As it looks for ways to help reintroduce anadromous fish upstream of Willamette Valley dams, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is considering adding a $100 to $200 million water temperature control tower in the Detroit Reservoir.
A growing snowpack that is driving up the water supply forecast in the North Fork Clearwater basin could cause the release of spring chinook and steelhead from hatcheries downstream of Dworshak Dam in the coming weeks.
A La Nina weather influence off the Pacific Ocean has been felt, but not at all like it manifested in the Columbia Basin last winter.
New NOAA research is showing the ability to predict snow levels in the mountains of the West some eight months in advance. This prediction can be down to the scale of a mountain range, which will improve regional water forecasts.
Defendants in a district court case that resulted in injunctive relief ordering more spring spill at eight lower Snake and Columbia river dams said in reply briefs before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that the current biological opinion covering dam operations on the rivers is improving survival of salmon and steelhead listed under the federal Endangered Species Act, not causing the irreparable harm that would be needed to warrant an injunction.
More water is being released at Dworshak Dam on the North Fork Clearwater River to help maintain a low reservoir level as officials expect up to two inches of warm rain that could cause low elevation snow to melt in the river basin.
Cleanup of an oil spill and removing the spill’s source in the Columbia River estuary near Astoria will continue for a couple more weeks, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.
This year the larger portion of chum redds downstream of Bonneville Dam are nearer the dam in an area dubbed the Strawberry chum spawning area, according to information provided by Tony Norris of the Bonneville Power Administration.
Anticipating more rain and higher flows late this week, the interagency Technical Management Team chose to increase outflow at Dworshak Dam even with a slight risk that the flows would increase total dissolved gas levels above state standards in the North Fork of the Clearwater River.
Heavy rain in the North Fork Clearwater River basin expected this week will cause inflows to the Dworshak Reservoir to rise to 4,500 cubic feet per second late in the week and will reach as high as 10 kcfs by the weekend.
The U.S. Coast Guard has decided that a 45-foot pleasure yacht that sank in the Columbia River Oct. 31, 2017 is a hazard to navigation and will remove the boat from the river’s bottom in the next couple of days or weeks.
High flow, involuntary spill, high dissolved gas and early migration of juvenile salmon and steelhead mark mainstem Columbia/Snake river 2017 winter/spring operations.
A record runoff in March, a persistent outage of the dam’s largest generator and worries that dangerous dissolved gas levels for hatchery fish generated by more spill than normal created what officials call a perfect storm for operations at Dworshak Dam in Idaho.
Colder and wetter-than-average conditions persisted across the Pacific Northwest in November, with a La Nina weather pattern becoming well established and strengthening during the month, and the outlook is for much of the same going into March.
2017 turned out to be a good year for the white sturgeon in the middle Snake River, says Idaho Department of Fish and Game. In the river between Bliss Dam and CJ Strike Reservoir, sturgeon took advantage of the rare high river flows and spawned successfully in the spring.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is extending the review period for the Willamette Valley reservoir storage reallocation study. The review period now ends December 28, adding six days to the original 45 day review period.
Subyearling fall chinook salmon lose weight as they migrate downriver through the McNary and John Day dam pools. Although their preferred food through these still waters is Daphnia, a naturally occurring small planktonic crustacean, warmer water requires more energy and the fish in August will turn to non-native juvenile America shad as a food source.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is looking for snowshoers, backcountry skiers and snow-machine users in the Pacific Northwest to gather data to use in computer modeling for snow-water equivalent, or SWE.
Fisheries and dam managers agreed last week to maintain a lower than normal reservoir elevation at Dworshak Dam in order to avoid the high emergency outflows from the dam experienced last winter due to heavy snow and rain.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineer's system of 13 dams and reservoirs in the Willamette River Basin's primary purpose is flood risk management. However, the Corps is in the process of determining if a reallocation of water storage could grant municipal and industrial water supply, irrigation and fish and wildlife better access to the stored water.
In some Puget Sound streams up to 100 percent of coho salmon die before they spawn and a new study has identified the cause – contaminants from cars and trucks on high-use roads – a nonpoint source of pollution that flow as stormwater from impervious surfaces into streams.
An annual study that looks at salmonid survival through Snake and Columbia river dams for the first time evaluated juvenile fish survival in the Snake River with and without the presence of the four lower dams on the river, as well as the impact on survival if spill is increased, as it may beginning next year.
Irrigators in eastern Washington are blaming fisheries managers for choosing spill over transportation during the spring juvenile migration in 2015, a choice they allege resulted in the loss of 65 percent of the wild spring chinook adults returning to the Snake River this year.
The Western Rivers Conservancy has purchased a ranch in Idaho’s Sawtooth National Recreation Area that has two creeks home to steelhead, chinook salmon and bull trout, and the Bonneville Power Administration is purchasing the water rights that will keep those creeks watered in the future.
Hot weather is continuing in the lower Snake and Clearwater river basins but the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is managing to keep dissolved gas issues at bay as well keep the tailwater temperature at Lower Granite Dam under the 68 degree Fahrenheit threshold required by a biological opinion for salmon and steelhead in the Columbia/Snake river hydro system.
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