In 2015, nearly half of steelhead smolts that began their journey to the ocean at Rock Island Dam on the upper Columbia River did not survive the onslaught of birds that feed on the smolts along the way, according to Blaine Parker, avian predation coordinator at the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission.
Environmental groups filed a lawsuit in King County Superior Court to block a permit that would allow Cooke Aquaculture to transition from rearing non-native Atlantic salmon to rearing native steelhead at its net pen facilities in Puget Sound.
Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife staff reviewed the findings of a recent report on hatchery reform at the state’s Fish and Wildlife Commission meeting Thursday, Feb. 6.
This has been a busy week for Oregon and Washington recreational and commercial fishing regulations both upstream and downstream of Bonneville Dam.
NOAA Fisheries is proposing to approve and implement fishery management plans for two overfished stocks of chinook salmon – Klamath River fall-run chinook and Sacramento fall-run chinook. The stocks are large contributors to ocean salmon fisheries off the California and Oregon coasts.
As with many things in our salmon and steelhead world, clipping or not clipping hatchery fish can get a little complicated. Some hatchery steelhead smolts are released with their adipose fin still intact on purpose. But, a lot of thought and coordination with our partners goes into making decisions for these programs.
In 2014, a disease of epidemic proportions gripped the West Coast of the U.S. You may not have noticed, though, unless you were underwater.
