The most endangered run of all !!! I just heard that as many as 100 sockeye salmon have crossed lower granite dam and are headed to the stanley basin. While that sounds like nothing its actually a good return when you concider that in most years as few as 1 have made it back. Pre lower snake dams the run was in the 100,000's closer to a million. I guess I just have to say ( WELCOME HOME BABYS!!!) Is it possable that a huge run of steelhead is right behind you??? Just goes to show what several good water years in a row can do.

B-RUN:

That is good news! let me ask you this though; Is this the same strain of sockeye that returns to redfish lake? If it is, then it truly is a miracle. I remember watching a special on the redfish lake sockeye run and how they were looking for returns of SINGLE FISH! Seems to me there was a year or two where no females returned so they spawned the males and froze the milt to hopefully use later if and when more fish returned in order to preserve the genetic integrity of the run.

If this same run is up to a hundred and they can be left alone, and good river/ocean conditions persist.....I'm hopeful.

It's small numbers in the big picture but fighting back from 1 fish returns/extinction is encouraging. Now let's see how some of the other upper Columbia fish respond.

These are redfish lake fish!!! Every thing you stated was true. A couple of years none returned. Its like putting your last dollar into a slot machine and getting a 100 dollars back!!! A small victory for the snake and salmon rivers !!!! How many actually will get to the lake is still a question. A couple of years ago, a lone male was spotted at lower granite.. they named him Sam or something like that. The whole state waited and figured he did'nt make it. Then, just when everybody was about to give up, there he was in the fish trap. I have high hopes for this years wild B-run crop of steelhead... please please please swim around the nets and come home !!!!

Hey B-run, just thought I'd give a little update to your 100 sockeye numbers. I just looked at the army corp of eng. site for fish passage and as of 072900 there have been 266 sockeye counted over lower granite dam!! Yes, that is nothing short of incredible. I believe a few years back the idaho F/G blew nearly their hole wad of milt and eggs that had been stored and this is the end result. It appears that their timing was excellent (ie:lucky as hell) in that the ocean conditions were favorable for a good return of fish. Lets hope that conditions can stay this good in the ocean for a few years and mayby some of these endangered stocks can stage a comeback. Unfortunately, with all they must go through it's going to be a long time (apparently at least ten years...dams Hmmm) until they can even be a shadow of what they were. Until then it's great to see that there is some progress being made

tight lines and lets keep our fingers crossed for those big B's!

Duke

If memory serves me correctly, that solitary sockeye that made it to Redfish a few years back became forever known as Lonely Larry. There's a lot of water to cover between Lower Granite and Redfish -- what, 300-some miles? -- but having almost 300 fish past the dam is certainly an encouraging sign. So far as a good steelhead run, everything seems to point in that direction. Already seeing the occasional fly fisherman churning the water in the top end of the Mill Hole. Word around is that some guys have already picked up three or four.

At this time, anadromous fish passage remains cut off to all former Snake River sockeye salmon habitat except that in the Stanley Basin. Habitat is so poor that Snake river Sockeye will never be removed from the Endangered species list if things stay as they are. Here is some history on them:

Historically, Snake River sockeye salmon were produced in the Stanley River Subbasin of Idaho’s Salmon River in Alturas, Pettit, Redfish, and Stanley Lakes and in Warm Lake on the south fork salmon. Sockeye salmon may have been present in one or two other Stanley Basin lakes. Elsewhere in the Snake River Basin, sockeye salmon were produced in Big Payette Lake on the North Fork Payette River and in Wallowa Lake on the Wallowa River. The largest single sockeye salmon spawning area was in the headwaters of the Payette River, where 75,000 were taken one year by a single fishing operation in Big Payette Lake. However, access to production areas in the Payette Basin was eliminated by construction of Black Canyon Dam in 1924. During the 1880s, returns to headwaters of the Grand Ronde River in Oregon (Wallowa Lake) were estimated to have been at least 24,000 and 30,000 sockeye salmon, but access to the Grande Ronde was eliminated by construction of a dam on the outlet to Wallowa Lake in 1929. Access to spawning areas in the upper Snake River Basin was eliminated in 1967 when fish were no longer trapped and transported around the Hells Canyon dam complex. All of these dams were constructed without fish passage facilities. There are no reliable estimates of the number of sockeye salmon spawning in Redfish Lake at the turn of the century. However, beginning in 1910, access to all lakes in the Stanley Basin was seriously reduced by the construction of Sunbeam Dam, 20 miles downstream from Redfish Lake Creek on the mainstem Salmon River. The original adult fishway, constructed of wood, was ineffective in passing fish over the dam. It was replaced with a concrete structure in 1920 but sockeye salmon access was impeded until the dam was partially removed in 1934.
Even after fish passage was restored at Sunbeam Dam, sockeye salmon were unable to use spawning areas in two of the lakes in the Stanley Basin. Welsh (1991) reported fish eradication projects in Pettit Lake (treated with toxaphene in 1960) and Stanley Lake (treated with Fish-Tox, a mixture of rotenone and toxaphene, in 1954). Agricultural water diversions cut off access to most of the lakes, during the 1950s and 1960s, Redfish Lake was probably the only lake in Idaho that was still used by sockeye salmon each year for spawning and rearing and, at the time of listing under the Endangered Species Act (November 20, 1991; FR 56 No. 224), sockeye salmon were produced naturally only in Redfish Lake. Escapement to the Snake River has declined dramatically in recent years. Adult counts at Ice Harbor Dam have fallen from 3,170 in 1965 to zero in 1990. The Idaho Department of Fish and Game counted adults at a weir in Redfish Lake Creek during 1954 through 1966. Adult counts dropped from 4,361 in 1955 to fewer than 500 after 1957. Fewer than 20 wild adult sockeye salmon returned to Redfish Lake in recent years (1991 through 1998.

On a side note, while the lower four Snake river dams definatly don't help this situation, The primary dammage to Sockeye in the snake river was done prior to their construction and these fish would be in trouble regardless.

Thinker, Thank-you very much for your insight into a very delicate issue. It should become mandatory reading for all!! Lessons learned!!

Sunbeam dam was removed totally. All that remains are some chunks of cement on the side of the river. This leaves the Salmon river as the longest free flowing river in the lower 48. No other fish has to go as far in terms of river miles from the ocean than these Sockeye. The steelhead and Springer also go this far. Not sure about your numbers thinker. They seem on the low side but I will look into it. I know that the Springers far outnumbered the 4136 total count you quoted for 1955. The total decline in that run can be directly traced the the 4 lower snake dams . Thanks for that post. It has some good info and I need to look it up.

B-Run Steely, just wanted to make sure that you did not think any of the numbers applied to Spring Chinook. It was strictly information on Sockeye. I did not write most of the information in my post, it is strait cut and paste from the full Army Corps report released a while ago that I downloaded to my computer in PDF format.

Thinker, thanks for the sad but true history lesson! It's easy to forget what we used to really have for fish runs here on our side of the mountains. I was aware of all the habitat destruction due to logging, farming (grazing, irrigation...), mineing and even trapping years ago but the info on the dams on the Payette and Wallowa areas are interesting. Funny that you never hear anything about those dams concerning fish recovery. It's sad that once a run is gone how fast it fades from memory.


Duke

I for one hope that the run is good this year. I only had one fish in the boat(I didn't land it) this year for over 80 hours of river time. I still have not landed a fish in the Clearwater since I got my new boat and am hoping to do so with my two new sons. I would also like to take my older brother fishing over there since he has not fished over there since graduating from Moscow high in the late 70's. I will keep my fingers crossed for your(our??) rivers.