Timely & Accurate Fish Counts on Oregon’s North Umpqua River

In Newsletter: The Wild Steelheader, Oregon by Nick Chambers

Knowing exactly how many salmon and steelhead comprise a particular run is crucial for proper fisheries management.  Throughout wild steelhead range, agencies struggle with tight budgets and frequently, monitoring returning adults falls to the bottom of the priority list. Since the 1950’s the fish ladder and viewing window at Winchester Dam near Roseburg, Oregon on the famed North Umpqua river …

WSU leading the charge on sonar

In Alaska, California, Idaho, Newsletter: The Wild Steelheader, Oregon, Washington by Nick Chambers

Occasionally, we get asked what Wild Steelheaders United is really doing to improve wild steelhead populations across their range.   We could start by mentioning that our habitat restoration and fish passage improvement projects are delivering big results in some of the last best wild steelhead strongholds in North America. In the past year alone, our work along California’s fabled …

Mining & Transboundary Rivers: What do the Skagit, Taku, Stikine, and Elk rivers have in common?

In Alaska by Nick Chambers

  British Columbia is in the midst of a mining boom, with dozens of large-scale mines in various stages of exploration, development, and operation. Lax mining regulations and low standards for financial bonding have encouraged the industry’s expansion in the region, but at what cost? Many of these mine sites sit within watersheds of rivers — like the Skagit River …

TU lauds new public lands bill for NW California

In California by Nick Chambers

  The northwest corner of California, between the Russian and Klamath Rivers, is home to some of the best remaining salmon and steelhead streams in the West. This region boasts some of the most famous steelhead fisheries in the world, including the Trinity, Mad, Mattole, and Eel River systems.   Trout Unlimited’s North Coast Coho Project has been working for …

Science Friday: Surviving heat, drought and ponded streams

In Science Friday by Nick Chambers

It is that time of year again. Heat wave after heat wave.   As summer progresses stream flows will continue to decline all across steelhead country, and in some cases, smaller tributaries will go dry. In other cases, streams won’t be completely dewatered; instead, they will become ponded. This occurs when flows diminish so much that the only remaining surface …

Summer 2018: Time to make new Rules for suction dredge mining in Washington

In Oregon by Jenny Weis

Washington’s salmon, steelhead, and other native fish are critical to our state’s economy, way of life, and identity. Many of our most prized fish populations are struggling, with some on the brink of extinction, and we are spending hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars on recovery efforts to try to save them. Suction Dredge Mining is a problem on Washington’s …

The Salmon Coast

In Washington by Nick Chambers

The Olympic Peninsula is home to some of the last great places for wild salmon and steelhead in the Lower 48. Of course, it’s the wild steelhead that draw many of us to the OP. But it’s also the huge trees and beautiful brawling rivers that make the OP a destination for fish and anglers alike.   While much of …