Fisheries

Little Creek in Hoh River Watershed on Track to Produce More Coho

Adult and juvenile coho will once again swim in the upper reaches of Chalaat Creek on the Hoh Tribe’s reservation for the first time in decades thanks to a fish passage improvement completed by the Hoh Tribe this fall.

Chalaat Creek is a tributary to the lower Hoh River. The 5-mile long creek meanders through mature second growth timber and forested wetland on the tribe’s reservation about 30 miles south of Forks. It empties into the Hoh River several thousand feet from the ocean.

“This is the first main tributary to the Hoh River that fish encounter coming in from the ocean,” said Steve Allison, habitat biologist for the Hoh Tribe. “These kinds of streams are historically significant coho producers and we think we’re going to see a noticeable increase in the numbers of young coho coming out of Chalaat Creek.”

The tribe, through a $218,000 Pacific Coast Salmon Recovery Fund grant, replaced a failing, impassable culvert with a bridge and created a 330- foot section of stream channel to allow fish access to a pond with about 2.5 miles of additional habitat upstream. (more…)

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Quileute Tribe Boosts Sol Duc Summer Run

Quileute Jack and Ruben with chinookThe Sol Duc River on the northwestern Olympic Peninsula runs at its lowest and warmest when summer chinook return to its waters every year. Despite being in one of the world’s greatest temperate rain forests, near-drought conditions often occur in late summer before the fall rains begin in earnest.

“These fish are survivors,” said Roger Lien, fish biologist for the Quileute Tribe. After four to five years at sea, the fish return to their river of birth at a difficult time. Low flows go hand in hand with higher water temperatures, placing enormous stress on the fish and making them susceptible to disease. Water temperatures near 70 degrees can be lethal to salmon. (more…)

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Tribe preserving threatened South Fork Stillaguamish River chinook

ARLINGTON – The Stillaguamish Tribe has everything it needs to start a chinook supplementation program in the South Fork of the Stillaguamish River – except the fish.

The tribe hired additional field technicians and acquired an old trout farm to spawn and rear threatened South Fork Stillaguamish River chinook. But because there are so few chinook returning to the South Fork, it has been a challenge to collect enough adult fish to spawn.

South Fork chinook are genetically distinct from North Fork chinook, and always have been smaller in number.

The tribe’s hatchery program in the North Fork has supplemented that population for 20 years, with about 1,500 fish returning to the North Fork each year. Meanwhile, chinook returns to the South Fork have declined to fewer than 100 fish. (more…)

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