Bonneville Power Administration is writing some big checks to fishermen this fall. One guy is getting more than $81,000.
Each year, BPA pays a bounty for northern pikeminnow caught in the Columbia River. The fish, according to BPA, eat millions of young salmon and steelhead.
For 2010, BPA will pay a total of $1.2 million for 173,112 pikeminnow.
Continue reading for the full press release.
There’s no doubt that salmon raised in hatcheries are important. They make up the bulk of what’s caught in the ocean. But researchers meeting this week in Portland say hatchery salmon pose a threat to their wild cousins.
OPB: Scientists Determine Hatchery Salmon Threaten Wild Fish
Oregon’s House Speaker Dave Hunt wants wildlife officials to trap and kill sea lions that are hanging out at Willamette Falls near Oregon City. It’s similar to what’s going on at Bonneville Dam. The sea lions have figured out that this spot, on the Willamette River, is a great location for easy pickings of salmon and other fish. They’re even stealing fish off the lines of fishermen. Hunt held a public meeting Monday night to help fishermen vent their frustrations.
The Copco 1 Dam on the Klamath River. Photo courtesy U.S. Fish and Wildlife.
When government and tribal leaders gathered in Salem earlier this year to sign the Klamath basin agreements, the talk was all about dam removal. ”Hasta la vista to the dams,” said California’s Governor Schwarzenegger.
But what Schwarzenegger, Governor Kulongoski and the others glossed over is that there is no agreement to remove dams on the Klamath River. There’s only an agreement to study the issue. A decision is a couple of years away.
And now we’re seeing what could be the first attempt to take advantage of that loophole.
Columbia River Sockeye Salmon. Courtesy WDFW.
The Obama Administration is walking away from what could have become the first big salmon fight of 2010.
NOAA Fisheries is dropping plans to cut off spring time spills at four dams on the Lower Snake River.
After three years of depressing news, there’s finally enough salmon to allow for fishing everywhere on the West Coast this summer.
Columbia River Sockeye Salmon. Courtesy WDFW.
In any other part of the country, the idea might sound too crazy to be true.
The feds want changes in how they help young salmon in the Columbia River Basin migrate to the Pacific Ocean this summer. Instead of making sure there’s enough water to help salmon swim past dams, the feds propose rounding them up, putting the fish on barges, and shipping them down river.
In 2002, tens of thousands of salmon died in the Klamath River after the Bush Administration decided to give farmers priority over fish and wildlife. Photo from Water Watch.
A rather disturbing story from the Times-Standard newspaper in Northern California.
Reporter John Driscoll interviewed scientists, including some from OSU, who say there’s so little water in the Klamath River we may see a repeat of 2002 when as many as 60,000 salmon died.
The problem is a tiny parasitic worm that lives in river silt. Driscoll reports that silty river bottoms are spreading across the Klamath River and scientists are finding higher concentrations of worms in those areas. Releasing more water from dams could flush away the silt and help the fish. But with the area facing a historic drought, will there be a enough water in the system to do that?
For the entire story see: Klamath River fish diseases spreading
Tip from the Pacific Fishery Management Council
Condit Dam on the White Salmon River in Washington State.
In 1999, Pacific Power, environmental groups and the Yakama Nation reached a landmark agreement to remove the Condit Dam on the White Salmon River.
More than a decade later, the dam is still there.
The delays are frustrating the Gifford Pinchot Task Force, which recently warned members that time is running out if the dam is going to be removed this year.
And here’s what it says you can do to help.
Fishing and conservation groups want the Washington Department of Ecology to loosen up some regulations and allow more water to be spilled over dams on the Columbia and Snake rivers.
If the timing is done right, spilling more water over dams helps young salmon migrate down river to the ocean. Conservationists compare it to the ride salmon used to get when they went over free flowing waterfalls. It speeds them along during a crucial phase of life, increases their survivability, and is a heckuva lot safer that being flushed through turbines.
