of biological and political storms over the past several years — the Oregon coastal coho — is officially off the Endangered Species Act list.
The Nez Perce Tribe, saying that keeping subyearling chinook one extra year in the Lyons Ferry hatchery is unlawful, filed suit Monday (June 14) in Federal District Court in Portland to order the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife to release the fish this year.
Federal agencies met with tribes, states and others Monday afternoon (June 14) to get feedback about an amended summer spill proposal that would cut spill for fish passage at Columbia and Snake River dams in July and August by about 39 percent.
The amended spill proposal released Tuesday (June 8) by the Bonneville Power Administration and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers contains six offset measures that the agencies say will mitigate for juvenile salmon losses in 2004 caused by curtailing spill in July and August.
Columbia River sport and commercial fishers harvested more than 64,000 spring chinook salmon this year – one of the better catches in recent decades — despite the fact that the upriver spawning run did not return in the numbers that fishery officials had anticipated.
Citing a potential federal-court violation, leaders of four Columbia River treaty tribes this week denounced the Bonneville Power Administration and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ revised proposal to reduce summer spill at Columbia/Snake river dams.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council was told this week by its staff that it would take $145 million in spending during fiscal year 2005 to fund fish and wildlife projects and research at levels the panel recommended over the past few years during its provincial review process.
The Bonneville Power Administration and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers unveiled at a press conference Tuesday (June 8) an amended proposal that will cut spill this summer at lower Snake River and Columbia River dams.
The offspring of spring chinook salmon planted in 2000 have returned to the Walla Walla River as 10-15-pound four-year-old adults.
The returns are the result of the supplementation and habitat improvement program of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation and the cooperative efforts of the Tribes, states and the Walla Walla Watershed Council, landowners, local irrigators and others.
For the first time in eight years, anglers can legally fish for bull trout
in Lake Koocanusa, Hungry Horse Reservoir, and the South Fork Flathead
River.
The Upper Columbia steelhead “evolutionarily significant unit” is proposed for downlisting from endangered to threatened and the Lower Columbia River coho salmon should be given protection under the Endangered Species Act, NOAA Fisheries announced today (May 28).
NOAA Fisheries officials said today they will continue to weigh the risks that hatchery production poses to wild, naturally spawning West Coast salmon and steelhead, but that a proposed new policy does take into account developing science which indicates hatcheries may play a stronger role in the rebuilding of depressed natural stocks listed under the Endangered Species Act.
The reaction to the anticipated draft NOAA Fisheries Hatchery Policy began long before the official announcement this morning at 10 a.m. and ranges from cautious optimism to immediate threats of lawsuits.
Tribal gill net fishers targeted the tail end of the 2004 upriver spring chinook salmon run this week in a mainstem fishery approved Tuesday by the Columbia River Compact.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service outlined late Friday, May 21, its proposal for Libby Dam flows that are designed to aid spawning endangered Kootenai River white sturgeon and threatened bull trout in the river.
The Oregon Environmental Quality Commission on Thursday adopted water quality criteria for toxic pollutants that tribes say do not adequately protect people who consume large amounts of fish.
There is just enough water in the forecast for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service this week to move ahead on a white sturgeon operation in the Kootenai River in Montana.
The operation, which calls for ramping up higher flows out of Libby Dam once sturgeon spawn, could begin as early as next week.
The Nez Perce Tribe took a step Saturday (May 15) in reaching a settlement with the state of Idaho and federal agencies over Snake River water rights the tribe’s initially challenged in 1993.
Washington and Oregon officials this week OK’d tribal commercial fishery that will target a dwindling stream of “upriver” spring chinook salmon in Columbia River mainstem reservoirs above Bonneville Dam.
NOAA Fisheries today corrected what it said are misconceptions in the news about the intent and impact of its hatchery policy and that the agency would likely relist by May 28 at least 25 of the 26 salmon stocks that are currently under review.
The agency charged with protecting Columbia River basin salmon and steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act will have more time than originally scheduled to remold its opinion about the effects of federal hydrosystem operations on the fish, according to the judge that last year ruled the prevailing recovery strategy invalid.
Wrestling through numerous legal, biological and social complexities has prolonged the task of assembling a summer hydrosystem spill reduction plan that the region can accept, according the Bonneville Power Administration’s top fish and wildlife official.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved Portland General Electric’s application to surrender the ownership of its Sandy River dams, opening the way to remove the dams by 2008. FERC is charged with licensing hydroelectric dams among its other responsibilities.
The latest estimate of the 2004 return of “upriver” spring chinook salmon to the Columbia River is roughly half what was forecast in preseason, but it is still expected to be the fifth largest in recent decades.
Spring chinook salmon fishing was ended sooner than most would like on the Columbia River mainstem, and likely the Snake River, in large part because the overall return will not be as large as expected.
About 2,000 10- to 12-inch-long white sturgeon will be released in Lake Roosevelt May 12, marking Washington’s first effort to recover declining populations of the largest and oldest freshwater fish in the upper Columbia River.
A Spokane-based U.S. District Court judge this week ordered the federal government to deliver its judgment within 30 days on whether eight stocks of West Coast salmon and steelhead still merit listing under the Endangered Species Act.
Fears that a late-timed 2004 spring chinook salmon return may also be less numerous than expected has prompted Oregon and Washington officials to close what has been productive mainstem Columbia River fishery.
Salmon managers said at this week’s Technical Management Team meeting that a monitoring plan developed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for operating McNary Dam turbines outside the one percent efficiency range is insufficient to monitor changes in fish survival at the dam.
Anglers’ opportunities will be limited for the balance of the season after one week’s sport catch in the Columbia River mainstem witnessed a near doubling of that fishery’s “impact” on the upriver spring chinook salmon run.
About 13 million juvenile chinook salmon and steelhead are being released this spring from 13 Lower Snake River Compensation Plan (LSRCP) hatcheries and ponds in Oregon, Washington and Idaho, says the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Attorneys for the state of Oregon and tribal fish managers told a federal judge today (April 16) that they had deep concerns about a federal proposal that makes dams and reservoirs part of the environmental baseline and judges the perils faced by salmon on day-to-day operations alone.
After being overwhelmed by over 200 comments about its preliminary summer spill proposal, the Bonneville Power Administration and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers put off until April 21 the release of their amended proposal and for one week a regional federal executives meeting previously scheduled for today.
Accelerating recreational catch rates on the lower Columbia River mean fish are present in relatively ample numbers, but upriver spring chinook salmon counts at Bonneville Dam continue to lag behind those that produced the bountiful returns of recent years.
With a plummeting water supply forecast in the Columbia and Snake river basins, the Bonneville Power Administration proposed Thursday (April 8) to Technical Management Team salmon managers to immediately shut down spring spill at lower Snake River dams.
Lower Columbia River commercial fisheries tightly restricted both in time and geography were approved Thursday by Oregon and Washington officials despite concerns about crowded fishing conditions and a certain wariness about the size of the spring chinook run.
The head of NOAA Fisheries’ Northwest Salmon Recovery Division balked when asked to detail the proposal Wednesday but acknowledged that his agency might judge the effects of federal hydrosystem operations on salmon from a different vantage point than it has in the past — one that considers the dams and reservoirs a part of the landscape or “environmental baseline.”
Columbia Basin state, tribal and federal fishery managers attending this week’s Implementation Team meeting expressed concerns that a federal proposal for a three-year pilot plan to cut summer spill does not include adequate testing that would result in new information.
Revisions to the Federal Columbia River Power system biological opinion will likely be completed in November, not June 2 as ordered by a federal court, so that a federal collaboration with state and tribal fish managers on related scientific and analytical issues can run its course.
Washington said yes, and Oregon said no to additional Lower Columbia River mainstem commercial harvest opportunities in the near term after an unexpectedly high catch during a Monday-Tuesday outing that pushed gill-netters near their allowable upriver spring chinook impact limit for the year.
Federal officials met with state and tribal officials, congressional staff and other Columbia River hydrosystem “stakeholders” Tuesday to explain a proposed test of fish management flexibility that involves shutting off one of the downstream fish passage routes in August, and providing more limited access in July.
Organizations that have asked NOAA Fisheries to drop eight salmon and steelhead stocks from the Endangered Species Act have asked a federal court to order the agency to produce those decisions within 30 days.
The previous fisheries were from 15 to 24 hours. A big difference maker in the most current fishery was that the fleet deployed nets with 4 ¼-inch mesh instead of the 9-inch mesh used in the previous fisheries. The smaller-mesh captured the smaller-salmon that fishermen had complained were swimming right through the large mesh. The average size of the fish count Tuesday night is 13 pounds as compared to 18 pounds for the earlier fisheries.
An Earthwise Knowledge Initiative Publication
