Killing The Klamath River

[oc1]

Lee, would getting above average rain help flush the basins, or just add to the silt load?

[Keta]

I don't think it would make much difference with them using heavy equipment to dump silt and clay into the river.  Once brush and grasses get establish on the former reservoir bottom heavy rain will just add more. 

After they quit dumping and plants have grown enougha flood event like the '64 flood might help.

[jurelometer]

First salmon spotted migrating past what used to be the Iron Gate dam:

https://apnews.com/article/klamath-dam-removal-california-oregon-salmon-river-f3c44eaa8caebfd79fed54e68da862f4

-J

[Keta]

They/it will have to get to Spencer Creek, above where JC Boyle Dam was and at the upper end of JC Boyle Reservoir, to find a place to spawn.

[JasonGotaProblem]

Hey it's a start.

[Keta]

It would have been a better start if they did not dump millions of not billions of yards of clay and silt on top of spawning steelhead, covering the downstream gravel with a layer of clay and suffocating all life below the dams with silt, including hundreds of thousand Chinook smolts below Irongate Dam.  They were dumping clay and silt into the river with large loaders and backhoes.  The original plan was to truck it to areas where it could be safely dumped, only a few miles for JC Boyle.

I was hoping to see spawning steelhead and salmon in the Williamson River next year upstream of where I work.

[Midway Tommy]

They're pretty proud of what they've done. Lot of articles lately touting it. Typical bureaucratic propaganda. 

[Keta]

Not a lot about dumping the silt and clay though.  From what I saw all of the life from invertebrates to fish have been wiped out if they could not get into the tributaries.  I saw hundreds of dead crawfish mixed in with dead trout, steelhead, salmon and endangered suckers.  Elk, deer and wild horses have died in the muck that was on the reservoir bottom too.

We need a major 100 year flood or more to flush the system but the upper and mid  Klamath Basin is dry country and it might not happen.

[oc1]

The weaker-than-normal polar vortex is predicted to give you guys higher-than-normal precipitation this winter.

[Gfish]

Such a great drainage system. A wonderful aquifer system around the Upper Klamath. Up at Fort Creek(Agency lake area) the water was only 8 inches underground in some places. Clear, cool and nutrient dense, perfect for rearing salmonids...
I've seen Salmon and Steelhead get through some nasty looking warm water and on up those long fish ladders on the Columbia/Snake system... who knows...

[jurelometer]

We don't know how this is going to turn out yet.  Don't know if any of y'all read the studies I that linked to earlier (I just scanned through them TBH), but once the dams were removed, the sediment was either going to get washed downstream or it was going to get trucked out.  The sheer volume of sediment made removal not only costly, but would have taken multiple seasons to remove, so either way there was going to be lots of sediment getting washed down the river.

The "least bad" option according to the studies was to get it as much of it over with as quickly as possible.  This was also the option favored by the tribes and the environmentalists, whose interest are more aligned with ecosystem recovery. The cost of the studies ran into the millions if I remember correctly.  These were trained folk with resources, trying to get it right. 

This doesn't mean that they did get it right, but they have a better shot than taking a poll of us folk in the cheap seats.

Automatically assuming corruption and bureaucratic incompetence is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You get the government that you expect to have.

I am encouraged to see that Chinook are already starting to fight their way past the first dam site. I hope that the plan works out well enough that Lee's wish to personally see them return to the upper river is fulfilled.

-J

[Keta]

Such a great drainage system. A wonderful aquifer system around the Upper Klamath. Up at Fort Creek(Agency lake area) the water was only 8 inches underground in some places. Clear, cool and nutrient dense, perfect for rearing salmonids...
I've seen Salmon and Steelhead get through some nasty looking warm water and on up those long fish ladders on the Columbia/Snake system... who knows...

The Wood River system is a jewel. The Williamson above spring creek is not so good and the river in the canyon east of Spring Creek Hill is not passable, even when water is flowing out of Upper Klamath Marsh.  I think Spring Creek is too cold for good spawning. H Sections of the Sprague River have good spawning habitat but it is mostly soft bottom, above Bly to Gadowa springs is prime habitat.  Link River would support spawning in the late fall but it is running close to 70°F now.

I have heard from reliable sources that the Klamath above Keno often has zero oxygen and is all mud bottom. The Klamath above the JC Boyle dam site looks good once the river re establishes a channel, right now the upper part of the former reservoir is running 200 yards wide and 6" deep.

[Gfish]

"Us folk in the cheap seats". Ha! Good one, story of my life.

[Keta]

Automatically assuming corruption and bureaucratic incompetence is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You get the government that you expect to have.

I doubt corruption is a factor but I am 100% certain "profit" is.  A slow draw down and planting native vegetation to stabilize the former lake bottom and trucking the muck to sagebrush flats a relatively close haul from JC Boyle would have cost far more but the system below JC Boyle would not be dead now.  The area around Copco 1 and 2 would require trucking it further than JC Boyle and Irongate but there is suitable places a few miles from JC Boyle and  between Irongate and Montague to dump it, the pot farms around Montague might even  pay for it   

Silt will flush out relatively quick, clay will not.

[jurelometer]

This is the first chinook spotted that made it past the final dam site -J. C, Boyle. Date:  Oct 16.  Several more were spotted shortly after.



A few salmon ain't a recovery, but it is still cool to see.


Lee:  Is that Keno stretch the last hurdle for salmon making it up all the way to the Williamson?

-J