While most anglers are still focused on steelhead fishing, some are turning their attention to chinook salmon fishing.
Biologists are predicting a return of hatchery fish in adequate numbers to support a fishery in the upper Salmon River. Similar to last year, fishing will likely be restricted to the area below Ellis due to a poor predicted return to Sawtooth Hatchery.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers awarded a $23.9 million contract March 22 to Slayden Construction Group of Stayton, Ore., to rebuild the Minto Fish Collection Facility, downstream of Detroit Dam near Stayton. The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife will continue to operate the facility.
Central Idaho anglers are enjoying a kokanee bonanza these days thanks to the inadvertent flushing of thousands of fish through Dworshak Dam into the North Fork of the Clearwater River below.
The reintroduction of spring chinook salmon and summer steelhead to habitat above the Pelton-Round Butte hydroelectric project on central Oregon’s Deschutes River is becoming a rite of spring for stakeholders, including school children and other local residents.
Preliminary data suggests the new fish facility at central Oregon’s Round Butte Dam can sweep in significant numbers of salmonid smolts so that the young fish can be given a ride around the hydro project and two other dams to be released downstream.
An exhaustive look at available data for 89 populations of chinook and coho salmon and steelhead shows that productivity in the wild shrinks in direct proportion with increases in the percentage of hatchery fish that join wild fish on the spawning grounds.
An effort to build a new, “local” coho salmon broodstock in central Idaho’s Clearwater River drainage reached an important milestone last week with the release of 550,000 hatchery reared juvenile fish that are the offspring of adults that returned to the basin in 2009.
A statistical “chum emergence model” that has proved out in recent years’ testing is giving hydro and salmon managers another tool for assessing conditions experienced by the threatened species in the often roiled water below Bonneville Dam.
A federal judge in a March 11 order ruled that the federal government can and must legally consider a request from Idaho’s Shoshone-Bannock Tribes for permission to go fishing in northeast Oregon’s Grand Ronde and Imnaha rivers.
Anglers can look forward to another promising steelhead season on the Columbia River and its tributaries this year, based on a forecast released recently by a team of state, federal and tribal biologists.
Idaho Fish and Game plans to propose spring seasons on chinook salmon fishing to the Idaho Fish and Game Commission in late March.
A hatchery program that has since 1991 focused, primarily, on preserving genetic materials and avoiding extinction of a species is poised to take the next steps toward recolonizing three high country lakes, two of which that have long been empty, with anadromous, naturally produced Snake River sockeye salmon.
The sluiceway at Bonneville Dam’s Powerhouse 1 (nearest the Oregon shore) passed with flying colors tests evaluating whether it would be a suitable passage route for spawned out steelhead, or kelt.
The kelt are headed downstream toward saltwater and thus have the potential to turn around and return later in the year to spawn again.
Only a hint of the annual spring chinook salmon run has arrived in the Columbia River but anxious sport fishers are doing their best land some of the precious cargo, already logging an estimated 13,452 angler trips to the lower mainstem through March 6 this year.
Anglers fishing along the north Oregon and Washington coast will see a lower catch quota for chinook salmon this year even though the total number of fish expected to return is higher than in 2010.
The ocean recreational coho and chinook salmon fisheries off the coast of Washington would vary under the ocean fishing options being considered this year by the Pacific Fishery Management Council.
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game says the statewide commercial salmon harvest for 2011 is forecast to total 203 million salmon of all species.
Steller sea lion predation on white sturgeon in the waters below Bonneville Dam this year has continued its rapid growth and in the process left fish and wildlife managers with a problem for which there are really few answers.
The states of Oregon and Washington on Aug. 30, 2010, petitioned NOAA Fisheries to delist the eastern “designated population segment” of Steller sea lions. Two days later, the state of Alaska submitted a similar petition.
It’s a whole new world in central Oregon’s Lake Billy Chinook where a new water withdrawal-juvenile salmon collection “tower” is stirring the reservoir’s temperature-stratified waters and recreating historic seasonal temperature conditions below the Round Butte-Pelton dam hydro project in the Deschutes River.
Forecasts released early this week point toward an average upriver summer steelhead return to the Columbia River – an overall run that is expected to total 390,900 adult fish as counted at Bonneville Dam.
Lodgepole pine, a hardy tree species that can thrive in cold temperatures and plays a key role in many western ecosystems, is already shrinking in range as a result of climate change – and may almost disappear from most of the Pacific Northwest by 2080, a new study concludes.
The Idaho Department of Fish and Game will, once again, be seeking help from the public in early March to collect adult hatchery steelhead for brood stock from the South Fork Clearwater River.
Run-size forecasts completed this week include an expected return this year to the mouth of the Columbia of 17,500 Snake River “wild” fall chinook salmon, a stock that is protected under the Endangered Species Act.
The 2011 return of fall chinook salmon to the Columbia River basin is expected to be the fifth largest since at least 1948, and nearly 200,000 fish higher than the recent 10-year average return, according to preseason forecasts released this week by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and the U.S. v Oregon Technical Advisory Committee.
Researchers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Northwest Fisheries Science Center’s Watershed Program have completed a study demonstrating that a larger, more concentrated effort is required to produce measurable changes in fish abundance at a watershed scale.
U.S. Rep. Don Young of Alaska earlier this month introduced one piece of legislation that would require the labeling of genetically engineered fish and another that would impose an outright ban such fish in the United States.
Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar announced last week the distribution of more than $749 million in excise tax revenues generated by sportsmen and women to state and territorial fish and wildlife agencies through the Dingell-Johnson Sport Fish Restoration and Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration programs.
Fishery managers from Washington and Oregon on Tuesday set a spring chinook fishing season for the Columbia River that is expected to entice nearly 100,000 angler trips this year.
Fishery managers from Washington and Oregon on Tuesday agreed on new sport and commercial fishing seasons for Columbia River white sturgeon that reflect mutual concerns about the declining abundance of legal-size sturgeon below Bonneville Dam.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced this week the availability of a draft Environmental Assessment of Idaho Department of Fish and Game’s request to manage gray wolves in the Lolo Elk Management Zone in north central Idaho in response to impacts of wolf predation on elk.
Fishery managers and researchers face a number of troublesome questions before pursuing their goal of reintroducing chinook salmon, and building viable naturally spawning populations, to historic and relatively pristine habitats in the upper Willamette River basin that are now blocked by impassable dams.
A record number of fall chinook were counted at Lower Granite Dam on the lower Snake River in 2010, and a record number of them built egg nests or redds in the gravels of such places as Alpowa and Asotin creeks and the Grande Ronde and Imnaha rivers.
The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife will soon begin hazing sea lions below the fish ladders at Willamette Falls in an attempt to reduce predation on federally protected salmon and steelhead during migration to the upper reaches of the Willamette River and its tributaries.
NOAA Fisheries announced Wednesday that it will convene a multi-session science workshop to discuss killer whale recovery.
NOAA Fisheries’ proposed judgment on a Puget Sound Chinook harvest plan has drawn criticism from the Hatchery Scientific Review Group and a coalition of fishing groups who say it allows too much harvest of wild, protected fish and too much straying of hatchery fish onto spawning grounds.
Genetic research is showing that healthy steelhead runs in Pacific Northwest streams can depend heavily on the productivity of their stay-at-home counterparts, rainbow trout.
Fish and laser beams sound like things out of a sci-fi movie, but a combination of the two is being used for important research into the future of rainbow trout.
A newly published research paper offers a Pacific Northwest lessons learned perspective on how migratory fish might be protected in southeast Asia’s Mekong River basin in the face of planned hydropower expansion that is needed to boost the economy.
It’s a time for celebration for anyone who fancies getting out on the Columbia River again. The first reported spring chinook salmon of the New Year was hauled in Wednesday – an 18-pounder of lower river hatchery origin.
A coalition of fishing and conservation groups, the state of Oregon and the Nez Perce Tribe last week continued to press their claims that the federal government’s plan to mitigate for Columbia-Snake river dams’ impacts on protected salmon is inadequate, and illegal.
The Bureau of Reclamation has awarded a $2,992,745 construction contract for repairs to the Winthrop National Fish Hatchery located on the Methow River near Winthrop, Wash.
The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission during a Jan. 21 conference call approved tighter conservation guidelines for Columbia River sturgeon fisheries and elected Miranda Wecker and Gary Douvia to second terms as chair and vice-chair, respectively.
NOAA Fisheries announced Wednesday it won’t seek further review of an appellate court decision that, in effect, requires the agency to rethink its authorization that allows Washington, Oregon and Idaho to trap and kill California sea lions that feed on salmon below the lower Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam.
Lower Columbia hatchery operations funded through the Mitchell Act provide nearly half of the salmon and steelhead caught by sport and commercial fishers in the Columbia River basin, according to the results of a recent study.
Lower Columbia fish managers’ desire to implement hatchery reforms got a boost this past year with an infusion of a specially earmarked $10 million appropriation to help steer toward the dual goals of conserving wild salmon and steelhead while maintaining harvests of hatchery fish.
Research conducted at the University of Montana’s Flathead Lake Biological Station has provided important data about how introductions or invasions of nonnative organisms can lead to major changes in the structure of aquatic ecosystems.
Lower Columbia River chum salmon finished spawning in late December, and biologists say the returns look good for the threatened species this year.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council recommended Wednesday that funding be continued for research aimed at identifying through genetics particular fish traits that might allow them to survive better in the wild.
An independent science panel in a new 364-page report recommends that an effort be launched through the Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program to better understand an ever-changing and complicated food web that must sustain salmon and other species.
Biologists in Idaho Power’s environmental program this fall observed more than a 40 percent increase in the number of Snake River chinook salmon nests, or redds, compared with the previous year.
The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission will take action on a proposed new management policy for Columbia River white sturgeon Jan. 21, when commission members will convene via a conference call.
NOAA Fisheries put in place Tuesday a management system that for the first time will make a major shift in how West Coast trawl groundfish harvests are carried out. The agency says the new system can benefit both fish and fishermen and lead to economic efficiencies that are difficult to obtain under traditional management schemes.
NOAA Fisheries announced Wednesday that it is proposing to designate as critical habitat for the southern distinct population segment of Pacific eulachon the lower Columbia River as well as 11 other waterways in California, Oregon and Washington.
By Bob Esselman, Idaho Department of Fish and Game
Even after years of working on Idaho’s rivers and streams, a fisheries project can still amaze me.
The federal government and a host of other parties filed court documents today (Dec. 23) in support of a retooled “biological opinion” that they say puts the Columbia River basin on the proper legal and biological paths toward boosting imperiled wild steelhead and salmon stocks.
NOAA Fisheries Service continues to mull over its options for responding to a Nov. 23 appellate court’s decision that struck down the federal agency’s decision to authorize the lethal removal of California sea lions that prey each spring on Columbia and Snake River salmon spawners.
Sport and commercial fishers in 2011 are likely to see continued shrinkage of white sturgeon fishing opportunity in the lower Columbia and Willamette rivers due to estimated downturns in populations of the big fish.
The North Pacific Fishery Management Council is proposing fast-track measures to address the potential impact of this year’s record bycatch of chinook salmon by pollock boats and commercial fisherman in the Gulf of Alaska.
Fisheries officials predict that the 2011 return of summer chinook salmon to the mouth of the Columbia River will be the largest on a record dating back to 1980. And the upriver spring chinook forecast is for a return very close to the recent five-year average.
A Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife test this late summer and fall of “selective” commercial gear produced “very positive results” in catching salmon and steelhead efficiently and benignly.
Mailboxes at NOAA Fisheries Service’s Northwest headquarters were stuffed full with advice, criticisms and some praise as the Dec. 3 deadline approached for comments on a draft environmental impact statement regarding salmon and steelhead hatchery operations across the Columbia River basin.
The wild vs. hatchery public debate was amplified this week with the closing of NOAA Fisheries’ comment period on a draft environmental impact statement on the use of federal funding for artificial propagation to fuel Columbia River basin fisheries.
Columbia River anglers who fish for salmon and steelhead will not be required to switch to barbless hooks next year, but state fishery managers are asking them to do it voluntarily.
Bacterial coldwater disease (CWD), caused by the bacterium Flavobacterium psychrophilum, is a lethal infection that causes significant losses of hatchery-reared salmonids worldwide.
A draft environmental review for a lake trout netting project on Flathead Lake has been delayed but should be released sometime this winter, an official with the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes said Thursday.
Oregon and Washington fishery managers will seek public comments on issues affecting Columbia River white sturgeon management and fisheries at three meetings scheduled next week.
For years at the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Clackamas Fish Hatchery, birds have been feasting on defenseless juvenile chinook salmon, coho and steelhead while they were being reared in the three asphalt ponds and “raceways” until the fish were large enough to be released into the nearby Clackamas River to begin their long journey to the Pacific Ocean.
Many coastal wetlands worldwide may be more sensitive than previously thought to climate change and sea-level rise projections for the 21st century.
The Selkirk Mountains woodland caribou is one of the nation’s most endangered species, with 50 or fewer individuals remaining in eastern Washington, northern Idaho and southeastern British Columbia.
Fish and Wildlife staff told Chelan County PUD commissioners last week that an effort to save water at PUD hatcheries also seems to be producing juvenile salmon and steelhead that appear stronger and travel faster to the ocean once they are ready.
“You’re going to find differences in reproductive fitness” between wild salmon and hatchery fish that find their way to the spawning grounds, according to the Yakama Nation’s Bill Bosch.
After years of discussion, the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, the Bonneville Power Administration and Grant County Public Utility District have signed a cost-sharing agreement to build and operate the Chief Joseph Hatchery, an estimated $43 million construction project on the Columbia River near Bridgeport, Wash.
A new adult fish collection facility was in operation this summer at Cougar Dam on the South Fork McKenzie River and construction is set to begin this winter to create a new and improved Minto Fish Facility on the North Santiam River as the strategy for improving the lot of threatened upper Willamette River chinook salmon and steelhead starts to unfold.
The most widely adopted measure for assessing the state of the world’s oceans and fisheries led to inaccurate conclusions in nearly half the ecosystems where it was applied according to new analysis by an international team led by a University of Washington fisheries scientist.
With a bumper crop of fish streaming up the Columbia and Snake rivers this year, the Idaho Department of Fish and Game has begun to trap and move steelhead from the Snake River to the Boise River to provide extra opportunities there for anglers.
The review process being used by the Food and Drug Administration to assess the safety of a faster-growing transgenic salmon fails to weigh the full effects of the fish’s widespread production, according to analysis by a Duke University-led team in this week’s Science.
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game has released preliminary estimates for the 2010 commercial salmon harvest, and the projected value of that harvest to commercial fishermen.
RE: “ Rebuilding Snake River Sockeye Run A Multi-Lake Recovery Strategy; 176 Natural-Born Return This Year” https://www.www.www.staging.columbiabasinbulletin.org/399491.aspx
A May 2010 Columbia-Snake river “biological opinion” is illegal in its own right, and does nothing to cure the ills of a 2008 federal strategy for assuring the hydro system avoids jeopardizing the survival of salmon and steelhead protected under the Endangered Species Act.
That’s the contention of the Nez Perce and Spokane tribes, the state of Oregon and a coalition of fishing and conservation groups.
Hundreds of steelhead fish were found trapped in the draft tube area below turbine unit 1 by staff at Dworshak Dam and Reservoir Wednesday while the electricity generator was being dewatered for routine maintenance, according to U.S. Army Corps of Engineers operations officials at the Walla Walla District.
For the first time in more than 50 years, wild coho are moving into the upper reaches of Cedar Creek near Sandy.
A record number of sockeye salmon have passed through the Priest Rapids Project on the mid-Columbia on their way to spawning grounds in the Wenatchee and Okanogan river watersheds.
The stars have been aligned to produce recent years’ surge in sockeye returns to the Columbia River basin — favorable ocean conditions, increased hatcheries releases and improved juvenile rearing habitat and freshwater migration conditions.
Warmer than usual water temperatures on the lower Deschutes River in central Oregon have raised concerns among guides and anglers, with most pointing their fingers at a new operational strategy being employed at a dam 100 miles upstream.
For Columbia River mainstem anglers, the month of August provides plenty of opportunity.
One of the best returns of fall chinook salmon in several years is expected and the fishing seasons begins Sunday (Aug. 1) for chinook and hatchery coho salmon. And summer steelhead are expected to continue providing good fishing well into September.
For the past 15 years, Canada’s late-run Fraser River sockeye has changed its migration behavior, which has resulted in significant “en-route” mortality rates.
The Columbia River Compact launched the fall commercial fishing season with the approval of four mainstem outings over the next two weeks targeting sturgeon and what is expected to be a huge fall chinook run.
Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs released Rocky Mountain goats on tribal lands in Upper Whitewater River at the base of Mt Jefferson this week.
The Idaho Department of Fish and Game this week completed its purchase of a former southeast Idaho trout hatchery site with the goal of constructing a new hatchery to help boost numbers of endangered Snake River sockeye salmon.
The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife this year will expand considerably its efforts to test “selective” fishing gear that might be deployed successfully in the mainstem Columbia River by the commercial fleet.
There’s been good news coming from Idaho’s Bear Valley Creek this summer.
First, fish biologists are excited about last June’s construction and operation of the new Bear Valley Creek Chinook Salmon Abundance Monitoring Project — the first fish monitoring station in a key portion of Bear Valley Creek.
Bonneville Power Administration officials were recently shown on-the-ground results of the 10-year Columbia Basin Fish Accords — a spring chinook salmon in a newly scoured pool on Meacham Creek on the Umatilla Indian Reservation in northeast Oregon.
CBB Shorts: Response To Climate Change; Association Of Power Biologists; Giant Palouse Earthworm
The overall 2010 Columbia River basin sockeye salmon return and its small, endangered Snake River component are now setting records with every spawner counted passing upstream up and over hydro projects.
NOAA Fisheries Service’s Northwest Region and Northwest Fisheries Science Center have recently added tools to their web sites to track protected salmon and steelhead stock status and Federal Columbia River Power System passage survival and salmon population trends.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council on Wednesday recommended funding for three projects that aim to fill needs of either the May 2008 Federal Columbia River Power system biological opinion or a Columbia Basin Fish Accord.
The Idaho Fish and Game Commission has adopted a recommended harvest season on fall chinook salmon to open September 1.
This year’s recreational fishery for white sturgeon in the Columbia River estuary has been extended for the second time, giving anglers 18 more days of fishing.
Researchers last week began to test whether endangered Snake River sockeye salmon spawners can be trapped at southeast Washington’s Lower Granite Dam and safely transported via tanker truck to holding facilities at Eagle Hatchery near Boise.
Sockeye salmon continue to zoom up and over the lower Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam where they are now setting records daily.
It is too soon to say much about upriver summer steelhead counts at Bonneville Dam this year since the return to the Columbia River basin is just starting to build momentum.
The 2010 upriver spring chinook salmon return brought high numbers of fish to the Columbia River basin, though not as many as expected, and tribal and non-tribal fishers took advantage.
The “summer” fishing season on the Columbia River mainstem continues next week for four treaty tribes with the approval of a 2.5-day commercial opening in reservoirs between Bonneville and McNary dams.
People who fish for a living pursue top profits, not necessarily top predators, according to the first-ever analysis of worldwide catch and economic data for the past 55 years.
CBB Shorts: Ocean Chinook Harvest; Spring Chinook Fishing In Wallowa, Imnaha; Fall Chinook Fishing In Deschutes; $30 Million For Puget Sound; Eastern Oregon Watershed Restoration; Carbon Emissions Impact Fish; Salmon In Hot Water; Potential Water Crisis In West
With an unknown number of chum salmon known to be headed up the Columbia River, the Technical Management Team on Tuesday set Nov. 1 as the date for the start of flows past Bonneville Dam at levels designed to facilitate spawning and protect egg nests until young fish hatch out next spring to start a new generation.
Federal agencies on Wednesday released details of planned work for 2010-2013 to protect Columbia/Snake River salmon and steelhead. The document describes a extensive program of habitat restoration, hatchery reforms and hydrosystem operations and improvements.
A record-setting surge of sockeye salmon over Bonneville Dam has given fishery managers the confidence that they can allow anglers to target the species in the Columbia River mainstem without sacrificing upriver escapement goals and impact limits.
After a near century of no spring chinook or salmon fishing in the Walla Walla River, the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation last Sunday (June 20) opened a fishing opportunity for tribal members on the South Fork Walla Walla River on a 2-mile reach downriver from Harris Park. A 100-fish harvest was approved for this fishery.
With an initial juvenile fish passage season winding down, operators of the new 273-foot-tall underwater tower at central Oregon’s Round Butte Dam are approaching a very important milestone.
The Bonneville Power Administration’s Greg Delwiche next week will complete a full circle of sorts when he takes over as the federal power marketing agency’s senior vice president for Power Services.
The four Columbia River treaty tribes opened the commercial sales of local, fresh summer chinook (historically called “June Hogs” because of their large size) at 6 a.m. Wednesday.
Time will tell if a “pulse” of water now beginning to surge down the down the Kootenai River in northwestern Montana-northern Idaho is a viable tool for improving productivity of wild white sturgeon populations that have been judged to be on the brink of extinction.
Tribal and non-Indian commercial fishermen, and anglers as well, get to test the Columbia River mainstem waters for adult salmon for the first time since early this spring with the opening of fisheries targeting what is expected to be the largest summer chinook run since 2002.
Remember when you were a child running barefoot — how you would run quickly over a hot sidewalk, rest in a shaded spot, and let your feet cool down before braving the hot surface again?
The “low water year” forecasted for the Columbia River basin in 2010 has seen heavy late spring precipitation push rivers and streams beyond flood stage, fill reservoirs and, perhaps, delay spawning salmon that face strong, muddy flows and huge volumes of involuntary spill at dams that roils the waters.
The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife this week reported the loss of approximately 40 percent of the spring chinook fry at Lookingglass Hatchery near Elgin.
CBB Shorts: Invasive Species Factors; Development Impacts On Aquatic Life; Status Of Washington’s Forests; Crooked River Trout Survey; Grouse Recovery Plan
A third season of trapping sea lions below the lower Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam has come to a close, leaving state and federal officials and others to ponder the success thus far of the effort to reduce predation on salmon and steelhead spawners.
The many populations of sockeye salmon in Bristol Bay, Alaska act like a diversified portfolio of investments, buffering fisheries and incomes from the ups and downs of particular stocks.
Douglas PUD filed its Final License Application for the Wells Hydroelectric Project with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission last week.
CBB Shorts: Oregon Coast Coho; Willamette Reservoirs; Washington Climatologist; Earthquake Odds; NSIA Science, Policy Board
Federal agencies Thursday issued a 2010 “Supplemental Biological Opinion” intended to protect Columbia/Snake River Basin salmon and steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act.
The emergency closure of a tribal platform and hook and line fishery on the Columbia River mainstem was forced this week with the realization that the upriver spring chinook salmon catch in an earlier commercial fishery was greater than had been estimated.
The young hatchery spring chinook salmon that emerged from lower Columbia River estuary net pens two years ago entered a Pacific Ocean that was cool, inviting and rich with the nutrients fish need to grow and survive.
There were smiles, and praise, aplenty this week as the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation closed in on a long-held dream — boosting salmon returns to tribal lands that were decimated long ago with construction of fish-stopping Chief Joseph and Grand Coulee dams.
The 2010 upriver spring chinook salmon return to the Columbia River is unlikely to set a modern-day record as was forecast in preseason, but a companion run — hatchery fish that left lower river estuary “select areas” two or more years ago — looks like it’s already the best ever.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council and staff are getting ready to trigger the largest — both in number of projects and dollars spent — of its sequenced categorical reviews of projects seeking funding through the Council’s Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program.
Four fisheries stocks, including Atlantic swordfish, have now been rebuilt to healthy levels, according to a report to Congress from NOAA’s Fisheries Service issued this week.
The 2010 fall chinook return to the Snake River basin is huge, more than two times the modern-day record. But, it is not catching on very well with anglers who recently have had their first opportunities in decades to catch and keep the prized late season salmon.
North Idaho’s Lake Pend Oreille will be drawn down by Nov. 15 and held at 2,055 feet elevation, which is just a foot below its maximum wintertime flood control elevation, in order to provide access to as much spawning gravel as possible for what is believed to be a reviving population of kokanee.
During a public meeting last week Grant County PUD officials previewed concept designs planned for future facilities for supplementation of spring chinook salmon on the White River and Nason Creek, two tributaries to the Wenatchee River in central Washington.
Both non-tribal and tribal commercial fishers were back out on the Columbia River mainstem this week chasing the last of the year’s salmon spawners, as well as the last of their harvest allocations for the season.
With the 2010 “upriver” spring chinook salmon return to the Columbia-Snake river basin believed at its midpoint, fishery officials have decided the run will be big, but not big enough to break the record as was forecast in the preseason.
With lower Columbia River estuary select areas relatively clean of protected upriver spring chinook salmon, Oregon and Washington officials OK’d commercial fisheries aimed at hatchery fish that might otherwise stray onto tributary spawning grounds.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has awarded two contracts totaling $654,335 under the American Recovery and Reinvestment for improvements at the Carson National Fish Hatchery.
Young fish that have long been waiting for an exit are suddenly streaming into the newly created fish collection facility at central Oregon’s Round Butte Dam to await transport downstream and a continuation of their journey to the Pacific Ocean.
With strong, though not eye-popping, numbers pouring over the lower Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam, the jury’s still out on whether this year’s of “upriver” spring chinook salmon run will approach the record.
In order to avoid an early closure of a large chunk of the lower Columbia River, fishery managers from Oregon and Washington on Monday decided to close a shallow slough above Oregon’s Rooster Rock State Park where white sturgeon tend to congregate and create easy pickings for anglers.
The lower Columbia River is so crowded with spring chinook salmon that some are being bumped into off-channel areas where the spawning fish — most headed for tributaries 100 and more miles upriver — rarely wander.
The potential biological and economic impacts of a zebra or quagga mussel invasion of the Columbia River basin could vary considerably depending on a dizzying number of factors, many of which have yet to be quantified, according to a draft summary of an investigation being carried out by the Independent Economic Advisory Board.
Already this year, the sport fishing effort aimed at spring chinook salmon in the lower Columbia River — 166,027 angler trips — is the highest since 2002.
A package of nine “fast track” research, monitoring and evaluation projects earned the endorsement of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council April 14.
Tribal fishers from the Umatilla and Warm Springs Indian tribes are expected to start fishing this weekend for subsistence purposes in a four-mile stretch of the Columbia River below Bonneville Dam, according to a memorandum of understanding signed Wednesday by the two tribes and the Oregon and Washington departments of fish and wildlife.
Anglers will get another weekend of fishing on the lower Columbia River despite bumping up against an early-season spring chinook salmon catch “guideline” due to a high level of effort and high catch rates.
With a boost from recent precipitation, it appears that spilling water for Kootenai River white sturgeon is still on track at Libby Dam in Montana.
The Pacific Fishery Management Council on Thursday adopted a set of salmon seasons that provides both recreational and commercial opportunities coastwide for the first time since 2007.
CBB Shorts: Snake Tribs Water Quality; Sagegrouse Protection; Spring Creek Hatchery Improvements; Wolverine Protection; Interior Habitat Grants For NW
With Columbia River flows expected to remain at low levels over the next few weeks, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will likely spill less water at times than is desired to provide juvenile salmon passage at Bonneville Dam.
Despite stormy weather that has roiled the lower Columbia River over the past week or so, anglers continue to haul in large numbers of fish from what is expected to be a record run of upriver spring chinook salmon.
Hazing of double-crested cormorants that eat juvenile salmon and steelhead on their migration to sea began the first week of April in the Nehalem and Tillamook estuaries.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on Wednesday released a 98-page “plan of study” that outlines steps it believes would be necessary to evaluate whether one or more of the four lower Snake River dams should be breached to support Columbia River basin salmon recovery.
The early season fishing has been good at “select areas” on the lower Columbia River – too good.
The Confederated Salish-Kootenai Tribes are launching a public review process for a controversial lake trout netting proposal for Montana’s Flathead Lake, starting with upcoming meetings in Polson, Kalispell and Missoula.
The state of Montana Department of Environmental Quality issued a temporary waiver of the state’s water quality standard for total dissolved gas on the Kootenai River this week to allow the Army Corps of Engineers to potentially spill extra water for a week this spring at Libby Dam.
A burst of rainbow trout productivity in the South Fork of the Snake River has prompted state officials to set a cash bounty on the non-native fish species with the aim of reducing the number that interbreed with treasured native Yellowstone cutthroat trout populations.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service announced Tuesday it is listing Pacific smelt as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
New advances in genetic testing have allowed scientists to determine the specific origin of chinook salmon that were consumed by killer whales in the inland waters of Washington and British Columbia, according to new research by NOAA Fisheries scientists and others.
A “difference of scientific opinion” will be rethought even as the Yakama Nation moves forward with preliminary and final planning for the construction component of its Mid-Columbia Coho Restoration Project.
Spring chinook salmon fishing is starting to pick up on the lower Columbia River, as are counts of upriver fish crossing over Bonneville Dam, in what is expected to be the tip of the iceberg — an overall return of 559,900 to the Columbia-Snake River basin.
Researchers from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife recently began surveying the Willamette River downstream of Willamette Falls to learn more about a previously unknown white sturgeon spawning area.
The record 2009 summer steelhead return to Idaho and northeast Oregon streams has continued unabated into a new year that also may see the biggest upriver spring chinook salmon run in modern times.
Oregon’s recreational and commercial ocean salmon seasons scheduled to open from March 15 through April 30 have been closed due, in part, to a low projected run of fall chinook to the Sacramento River.
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The reigning Federal Columbia River Power System biological opinion requires fishery and hydro managers to revisit their annual chum salmon redd protection decision at least monthly to make sure “it is consistent with the need to provide spring flows for listed Columbia and Snake River stocks.”
The prospect of a huge spring chinook return to the Columbia River basin already has anglers in a fever.
Fishery managers are predicting that “upriver” fall chinook salmon returns to the Columbia River this year will be the biggest since 2004, and the third largest since the late 1980s.
The Pacific Fishery Management Council says higher returns of Sacramento River fall chinook this year will allow for some ocean fishing.
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game says that the statewide commercial salmon harvest in 2010 is projected to total 138 million salmon of all species. This is a decrease compared to 2009, with most of the decrease expected to come from lower pink salmon catches.
Richard Hannan, an 18-year veteran of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, has been named the Pacific Region’s assistant regional director for Fishery Resources, Robyn Thorson, regional director, announced today.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has awarded $7 million in grants to fund 42 Native American projects that benefit fish and wildlife and their habitat. Of those funds, $1,302,539 will be awarded to tribes in Idaho, Oregon and Washington.
A new look at the data, including that collected during the significantly changed hydro operations of recent years, produces the same message — after a certain point in time in springtime juvenile salmon and steelhead from the Snake River basin that were collected and barged downstream survive to adulthood at higher rates than fish allowed to proceed downstream in-river and through juvenile bypass systems.
With a record upriver spring chinook salmon return expected, anglers should be able to land catch and keep as many as 17,200 hatchery salmon during an early fishing season mapped this week for the lower Columbia River by Oregon and Washington fishery managers.
Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar Thursday joined Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, PacificCorp Chief Executive Officer Greg Abel and the chairmen of the Klamath, Yurok and Karuk Tribes in announcing final agreements that could potentially lead to removal of four dams on the Klamath River and the largest river restoration project in the nation’s history.
Fishery managers from Washington and Oregon on Thursday adopted fishing seasons for white sturgeon that provide greater protection than in the past for dwindling populations in the lower Columbia River.
Despite estimates of a 2010 upriver spring chinook salmon run that will be the best ever, non-tribal anglers and gill-netters in the lower Columbia River will be held in check to some degree until managers know that that dream run is indeed building.
Advocates of a mainstem Columbia River gillnet ban say they will go back to the drawing board, disappointed with changes made to their Oregon ballot initiative proposal made by the state Attorney General’s Office.
A new study by researchers at Oregon State University found that up to nearly half of the ocean-bound juvenile steelhead surveyed in two Oregon river systems appear to have died when they reached the estuaries — before they could reach the ocean.
The ocean abundance of Columbia River coho is expected to be 389,500 fish this year, or about 37 percent of 2009’s post-season total calculation of just over 1 million, according to a preseason forecast produced by the Oregon Production Index technical team.
High catch rates and angler effort have made short work of the 2010 white sturgeon sport season in the Bonneville Dam pool despite a doubling of the allowed harvest in the Columbia River reservoir.
It is expected that the states of Oregon and Washington will decide next week on a white sturgeon harvest reduction on the lower Columbia River mainstem of 35 to 45 percent over recent years’ allocations.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service this week revised the 2005 critical habitat designation for bull trout, a threatened species found throughout much of the Pacific Northwest and protected under the federal Endangered Species Act.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council on Thursday approved a move by the Kootenai Tribe of Idaho to go into the next phase of planning for an expansion of its landmark white sturgeon hatchery program and the creation of a one-of-a-kind burbot production program.
With fall chinook and coho salmon returns turning out to be slightly better than expected, Oregon and Washington fishery managers decided this week to give both commercial and sport fishers additional opportunity on the lower Columbia River mainstem.
State and federal entities are hosting a series of four public meetings on the soon-to-be released plan to restore spring chinook and winter steelhead populations in the upper Willamette River Basin.
Whale feces — should you be forced to consider such matters — probably conjures images of, well, whale-scale hunks of crud, heavy lumps that sink to the bottom. But most whales actually deposit waste that floats at the surface of the ocean, “very liquidy, a flocculent plume,” says University of Vermont whale biologist, Joe Roman.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service has mailed applications to almost 240 trawl fishermen and processors on the West Coast to invite them into what will be arguably the most important change in West Coast trawl fisheries management in a generation.
Now in the 11th hour of an eight-year, $8 million study, the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, along with the states of Oregon and Washington, local officials and the farm community, have started working with congressional leaders and the Obama Administration to secure funding for a $300 million project that would guarantee a source of water to irrigate crops while leaving flows in the Walla Walla River for migrating salmon and steelhead.
Ever-increasing levels of predation by Steller sea lions, and to some degree California sea lions, on white sturgeon appears to be a trend that is continuing upward in the waters below the lower Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam.
The newly devised Adaptive Management Implementation Plan’s triggering system got a test drive this fall and winter with an evaluation of whether the endangered Upper Columbia River spring chinook salmon stock had dipped to levels that require revival actions beyond those already taking place.
The first known spring chinook salmon catch of the year was reported Feb. 1 in the Columbia River off Davis Bar, west of Vancouver, Wash., according to the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife’s “Weekender Report.”
A newfound regional momentum in both the fish and wildlife and power arenas needs to be encouraged and nurtured by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, says Bruce Measure, newly elected NPCC chair.
Tribal leaders from the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission praised the Obama Administration for a long-sought funding increase for tribal treaty rights-based natural resource management.
The Oregon Attorney General’s office is now weighing the legality of a ballot initiative proposal that would outlaw the use of gillnets in Oregon waters — notably the Columbia River — by non-Indian commercial fishermen.
The Bureau of Reclamation and the Washington State Department of Ecology have completed the Cle Elum Fish Passage Facilities and Fish Reintroduction Project Draft Environmental Impact Statement.
The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission will consider adopting a new package of sportfishing rules for 2010-12, as well as updates to the Columbia River sturgeon management policy, during a public meeting Feb. 4-6 in Olympia.
Last summer, the Idaho Fish and Game Commission opened 130 miles of the Salmon River from Island Park in Salmon City upstream to the Sawtooth Fish Hatchery for chinook salmon fishing.
Biologists working to recover the kokanee population in Lake Pend Oreille are encouraged by progress seen in 2009.
With another poor run of smelt expected to return to the Columbia River and its tributaries, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife this week announced it would limit sport fishing on the Cowlitz River sport fishery to only four days this winter.
Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke has determined that there has been a commercial fishery failure for the Yukon River chinook salmon due to low salmon returns.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council on Tuesday gave its endorsement to seven “accord” fish and wildlife projects that will absorb more than $28 million in funding over a 10-year span.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week gave its blessing to a steelhead kelt “reconditioning” project with the hope that the strategy will be a helpful tool in efforts to restore a flagging Upper Columbia River steelhead stock.
The Idaho Department of Fish and Game says it is ready to launch the three-step process that must be completed before it can build the hatchery needed to boost production of endangered Snake River sockeye to as many as 1 million smolts annually.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s economic advisers will evaluate the possible economic and biological costs faced by the federal Columbia-Snake river hydro system and fish and wildlife if non-native quagga and/or zebra mussels invade the basin.
Coho salmon that once called mid-Columbia River tributaries home were decimated in the early 1900s.
And pre-1990s attempts to rekindle populations with hatchery programs were ended because of a failure to produce adequate adult returns.
The same conditions that led to a banner run of hatchery coho salmon last year appear to have had a similar effect beneficial to winter steelhead.
Federal officials say they are on track, and producing results in terms of improved fish survival, after the first year of implementation of measures called for in NOAA Fisheries Service’s 2008 Federal Columbia River Power System biological opinion.
A pilot study this year showed enough promise for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife to expand its evaluation of the use of “selective” commercial fishing gear on the Columbia River mainstem in the New Year and beyond.
Federal funding is being increased to repair and reclaim crumbling national forest roads in Washington and Oregon that have been harming endangered salmon and clean water.
Next spring as much as 10,000 cubic feet per second of water will be spilled from northwest Montana’s Libby Dam as part of a modified strategy for luring endangered Kootenai River white sturgeon to more suitable spawning grounds.
If you build it, they will come. That seems to be the case with the out-of-season presence in recent weeks of juvenile salmon at the doors of the newly completed underwater tower and collection and transfer facility at Portland General Electric’s Round Butte Dam on the Deschutes River in central Oregon.
Fishing seasons that begin in the new year on the lower Columbia River mainstem are designed to keep the eulachon (smelt) harvest to a minimum, and the allowable white sturgeon catch in 2010 will be less than in recent years, though it is yet to be determined how much less.
Adult salmon returns to the Columbia-Snake river basin should be improved almost across the board, according to a Dec. 17 preliminary draft “2009 Adult Returns and 2010 Expectations” produced by fishery officials.
Montana’s Confederated Salish-Kootenai Tribes have drafted a proposal for a “pilot project” for suppressing lake trout in Flathead Lake — a proposal that includes an aggressive netting effort.
Survival of Snake River yearling chinook salmon and steelhead swimming down through the Columbia-Snake hydro system this year was above average (1993-2010) despite relatively low flow conditions, according to preliminary estimates for the spring migration.
At a series of public meetings in recent weeks treaty tribes and other fishing interests expressed concern about a federal process they fear will conclude that Columbia River basin hatchery production of salmon and steelhead needs to be scaled back dramatically.
The good news is that the state of the science regarding hatchery-wild salmon interactions has evolved substantially.
The bad news is that that newer science seems to show those hatchery salmon and steelhead don’t do too well when they stray onto the spawning grounds and in many cases negatively affect wild fish they mingle with there.
A team of researchers from Canada and the United States have published an article stating that pink, chum and sockeye salmon in the North Pacific are now twice as abundant as in the 1950s.
With the 2010 coho salmon return the Willamette River basin on track to break existing records, Oregon fishery managers decided late last month to increase the bag limit for anglers.
“A very late spike” in the number of upriver fall chinook climbing fish ladders at the lower Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam has lifted the run right back on track to achieve preseason expectations.
A conservation project covering 9,500 acres of former Plum Creek Timber Co. lands in Montana’s west Swan Valley has been advanced by the state’s Fish, Wildlife and Parks Commission.
U.S. District Court Judge Garr M. King will hear oral arguments in Portland Nov. 8 over whether the federal government can properly consider a request from Idaho’s Shoshone Bannock Tribes for permission to go fishing in northeast Oregon’s Grand Ronde and Imnaha rivers.
The Idaho Department of Fish and Game’s assistant Fisheries Bureau chief last week gave the Northwest Power and Conservation Council a “gravel to gravel” update regarding his agency’s Snake River Sockeye Salmon Captive Broodstock program.
With a strong run of fall chinook salmon returning to the Cowlitz Salmon Hatchery, Washington fishery managers plan to transport up to 5,000 hatchery fish upriver and release them upriver above the last of three dams on the Cowlitz River.
Using data from 21 North American wolf populations, two Montana State University researchers have found that the recently proposed levels of hunting for Montana and Idaho wolves are likely to have larger effects on wolf numbers than has been suggested.
Fisheries experts this week predicted, though with a few caveats, that the new year will bring the biggest return of upriver spring chinook salmon to the Columbia River basin — 470,000 adult fish — on a record dating back to 1938.
If such a run materializes, it would break the record of 439,885 set in 2001.
High jack returns to the Columbia River basin this year could portend a larger return of 3-year-old fall chinook salmon next year, according to a preliminary run-size forecast produced by Oregon and Washington department of fish and wildlife staffs.
Nez Perce Tribe officials on Thursday for the first time in the 15-year history of the Clearwater Coho Restoration Project delivered fertilized coho salmon eggs from Idaho back to a western Oregon hatchery that has enabled the coho program to take wing.
Idaho Power Company fishery biologist Phil Groves recalls that during his first year on the job, 1991, only 46 fall chinook salmon redds were counted in the 100-mile stretch of the Snake River from Asotin, Wash., to the base of Hells Canyon Dam.
Salmon “abundance levels now are as high as they’ve ever been in history” in the north Pacific due to a friendlier ocean and, in large part, growing Russian hatchery production of pinks, according to University of Washington researcher Kate Myers.
Researchers continue to look for remedies for “an unforeseen byproduct” of hatchery supplementation of salmon populations — an unnaturally high occurrence of so-called mini-jacks, male fish that have experienced a precocious maturation and urge to spawn.
A proposal by the Colville Tribes to build a salmon hatchery near central Washington’s Chief Joseph Dam appears to have cleared another procedural hurdle with the release last month of what is a mostly positive final Environmental Impact Statement.
As part of a broader effort to recover the threatened bull trout, the Fish and Wildlife Service on Wednesday proposed to reintroduce the native fish species to the upper Clackamas River in northwest Oregon.
Tim Roth has been honored by Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar for his leadership and exceptional accomplishments as the deputy project leader for the Columbia River Fisheries Program Office in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Pacific Region.
A federal judge this week suggested that a legal strategy might soon be in place to protect salmon and steelhead impacted by the Federal Columbia River Power System.
“I really believe that with a little more work we’ll have a BiOp,” U.S. District Court Judge James A. Redden told two crowded courtrooms Monday.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has scheduled a public stakeholder meeting Dec. 8 to preview the Hatchery Review Team’s draft report and recommendations for Oregon Lower Snake River Compensation Plan fish hatchery programs located at Lookingglass, Irrigon and Wallowa fish hatcheries and their satellite juvenile acclimation and adult recapture facilities.
A new interactive Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife Web site offers a county-level view of the $2.5 billion spent in Oregon by fishing, hunting and wildlife viewing enthusiasts in 2008.
A pair of missives issued over the past week by U.S. District Court Judge James A. Redden note progress in the attempt to produce a legal strategy that avoids jeopardizing the survival of salmon and steelhead stock that negotiate the Columbia-Snake river hydro system.
Starting April 1, Washington State anglers who fish for salmon and steelhead in the Columbia River and its tributaries will be required to purchase a new endorsement intended to help maintain and improve fishing opportunities throughout the basin.
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game released this week preliminary estimates for the 2009 commercial salmon harvest that shows catch numbers below the recent 10-year average but with a higher dollar value.
With seven wolves harvested last weekend in Northwest Montana and three in Southwest Montana, the state’s wolf-hunting season officially closed Monday night.
The U.S. House of Representatives Thursday approved legislation to designate the Molalla River in northwestern Oregon as a federal Wild and Scenic River.
Both effort and knowledge have increased since early 2007 when the Nez Perce Tribe first authorized the use of gill-nets fall-winter commercial fishing in the lower Snake River basin.
The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission on Nov. 6 voted to adopt a new state hatchery and fishery reform policy designed to accelerate recovery of wild salmon and steelhead while also supporting sustainable fisheries.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council on Thursday recommended funding three “within-year” fish and wildlife project budget requests, including $243,059 to build on restored momentum for habitat restoration work in Idaho’s Lemhi River subbasin.
Studies conducted in California and elsewhere provide support for the use of marine reserves as a tool for managing fisheries and protecting marine habitats, according to biologists at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
— From Chris Hyland,Walla Walla, WA:
Re: “Fishery Managers Say Harvest Rules Must Allow More Spring Chinook Above Bonneville Dam” https://www.www.www.staging.columbiabasinbulletin.org/364176.aspx (CBB, Nov. 6, 2009)
I would like to comment on the above article.
While it was well written, and covered the issue from tribal and downriver perspectives, it totally missed another interest group in this picture: Non-tribal upriver sport anglers.
Has the removal of 25 known fish-eating California sea lions from below the lower Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam helped “save” spawning salmon and steelhead?
A roomful of, mostly, anglers and sport fishing guides grumbled Thursday night at the news that lower Columbia River spring chinook fisheries will be held in check early next year to allow more fish to pass through and assure an equal share of the harvest for upriver fishers.
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