In a few years, fishermen might be able to hit the water for chinook in Sinclair Inlet a month earlier than they can now.
Hatchery chinook generally return to the inlet near Gorst in August and September. An effort to expand the run timing would have fish swimming into Sinclair Inlet in July. (more…)
ALDER – Over 100 trees that have fallen into the reservoir behind Alder Dam will be put to use constructing engineered logjams to create salmon habitat on Ohop Creek.
“Trees that wash into the lake from the river and get stuck behind the dam need to be removed before they become a nuisance,” said David Troutt, natural resources manager for the Nisqually Tribe, which is spearheading the effort to gather the logs. “We’re just taking them out and putting them to good use.” Juvenile salmon find both food and shelter within logjams. The structures also slow the flow of the creek, easing adult salmon migration.
“We know logjams benefit salmon because we’ve been monitoring other restoration projects. We really see a difference in the section of river with logjams and those without,” Troutt said. “There are a lot more salmon around the logjams.”
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OLYMPIA – There’s a new bug that’s been going around for the last couple years. State and federal elected officials and bureaucrats seem to be coming down with it more than anyone else.
It’s called “salmon fatigue” and from what I can tell, it’s a brain infection that makes you tired of trying to save the salmon.
If we cried about fatigue every time we came up against a difficult problem in this country, where would we be? I don’t understand how you can get tired of trying to save the salmon.
What those infected with salmon fatigue are really saying is “stop coming to me and talking about salmon.” (more…)
The Kitsap Sun reported that a plan has been adopted to help recover Hood Canal summer chum: "A formal recovery plan to restore populations of Hood Canal summer chum has…
OLYMPIA (June 12, 2006) -- Life just wouldn’t be the same without the orca. For thousands of years, these magnificent mammals have splashed through the ocean waves and skipped playfully through the serene waters of Puget Sound. Tribal culture has been greatly inspired by these awesome black and white giants who have always been a wondrous sign of purity and vitality in the Northwest. Now our brother orca is listed as an endangered species, a fact almost too tragic to perceive. Orcas will disappear from our waters unless we all work together to make sure we have an environment that will sustain them. As it is, we don’t. Our waters are riddled with toxic filth and it is slowly killing them.
Tribe files 60-day notice of intent, but still hopes negotiations can ward off a suit
LACONNER (September 11, 2003) — Seeking to protect Skagit chinook salmon, the Swinomish Tribe today notified a Skagit County Diking District of their intent to file a lawsuit under the federal Endangered Species Act and Clean Water Act. After years of attempting to find mutually acceptable solutions locally, the tribe is turning to the federal courts. “We have tried to work cooperatively with the farming community, the Governor, the county and the state, and in every instance they have turned us away,” said Brian Cladoosby, chairman of the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community.
ELDON (June 16, 2003) — Using a small net, Greg Sullivan scoops the remaining salmon from a smolt trap’s holding tank and counts his catch before releasing the juvenile fish back into the river. “That’s the last of them for today,” says the Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe’s natural resources technician, who checks the trap on the Hamma Hamma River twice a week. “That makes 1,253 juvenile salmon. By far the most I’ve seen here at one time.”
And that’s a good sign. The more fish that show up in the smolt trap’s tank, the more accurate of a count the tribe can get on how many juvenile salmon, or smolts, are migrating from the freshwater of the Hamma Hamma River into the saltwater of Hood Canal. The smolt trap is part of a project conducted by the Port Gamble and Skokomish tribes, a local landowner, Long Live the Kings, the Hood Canal Salmon Enhancement Group and the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.
LOWER ELWHA (Feb. 7, 2002) -- Just when the legendary Elwha chinook were ready again to make their famous run into the Olympic Mountains, they may be snuffed out by…