With rain, warmer weather and more snow melt, juvenile salmon have been getting the amount of water they need to pass Columbia and Snake river dams. After a delayed spring snow melt, river levels began rising two weeks ago and have remained at or above target flow levels recommended in the National Marine Fisheries Service 2000 biological opinion.

A central Washington irrigation system -- the center of a fish vs. farmer dispute since 1988 and beyond -- will be given a legal reprieve under a pair of agreements reached this week after intensive negotiations led, at times, by the regional chief of the National Marine Fisheries Service.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers stopped spilling water over Bonneville
Dam this morning (March 15), ending nearly four days of spill to help
hatchery-bred juvenile chinook salmon pass the dam safely.

However, as the spill ended this morning at 6 a.m., only about 50
percent of the 7.8 million juvenile tule fall chinook salmon released
from the hatchery had passed the dam on their downstream migration to
the ocean, according to the Fish Passage Center.

Fisheries managers this week asked for ten days of spill and higher
flows at Bonneville Dam to aid passage at the dam for juvenile chinook
released from the Spring Creek Hatchery upstream.

However, dam operators said there isn't enough water in the system to
provide either the flow or the spill and sent the issue to a higher
forum for a decision.

Current scientific evidence does not support the need to require higher
water levels in Oregon's Upper Klamath Lake or higher flows on the
nearby Klamath River, as prescribed by two federal agencies to protect
endangered and threatened species of fish.

That's the finding of a new interim report from the National Academy of
Science's National Research Council.

Despite an agency career that has spanned 21 years, Columbia Basin
reactions to the appointment of Steve Wright to lead the Bonneville
Power Administration this week focused for the most part on his
performance over the past 12 months during drought-caused energy and,
some say, salmon, crises.

The memories of last year's Columbia Basin drought have not been washed
away, but near normal precipitation and snowpack accumulation to-date
means that hydrosystem operators, power users, fish managers and farmers
may be able to avoid some of the hard decisions of last summer.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is proposing to open new dumpsites for
the sediment it collects when dredging the shipping channel each summer
at the Columbia River mouth.

Of the eight sites proposed, one new site would put dredge spoils
directly onto a Washington beach to counteract erosion, while another is
a shallow water site west of the North Jetty that the agency proposes to
use under a special provision of federal law.

One or two storms does not necessarily mark the end of a drought cycle.
But things are looking up for those in the Pacific Northwest that have
been praying for rain, and snow.