Hey folks! Do you love steelhead? Do you love the public lands that provide them cold, clean water? Well do we have an opportunity for you. Trout Unlimited is hiring a North Idaho Field Coordinator to work on protecting those very things. Don’t miss this opportunity to join a great team doing great things. What are you waiting for? Head …
In Support of a Hatchery Steelhead Program in the Upper Willamette
By Dean Finnerty, Wild Steelhead Initiative Director Trout Unlimited’s Wild Steelhead Initiative is all about increasing populations of wild steelhead across their native range. Why should we care so much about wild steelhead? There are several reasons, among them the fact that wild steelhead cost nothing to produce, they can be more aggressive towards the gear anglers use to …
Honoring Two Oregon Treasures and Protecting Steamboat Creek
Last Thursday, a small group of local advocates gathered in Roseburg, Oregon to pay homage to Frank and Jeanne Moore. Frank is a WWII veteran who landed on the beaches of Normandy, and upon returning from his service settled with his wife Jeanne on the banks of the North Umpqua River. There the couple built the Steamboat Inn, which became …
Protecting Oregon’s Steelhead Heritage
Few Oregonians have had a more profound, positive influence on so many people in the Beaver State than Frank and Jeanne Moore. This remarkable couple, whose decades-long efforts to protect Oregon’s natural treasures—in particular steelhead streams and native flowers—have been an inspiration for many, were recently honored by the nation with the passage of the John D. Dingell Jr. Conservation, …
Lessons from a steelhead rescue and captive rearing program on California’s Carmel River
By: Natalie Stauffer-Olsen, Staff Scientist, TU’s California Science Program One of the things that I have always admired most about O. mykiss is how adaptable and resilient they are. The rainbow trout, in both its resident and anadromous forms, evolved to take advantage of the most abundant habitats for their different life history stages as well as the genetic …
A follow up to last week’s post: What is happening to steelhead in Hood Canal?
Last week we reviewed a study on a novel hatchery steelhead program that was implemented in a Hood Canal stream to help save and rebuild a population of wild steelhead that were on the brink. As part of the post, we highlighted the non-traditional methods that were used and why those may have helped the program increase abundance even after …
Science Friday: Can innovative methods for a wild broodstock hatchery rebuild a depleted wild population
This week we send you off with a review of a recent before-and-after study on hatchery steelhead published by Barry Berejikian and Donald Van Doornick (find the study here). The goal of this long-term study, conducted in a handful of rivers in Hood Canal, Washington, was to determine if a well-designed hatchery program could help rebuild populations of steelhead that …
Science Friday: Deschutes River (Oregon) rainbow and steelhead, how much do they overlap during spawning?
First Friday of the New Year, and we are serving up a fresh batch of steelhead science to help you further appreciate the remarkable relationship between resident and sea-going forms of O. mykiss. In this post, we review a study published in 2000 by Christian Zimmerman and Gordie Reeves, two scientists that have contributed a great deal to our …
Trouble in Idaho
By Michael Gibson: No matter how you frame it, wild steelhead in Idaho are in big trouble. While wild steelhead numbers have never really rebounded—as expected—after the listing of the species in 1997, 2017 and 2018 returns have been exceptionally poor. In 2017, fewer than 12,000 wild fish cleared Lower Granite Dam, the last of the lower …
Oregon Wildlands and Frank Moore Bills Need Your Help
Thanks to the leadership of elected officials in Oregon who understand the importance of wild places, and the value salmon and steelhead bring to our outdoor economy, there’s a decent chance that Oregon could end up with some new public lands protections in the next few days. As we posted last week, the halls of Congress are a flurry of …