Dam removal in California

[spike.t]

Interesting article on several dams being removed in northern California

BBC News - The largest dam-removal in US history

The largest dam-removal in US history

For over a century, one of the most important salmon runs in the United States has had to contend with historic dams – and now four of them are set to be taken down.

www.bbc.com

 

[HuntingGold]

This is right in my backyard so to speak and most of the deer hunting I do is within a long rifle shot of the river. It is a very contentious project.

Here is the view I see every morning on my 2 1/2 mile hike into "my spot." The photo was taken on the Oregon side and looking south into California. The river and one of its dams is in a canyon thereby cannot be seen in the photo.

 

[spike.t]

This is right in my backyard so to speak and most of the deer hunting I do is within a long rifle shot of the river. It is a very contentious project.

Here is the view I see every morning on my 2 1/2 mile hike into "my spot." The photo was taken on the Oregon side and looking south into California. The river and one of its dams is in a canyon thereby cannot be seen in the photo.
View attachment 382136

What do you feel?....surely it will be good to open up the river and have the fish running again, and the other ecological benefits that will come with it...

 

[WAB]

Each dam is a study of its own. Some provide tremendous benefit in power, irrigation, flood control, fisheries and recreation. Others merely impede sea run fisheries with little or no benefit.

The ‘free the rivers’ folks scare me. The blanket removal of dams would have a hugely negative impact on our nation.

I’m not sure where these dams fall in the spectrum, but I hope a responsible evaluation has been done.

Interesting side note, the recent drought has shown us that the removal of key dams in California would necessitate the elimination of a large percentage of the population. Hmmm...

 

[HuntingGold]

This article really only touches on minor points of this issue. The Klamath watershed is huge, starting in Oregon, draining into Klamath Lake, which after flowing into the short Link River, into Lake Ewuana and then into the Klamath River. In this upper basin, farming and agriculture are huge economically. Droughts have exacerbated political fights over water, further pitting neighbors against neighbors.

Politically I am deeply conservative... but with a left turn in environmental issues. I cut my political teeth as a teenager fighting against another dam on the Klamath, the Salt Caves project, that ultimately was defeated and gladly never built. With that said, I am in support of removing the dams.

 

[BRICKBURN]

........
Interesting side note, the recent drought has shown us that the removal of key dams in California would necessitate the elimination of a large percentage of the population. Hmmm...

They just have to increase bottled water production. Problem solved.

 

[Bearbait1]

I lived on the Iron Gate fish hatchery for a couple of years as a kid and have been watching the removal process with interest. I am not for removing all dams but think these should go. I’d like to see the lake beds as they are drained to see what appears.

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

What do you feel?....surely it will be good to open up the river and have the fish running again, and the other ecological benefits that will come with it...

I'm a bit like @HuntingGold in that on certain environmental issues I take a bit of a left turn. In the 90's when I lived in Idaho, the issue was the so called "Lower Snake River Dams" and their impact on salmon/steelhead. While those dams do provide some hydropower and irrigation benefits, their primary purpose was to provide a shipping port in Lewiston, Idaho.

What you may not know Mike is that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has the responsibility for building and maintaining dams and waterways in the U.S. And so is the case with the dams on the Snake River. And who pays for the U.S. Army Corps of Engrs, the taxpayer of course.

So the lumber and paper companies and whoever else ships goods out of Lewiston, Idaho via the Snake River do so in part at the expense of the U.S. taxpayer. By the numbers I saw, the costs saved by those companies by shipping via the Snake versus truck, were less than what taxpayers were paying to maintain the dams. So it would in fact be cheaper for the taxpayers to just pay those companies shipping costs than to maintain the dams.

For most people, it's quick to see how difficult it would be for an adult salmon to swim upstream to it's birthplace. And of course this led to the fish ladders. But what always seems to get untold is the return of the smolts. The baby fish when they hit a big pond of warm water have an issue if they don't end up at an outlet of the reservoir and die. My understanding is that this is as much if not more of the problem than the return of the adult fish.

 

[lwaters]

I live by two large reservoirs here in Kansas that were built in the late 60's for flood control. They served their purpose until the flood of 93. Milford went out its uncontrolled spillway and Tuttle Creek had to open their flood gates. There was major flooding downstream. If we get a similar rainfall total it will be a lot worse because of 27 more years of siltation filling in the lake. Looks like a temporary fix to the problem.

 

[Bearbait1]

I lived in that #@&=hole Las Vegas for a few years while lake Mead was falling fast exposing huge flats. You would not believe the # of outboard motors, anchors and tackle boxes exposed. Hopefully I can be there when irongate’s water level drops and do some scrounging!

 

[outwestidaho]

I'm a bit like @HuntingGold in that on certain environmental issues I take a bit of a left turn. In the 90's when I lived in Idaho, the issue was the so called "Lower Snake River Dams" and their impact on salmon/steelhead. While those dams do provide some hydropower and irrigation benefits, their primary purpose was to provide a shipping port in Lewiston, Idaho.

What you may not know Mike is that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has the responsibility for building and maintaining dams and waterways in the U.S. And so is the case with the dams on the Snake River. And who pays for the U.S. Army Corps of Engrs, the taxpayer of course.

So the lumber and paper companies and whoever else ships goods out of Lewiston, Idaho via the Snake River do so in part at the expense of the U.S. taxpayer. By the numbers I saw, the costs saved by those companies by shipping via the Snake versus truck, were less than what taxpayers were paying to maintain the dams. So it would in fact be cheaper for the taxpayers to just pay those companies shipping costs than to maintain the dams.

For most people, it's quick to see how difficult it would be for an adult salmon to swim upstream to it's birthplace. And of course this led to the fish ladders. But what always seems to get untold is the return of the smolts. The baby fish when they hit a big pond of warm water have an issue if they don't end up at an outlet of the reservoir and die. My understanding is that this is as much if not more of the problem than the return of the adult fish.

To my knowledge there isn't much being shipped out of Lewiston except wheat and peas by barge. In fact somewhere around 40 % of all wheat is handled in the Columbia / snake river corridor. Other goods, lumber etc are going by rail and truck. The dams have been there a long time. I grew up here , fishing in the 80 s and 90s was fantatastic. I could catch a limit before having to be at work at 9 AM. Steelhead or salmon depending on which one was open. Mid 90s you could limit on salmon in Orofino in a matter of 30 minutes.
Now you can't catch crap. Returning numbers are low. Takes hours to catch a single fish. So all of the sudden the dams are a problem and everyone wants them removed. Why did it work with the dams here before and not now ? No government or other organization has been able to answer this question.
They have already proven that predators and gill netting are as big an issue as any . But no one wants to deal with that. The water was just as warm behind the dams then as now. So dam removal is an extremely complicated issue.

 

[Bearbait1]

I know one of the issues with dams is that the dams catch all the gravel traveling downriver during floods and the gravel below the dams is slowly washed downriver. the spawning areas downstream of a dam are severly degraded. On the Klamath and the Rogue river in Oregon they are dumping gravel below Lost creek dam to restore habitat.

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

To my knowledge there isn't much being shipped out of Lewiston except wheat and peas by barge. In fact somewhere around 40 % of all wheat is handled in the Columbia / snake river corridor. Other goods, lumber etc are going by rail and truck. The dams have been there a long time. I grew up here , fishing in the 80 s and 90s was fantatastic. I could catch a limit before having to be at work at 9 AM. Steelhead or salmon depending on which one was open. Mid 90s you could limit on salmon in Orofino in a matter of 30 minutes.
Now you can't catch crap. Returning numbers are low. Takes hours to catch a single fish. So all of the sudden the dams are a problem and everyone wants them removed. Why did it work with the dams here before and not now ? No government or other organization has been able to answer this question.
They have already proven that predators and gill netting are as big an issue as any . But no one wants to deal with that. The water was just as warm behind the dams then as now. So dam removal is an extremely complicated issue.

I lived in Pocatello in the early 90's to early 2000's. What steelhead fishing I did was like you describe to take forever. I can't say I have all the answers. But I'd say if the shipping has dropped off out of Lewiston, then it calls into question that much more why to have the dams at taxpayer expense. The conservative in me always questions the ROI.

I don't doubt however that there are likely multiple causes for the decline of salmon/steelhead. One of those I believe is the protection of seals. It's only hearsay and not evidence, but as I heard it back in the day the seals were stacked up at the mouth of the Columbia waiting for the spring runs to start.

 

[HuntingGold]

It is complicated and each river system has issues that are different than the other. For instance on the Klamath, the original dams were built without fish ladders or very poorly engineered ladders. The salmon and steelhead have been gone so long that no one has first hand recollection of seeing them. The dams on the Columbia and Snake were built much later and had something that resembled decent ladders in place. Even at that, while I lived in The Dalles in the early 2000s, there were major projects underway to improve fish passage, especially for downstream smolts (juvenile salmonids). Information for those that live outside of the western US, there is even a program in place to pay anglers a bounty on a certain kind of native fish called the Northern Pikeminnow. This fish has flourished under the dam environment and has made a good living killing and eating smolts after they are shot out the bypass on the dams.

Also for those outside the Western US, we are now speaking of two very different rivers which are situated 300 miles apart. The Columbia is the largest and drains much of the Northwestern US. The Klamath, which the OP originally posted about, is 300 miles south drains a smaller area, starts in southern Oregon and moves into extreme Northern California before dumping into the Pacific. In short, both projects involve water, politics, and salmon, but that is about all they have in common.

The Dalles Dam on the Columbia River flooded this historic Native American fishing site at Celilo Falls. You cannot see the full site, it was massive. Native American tribes from all over the Northwest used to travel to this location and use dip nets to catch steelhead and salmon. In addition, much trading went on here. It is my understanding that items from as far away as Mexico had been found near here. The loss of this site (through flooding) has to be one of the largest cultural tragedies in the west.

 

[lwaters]

What do they do with the land that is there after the dam is taken out. Even out west there should be a lot of mud and dirt left over not to say no vegetation left for the banks.

 

[HuntingGold]

There is a lot of sediment behind the dams and that is one of the arguing points. At the moment, I cannot recall what the current plan is on the Klamath.

 

[Bearbait1]

They have done core samples and there is not nearly the amount of sediment I expected. They will mulch and plant to reduce sediment but there will still be some in the river. I would guess Copco lake will have most of the silt as it caught it before it made it to Irongate. There used to be good bass fishing in Irongate but I guess it is pretty poor now. I caught a 7.5# largemouth when I was 7yo on a live lamprey. Best bass bait ever, they will crawl up the bank to get lamprey!

 

[375Fox]

To my knowledge there isn't much being shipped out of Lewiston except wheat and peas by barge. In fact somewhere around 40 % of all wheat is handled in the Columbia / snake river corridor. Other goods, lumber etc are going by rail and truck. The dams have been there a long time. I grew up here , fishing in the 80 s and 90s was fantatastic. I could catch a limit before having to be at work at 9 AM. Steelhead or salmon depending on which one was open. Mid 90s you could limit on salmon in Orofino in a matter of 30 minutes.
Now you can't catch crap. Returning numbers are low. Takes hours to catch a single fish. So all of the sudden the dams are a problem and everyone wants them removed. Why did it work with the dams here before and not now ? No government or other organization has been able to answer this question.
They have already proven that predators and gill netting are as big an issue as any . But no one wants to deal with that. The water was just as warm behind the dams then as now. So dam removal is an extremely complicated issue.

You might find this article interesting. Apparently a chemical in tires is believed to be affecting fish numbers now.

Science | AAAS

www.sciencemag.org

 

[Bearbait1]

Interesting, declining salmon runs may have many causes.

 

[HuntingGold]

Death by a thousand cuts?

Habitat loss, Northern Pikeminnow, passage problems at dams going up and going down, water quality, over fishing (historical and current), illegal fishing, toxic pollutants... The list can go on and on.