In August and September, the Stillaguamish Tribe spawned adult chinook collected on the North Fork of the Stillaguamish River. The tribe's hatchery supplementation program has provided a comprehensive and long-running…
The Tulalip Tribes and Skagit River System Cooperative (SRSC) recently completed a six-year study of juvenile chinook salmon use of small coastal streams in the Whidbey basin.
“Small coastal streams are often overlooked as potential salmon habitat because many flow seasonally and do not provide spawning habitat,” said Todd Zackey, the marine and nearshore program manager for Tulalip who obtained grant funding for the research. Derek Marks, Timber/Fish/Wildlife manager for Tulalip, was an additional principal investigator on the research.
The researchers electrofished 63 streams in the Whidbey basin and found juvenile chinook using more than half of them. The migrant fry originated from the three nearby rivers: Skagit, Snohomish and Stillaguamish.
Chinook salmon are returning once again to the Elwha River, with the river in its second year of being free of the Elwha Dam. The Glines Canyon Dam is not…
The Lummi Nation Natural Resources Department is conducting a pilot tangle net fishery for hatchery chinook salmon that allows natural origin fish to be released without harm.
Nooksack River early chinook are part of a major population group that must be recovering before the Puget Sound chinook listed as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) can be delisted.
“We’re trying to conserve all the natural origin fish by using a smaller mesh net,” said Alan Chapman, ESA coordinator for the tribe. “The fish tangle by the snout, rather than the gills or body, so they can be safely released.” (more…)
The Upper Skagit Tribe and the University of Washington (UW) are doing a two-year study examining seasonal habitat preferences for yearling chinook and steelhead in the Skagit River.
Not all juvenile chinook salmon migrate out to sea right away. They spend a few months to two years in freshwater and estuarine habitat. This study will help researchers learn more about the fish that stay in the Skagit watershed’s freshwater habitat during the first year of life. (more…)
Less than a year since the Elwha River’s two fish-blocking dams started to come down, native salmon have made their way deep into the Elwha watershed for the first time…
Olympic National Park reported this week that its biologists have seen adult chinook salmon swimming two miles upstream from the park's boundary in the Elwha River, above the old Elwha…
The Stillaguamish Tribe's Natural Resources Department began its annual broodstock collection today on the North Fork Stillaguamish River. The adult chinook salmon will be spawned at the tribe's hatchery, which…
“This project has been identified for some time and we were finally able to get the pieces to line up to make it happen,” said Ray Colby, water quality specialist for the Makah Tribe. Previously located on private commercial timberlands, the site is one of several acquired by the Makah Tribe as tribal fee lands. (more…)
The Stillaguamish Tribe’s captive juvenile fall chinook soon will have a new home. The tribe has converted an old trout farm into a hatchery facility at Brenner Creek on the South Fork Stillaguamish River.
The tribe expects the Brenner fish hatchery to be completed by the end of the year. The tribe has been rearing the fall juvenile chinook from brood years 2008, 2009 and 2010 at its Harvey Creek Hatchery.
Fall chinook, which mostly rear and spawn in the South Fork Stillaguamish, are genetically distinct from summer chinook, which primarily use the North Fork. A hatchery program has been in place in the North Fork for more than 20 years, with about 1,500 summer chinook returning each year.
Stillaguamish fall chinook by comparison have declined to fewer than 100 fish — so few that there aren’t enough adult chinook in the South Fork to capture and use for broodstock. (more…)