Though mainstem Columbia/Snake River fish passage issues -- flow, spill, improvements at the dams -- get most of the attention, smaller-scale efforts to improve fish passage in the Basin's upper tributaries are just as important in the regional effort to recover salmon and steelhead populations.

To be successful, and to avoid litigation, these efforts at the tributary level – off-site mitigation, as it's called -- require a high degree of cooperation and collaboration among local stakeholders , such as landowners, irrigation districts, federal and state agencies, tribes, local governments, conservation districts, watershed councils and advocacy groups.

A recent example of such collaboration in the Yakima River basin illustrates that off-site mitigation work is taking place and it may serve as a model for those seeking to improve fish passage and fish spawning in tributary reaches hampered by water diversions.

Last month, a diverse group of parties involved in discussions to improve fish passage and habitat in Manastash Creek, which enters the Yakima River west of Ellensburg, agreed to a plan that consolidates smaller diversions, installs fish screens to block fish from moving into irrigation ditches, and returns flow to a several mile stretch of the creek that goes dry in the summer.

The work is expected to improve spawning and rearing habitat in the creek for spring chinook and Mid-Columbia steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act. At the same time, the consolidation of smaller diversions, plus other efficiencies, will keep the same amount of water flowing to farmers.

The work will be funded by the Bonneville Power Administration through the Northwest Power and Conservation Council's Fish and Wildlife Program, and the state of Washington. BPA has committed a total of about $3 million for fish passage and preliminary flow enhancement measures in the Manastash.

BPA officials say the Manastash Creek project illustrates how local tributary habitat work -- offsite mitigation -- can be important and successful components under a broader Federal Columbia River Power System biological opinion.

The Manastash Creek agreement was not a slam dunk. Rather than fall into litigation threatened by the Washington Environmental Council, parties, including the WEC, about seven years ago began talks on how to improve fish passage while keeping farmers whole.

Such a sustained effort, said David Byrnes of BPA, can serve as "an illustration for the future on how parties can work together." Such collaboration, he said, is key to the success of what federal agencies and the Council call the "integrated program" -- biological opinions, the Council program, and local fish recovery efforts.

Dale Bambrick, NOAA Fisheries' habitat division, Eastern Washington branch chief, who has been involved with Manastash from the beginning, said the key to keeping the process moving forward toward agreement -- and more water for fish -- was the "climate of cooperation and the desire of all parties to return flow to Manastash."

The process was able to move forward when parties committed "to keeping farmers on the land."

Philip Rigdon, deputy director of natural resources for the Yakama Nation, said the Manastash project successfully pulled together the irrigators, Yakama Nation, state agencies and others. He said the goal was to find a way to meet the needs of farmers and fish as much as possible.

While pleased with the results so far, Rigdon said the Yakama Nation will be working with others to continue seeking ways to increase in-stream flows in the creek beyond what's called for last month's agreement.

Rigdon said in the Yakima basin overall there is "an enormous amount of work to be done with fish passage issues. The Yakama Nation will be working with others, he said, to "open miles and miles of streams for fish."

Fish passage work in the Yakima basin has been a long-standing effort.

The Yakima basin is considered one of the Council's Fish and Wildlife Program's principal examples of offsite mitigation.

Because the mainstem Columbia and Snake River dams cut off one third of the habitat and, other than Hanford Reach, there is little or no salmon habitat on the mainstem Columbia, the Yakima Basin is one of the areas selected to "make up" for the losses on the mainstem.

The Yakima basin was one place where the fish habitat remained largely intact. Fish and wildlife specialists considered it to be one of areas with the best potential for producing anadromous fish in the Columbia Basin.

Fish screens such as those to be put in place in Manastash Creek play a key role in the context of the regional effort to mitigate for the effects of the federal hydro system on Northwest fish and wildlife.

More than a billion dollars has been invested since the early 1980s to improve fish passage at the federal dams on the mainstem Columbia and Snake rivers.

Prior to the current Manastash project, Phase I fish screen facilities on the large federal irrigation diversions in the Yakima Basin were completed between 1985 and 1991. The majority of Phase II fish screens on mid-to-small diversions came on line between 1992 and 2000. By 2000, the full cumulative benefit of Yakima Basin Phase I and Phase II fish passage improvements (fish screens and fish ladders) was benefiting Yakima salmon and steelhead runs.

Federal officials say the Yakima basin fish screens help to protect the investment in mainstem passage by ensuring that more fish eventually make it safely to the sea rather than being stranded in an irrigation ditch.

Another key feature of the project is the long-term commitment BPA and the Council have made to continue funding of operation and maintenance of the Phase I and II fish screens at an annual cost of about $250,000.

This annual funding for operation and maintenance of the Phase I and Phase II project, say BPA officials, safeguards the $33.4 million initial investment in the construction of the screens and related costs.

About $32 million of the total investment was provided by BPA ratepayers, and includes the cost of easements and cultural surveys needed to complete the project. At the same time, continued funding of operation and maintenance also helps to ensure that the improved annual smolt passage is maintained and the associated increase in adult returns.

As for impacts on fish survival, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife says the 18-year average return for spring chinook salmon to the Yakima River for the period from 1982 (when counting began at Prosser Dam) to 1999 was about 3,000 adults. For the period 2000 to 2006, the average return was about 12,300 adults -- or four times greater.