Unusually warm ocean conditions off the Pacific Northwest in the last few years led anchovies, sardines and hake to begin spawning in Northwest waters much earlier in the year and, for anchovy, longer than biologists have ever recorded before, new research has found.
A revolution in diagnostics portability is bringing the lab to the sample. Backpacks outfitted with environmental DNA sampling equipment make it simple enough for a six year-old to accurately test water samples in the field.
Biologists are reporting that salmon and steelhead are now using a newly restored section of Catherine Creek near La Grande in northeast Oregon after the Bonneville Power Administration and its partners completed a substantial habitat restoration project in October of 2016.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council formally requested a review of its 2014 Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program by the Independent Scientific Advisory Board at its September 12 meeting in Spokane.
To bring salmon and steelhead to the Columbia River above Grand Coulee and Chief Joseph dams researchers continue to search for the best hatchery stock and suitable habitat.
A concerted effort to restore a viable white sturgeon population in the upper Columbia River has had at least one positive effect – enough hatchery fish to support of both tribal and non-tribal fisheries of North America’s largest freshwater fish.
Two Idaho wildlife mitigation projects received approval by scientists after a previous review found the two projects – Albeni Falls and Southern Idaho wildlife mitigation projects – had not met scientific review criteria.
A fouled water supply caused by the Eagle Creek fire near Bonneville Dam and three Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife hatcheries in the Columbia River Gorge has forced the state agency to release some tule fall chinook six months early, as well as other chinook from four ponds, which were to be released next month. The total early release amounts to about 600,000 juveniles.
A recent study is the first to explore how infectious hematopoietic necrosis virus (IHNV) spreads among juvenile hatchery-raised fish in the Pacific Northwest, where high rates of infection and mortality can occur.
For the next two years the budget for the largest fish and wildlife program in the United States will remain at levels seen over the last several years, but that’s only if the Bonneville Power Administration is able to manage a number of uncertainties, including the price of its power on the wide open West Coast power market.
Although the summer has been hot, state fisheries managers have not seen the die-off of salmon and sturgeon this year that was experienced during the low flow and warm water conditions of 2015. Still, 2015 conditions likely had a big impact on current adult salmon and steelhead returns.
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.
The impacts of toxic pollutants on stream food webs are likely limiting the potential of habitat restoration projects in the Northwest, as well as putting at risk the investments already made in those improvements by the Bonneville Power Administration and its ratepayers.
In a six to two vote, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council approved $30,000 to develop a pilot demonstration map for Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs), a toxic contaminant that impacts aquatic organisms and stream food webs, and could limit habitat restoration projects.
Identified cost savings will help fund some $324,000 of hatchery upgrades, as well as $150,000 for upkeep of screens in fiscal year 2018 (Oct. 1, 2017 – Sept. 30, 2018).
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council approved its 16th review of the Bonneville Power Administration’s fish and wildlife costs for fiscal year 2016 at its meeting in Portland, August 15. The report had been out for review since the Council’s June meeting.
A white paper produced by Columbia Riverkeeper that used computer simulations says that if the four lower Snake River dams had not been in place in 2015, river water would have naturally remained cool enough for the sockeye salmon migrating in the river that year to have successfully completed their journey to their spawning grounds in the Sawtooth Basin in Idaho.
A federal appeals court has declined to hear a motion by Portland General Electric that challenges a lower court decision that denied the utility’s request to dismiss a lawsuit filed last year by the Deschutes River Alliance.
Steelhead trout research on a remote northeast Oregon river is showing good reason for the fish’s threatened status under the federal Endangered Species Act.
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers operations officials at Lower Monumental Lock and Dam this week investigated and confirmed a suspected oil leak in hydroelectric generator unit number 2.
This week the Bonneville Power Administration set rates for fiscal years 2018 and 2019 that, says the agency, “will help support long-term rate stability and maximize the value of the regional federal power and transmission systems.”
With growing risks to the nation’s electrical grid from natural disasters and as a potential target for malicious attacks, the U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security should work closely with utility operators and other stakeholders to improve cyber and physical security and resilience, says a new congressionally mandated report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
The population of northern pike that is taking up residency in Lake Roosevelt, the reservoir created by Grand Coulee Dam, has spread south this year and has a team of experts saying that suppression of the fish could easily have begun a year or two earlier than it did.
In a July 19 court memorandum, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s 2014 Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program.
A review of 29 wildlife habitat projects funded by the Bonneville Power Administration that is a part of the Council’s overall review of all programs funded under the power marketing agency’s Fish and Wildlife program was completed by the Independent Scientific Review Panel June 28.
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