Descendants Of Lonely Sockeye Head For Ocean

Grandchildren of the only female sockeye salmon to return to central Idaho’s Redfish Lake four years ago have started their 900-mile journey to the Pacific Ocean, state biologists report.

The female, named Eve, was netted as she entered the lake near Stanley, along with four males that also made it to Idaho in 1991 - the year Snake River sockeye was declared an endangered species.

Idaho Department of Fish and Game biologists spawned Eve and the four males, then raised their young and spawned them with the 10 sockeye that returned over the following three years.

Altogether, about 18,000 young smolt were produced. This is the first year that juvenile salmon from the experimental breeding program have left Redfish Lake for the ocean.

“It’s the beginning of a very important period of time that will make it or break it for this particular group of fish,” said Paul Kline, a Fish and Game fisheries research biologist.

Environmentalists on Wednesday criticized the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for not doing enough to help the fish past the eight federal dams on the lower Snake and Columbia rivers.

Charles Ray of Idaho Rivers United said the Corps is relying too much on a barging program and not enough on using spillways to get fish past the dams without sending them through turbines.

“The success of these fish depends almost entirely on what happens in the rivers,” Ray said. “The Corps is going to kill most of them.”

He said 3 to 5 percent of young fish survived the journey before the dams were built. Now, he said, fewer than 1 percent will likely make it.

State biologists say extra spill ordered by the Corps this year because of high river flows will help this year’s group of migrating sockeye smolts. But they agree with environmentalists that the Redfish Lake sockeye will not be saved unless more significant steps are taken.

To do that, the Corps has to either greatly improve its transportation program or change the river flow so young fish are carried more swiftly to the ocean, said Ed Bowles, anadromous fish director for Fish and Game. About 3,000 smolts have been tagged with tiny transmitters that allow biologists to monitor their passage through the dams.

Their progress also is being monitored by 27 classes of schoolchildren taking part in the “Adopt-a-sockeye” program set up by Idaho Rivers United.