Last week, in consultation with the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality and Warm Spring Tribal Natural Resources, PGE was granted flexibility to adjust the outflow schedule this year, if needed, to keep discharge temperatures below natural thermal potential.

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This spring, I had the great fortune to watch native summer steelhead spawning on a gravel bar in Trout Creek, a tributary of the Deschutes River. The scene was at Trout Creek Ranch, a 3,000-acre property purchased by Portland General Electric in 1999 for fish and wildlife habitat mitigation.

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July 1 marked the beginning of a new era of managing temperatures on the lower Deschutes. Hydro operators adjusted some controls on the new Round Butte Selective Water Withdrawal Tower (SWW) and the lower Deschutes River grew cooler. They had begun mixing the cold, deep water in Lake Billy Chinook with warmer water on the surface.

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In April 2008, I wrote about tagging fish with tiny chips and placing downstream fish traps on rivers and streams feeding Lake Billy Chinook for future fish migration studies. Well, the future is now.

PGE’s Megan Hill and her fisheries studies crew have been extremely busy keeping the six downstream-migrant fish traps operating on the Metolius, Deschutes and Crooked rivers and tributary streams feeding Lake Billy Chinook.

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We have now captured over 100,000 fish at the new downstream fish facility at Round Butte Dam. The numbers of salmon smolts (juvenile salmon migrating to the ocean) entering the new fish facilities increased dramatically during March and April, with several days when more than 7,000 salmon and steelhead were caught. The fish passage crew worked overtime to get them sorted, marked, transported to the lower Deschutes River and released safely to continue their journey to the Pacific.

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It all seems surreal. I’ve been a biologist at the Pelton Round Butte Project since 1971. That was only a few years after we learned that the original downstream fish passage system was unworkable because fish couldn’t find the outlet. The fact that we have completed the new selective water withdrawal intake and downstream fish facility at Round Butte Dam – and are passing salmon smolts downstream – is amazing!

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Work on the underwater tower and fish collection facility was substantially completed Dec. 3, after PGE made the final connections between major tower components, and fish have begun entering the system.

The first major migration of fish is not expected until February, but dozens of juvenile fish have already followed currents created by the tower and have been transported downstream by PGE biologists.The tower is now undergoing testing, which is expected to continue until mid-January. Read the rest of this entry.

The underwater tower near Round Butte dam is now expected to be completed and operating by the end of 2009, ready for the 2010 fish migration period.

The massive tower, originally scheduled for completion in May 2009, was delayed when a portion of the 40-foot diameter steel conduit connecting the top and bottom structures broke off April 11 during assembly in Lake Billy Chinook.

All segments have been retrieved from the lake floor. Design modifications have been made, and construction crews have begun work on repairs and replacements. An analysis of the incident by PGE staff and independent structural experts is continuing to determine the exact cause.

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During summer and fall 2009 and 2010, PGE, the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs and the Ochoco National Forest will invest about $35,000 to protect the fragile habitat around the Lower Whychus Creek Crossing. The creek, which runs near Sisters and joins the Deschutes River about 10 miles south of Lake Billy Chinook, is popular destination for campers and day trippers.

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The Crooked River Watershed Council has recently completed two projects that allow fish migrating up the Crooked River to reach their spawning grounds. These are two of many supporting projects helping to restore fish passage in the Deschutes River Basin. PGE and the Tribes, through the Pelton Fund, have contributed a total of $950,000 to these projects.
 

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