- Small area closed off. A small section of Lake Billy Chinook directly in front of Round Butte dam is now permanently closed off to boating and fishing. This is primarily a safety issue—both for you and for the fish. For the next year, there will be construction crews in the area, building the underwater tower. After that, the fish collection structure will be in place, which will be sucking in fish for transport downstream. To avoid any possible injury to you or the fish, the area has been closed off. Visitors can get a good view of the construction area at Round Butte Overlook Park.
- Upstream fishing opportunities. Eventually there will be new upstream fishing opportunities for salmon and steelhead. Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Confederated Tribes, with help from PGE and other groups and volunteers, released tens of thousands of steelhead fry in the Whychus Creek in May 2007. Salmon fry were released in February 2008. By the time these fish are ready to migrate downstream in 2009, the Deschutes Fish Passage project will be complete and the fish will be safely transported below the dams. We expect the adult fish to return in 2010 or 2011. It is too early to tell when upstream fishing will begin. But the hope is that there will be an additional 226 stream miles accessible to salmon and steelhead and that eventually a portion of that will be open to angling for them.
Visit PGE's corporate Web site for more Deschutes River fishing information, including:
For similar information on the Clackamas, Willamette and Sandy rivers, visit PortlandGeneral.com/Fish.
Round Butte fish hatchery
When the Pelton Round Butte hydro project was completed in 1964, it provided downstream and upstream passage for steelhead and salmon. However, unforeseen changes in the currents of Lake Billy Chinook made it impossible for the fish to find the downstream facility. In 1968, the fish passage facilities were abandoned and a fish hatchery was built instead.
The Round Butte fish hatchery, located below the three dams, is run by the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and funded by PGE. It produces about 240,000 spring Chinook salmon and 160,000 steelhead every year. Fisheries personnel capture adult returning salmon and steelhead below the dams and transport them to the fish hatchery. There the eggs are taken and incubated on screen trays. Once the eggs hatch and the fry are big enough, they are transferred to small tanks and then to larger areas that more closely resemble natural conditions. The smolts (juvenile fish ready to migrate to the ocean) are released during the spring. After a few years in the ocean, the adult fish return to the river and the cycle begins again.
Restored fish passage
PGE and the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs are building an underwater tower above Pelton Round Butte to provide downstream passage for Chinook salmon and steelhead. Both salmon and steelhead fry have already been released upstream of the dams. See our steelhead fry release video. When the young fish are ready to migrate to the Pacific Ocean, in spring 2009, the downstream fish passage facility will be in place, ready to transport them below the dams. When these salmon and steelhead return to the Deschutes to spawn, they will be captured and released above the dams.
Ultimately the goal is to allow the fish to migrate up and down past the dams with as little human intervention as possible. For now, capturing the fish on their upstream journey provides several benefits:
- Improved health of the fish population – Nearly a quarter of the upstream steelhead are strays from other rivers and could introduce disease. By separating the fish below the dams, we ensure only native fish are released upstream.
- Better monitoring – By capturing, counting and tagging the fish, we can better gauge the health and success of the salmon and steelhead populations as they return to their traditional spawning grounds.
A delicate balance
Chinook salmon and steelhead are not the only fish on the Deschutes that need careful monitoring. The bull trout is a threatened species, and Lake Billy Chinook is one of the few places where it has thrived. Bull trout feed on kokanee, the landlocked version of sockeye salmon. Fisheries personnel are closely monitoring both species to help maintain a healthy balance between the two.
Return of sockeye salmon?
It may be possible to actually re-establish a run of sockeye salmon in the Deschutes River by transporting a number of kokanee downstream of the dams. They are the same species of fish—the kokanee are simply the landlocked version of the sockeye salmon. If the transported kokanee reach the ocean and return, they are then considered sockeye salmon. If successful, this would be the first run of sockeye salmon in Oregon since the 1970s. |
