Despite the lack of rainfall, coho and fall chinook salmon continue to make their way up the Columbia tributaries in Southwest Washington. But the run of summer steelhead, which was huge in the Cowlitz River this year, seems to be just about over.
At the Cowlitz Salmon Hatchery last week, Tacoma Power and Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife employees recovered 4,251 adult coho salmon, 739 coho jacks, 629 fall chinook adults, 33 fall chinook jacks, 54 summer-run steelhead and three sea-sun cutthroat trout during six days of separator operations at the Salkum facility.
Tacoma Power employees transported 2,405 coho adults and 389 coho jacks to the upper Cowlitz River at the Lake Scanewa Day Use Site during the week. In addition, they released 565 coho adults and 108 coho jacks into the Cispus River above the mouth of Yellowjacket Creek.
Another 259 coho adults and 72 jacks were released into the Cowlitz at Franklin Bridge in Packwood. All steelhead were recycled downstream in the Cowlitz for another run past anglers.
A total of 382 coho adults, 80 coho jacks, 172 fall chinook adults, 21 chinook jacks and one cutthroat trout were released into Mayfield Lake at the Ike Kinswa boat launch last week. Those fish are all identified as originating in the Tilton River. They are being dumped into Mayfield because the Tilton water level is too low at the usual fish dumping location in Morton.
The river flow in the Cowlitz below Mayfield Dam is currently about 3,500 cubic feet per second. Water visibility is over 12 feet.
There were no WDFW creel checks published last week for any of the Southwest Washington rivers. Reports indicate that a few fall chinook are being caught throughout the Cowlitz. Not many coho are being caught above the Interstate 5 bridge. The coho hotspot in the Cowlitz River continues to be at the mouth of the Toutle.
Beginning today, Columbia River anglers will again be able to keep chinook salmon caught between the Rocky Point-Tongue Point line upstream to Bonneville Dam. WDFW reports that the new rule will run through Dec. 31.
Bill Tweit, Columbia River policy lead for the WDFW, said the latest action was triggered by the fact that the number of chinook salmon migrating upriver past Bonneville Dam since mid-September has been much higher than expected.
Since that time, fishery managers have increased their estimate of returning "upriver bright" chinook from 198,700 fish to 225,000, Tweit said. Although the peak of the run has passed, biologists are still counting 700 to 1,000 chinook salmon moving through the fish ladders at Bonneville each day.
"This run has a long tail," said Tweit. "That allows us to reopen the lower river for chinook retention, while more fish continue to move upriver to spawn. We're now back to the same rules for chinook retention set out in the Washington rule pamphlet."
