After Multiple Dam Removals On Oregon's Rogue River, Things Are Looking Up for Salmon Populations
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Dams started coming down on the Rogue in 2008, and the work continues to this day. In 10 years, eight dams have been removed or modified for fish passage on the Rogue and its tributaries at a cost of about $20 million, said Jim McCarthy, Southern Oregon program manager at WaterWatch of Oregon, an environmental group that has played a large role in the process. The work has restored 157 miles of free-flowing river.
Most of the dams were relatively small barriers built for water diversions and had fallen into disrepair. The most recent, Beeson-Robison Dam, came down in 2017 on Wagner Creek.
Although the dam removals began 10 years ago, the full benefit to salmon populations has only been measurable over the last two years. That’s because salmon have such long life cycles – usually three or four years spent in the ocean before returning to spawn in freshwater. This means the adult salmon being caught in the ocean now are the young of the first adults to spawn successfully in the free-flowing Rogue.
Van Dyke said it may take 20 years of data gathering before the dam removals can be declared a success for fish populations. But already some data paint a promising picture. For instance, the Rogue’s fall Chinook salmon population has roughly doubled in each of the last three years, according to the Pacific Fishery Management Council, the interstate agency that sets salmon fishing quotas. Even more telling is that this period was a roller-coaster ride in terms of environmental conditions, including one of the most severe droughts in history followed by one of the strongest El Niño weather patterns.
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https://www.newsdeeply.com/water/articles/2018/06/26/salmon-are-booming-in-oregons-rogue-river-dam-removal-may-be-why
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