Thanks to the Tribes for all their hard work and perseverance! This has been a dream of mine since I first visited the Klamath 35 years ago. I've lived next to it ever since.
Now. let the fish run up onto the Hoopa plateau and breed there, rather than netting ALL the fish for the "Klamath Nation" and shutting OUT fish for the "Hoopa Nation".
Idk if that river had a rainbow population above the dam but in the Elwha the Summer steelhead genetics survived over 100 years above the dams. Now they are returning in decent numbers.
Yes! Some giant resident red band trout live in the upper Klamath. The steelhead Will even go further upriver than the Chinook, and do really well. I can't wait to someday go steelhead fishing in that stretch below Keno.
@@georgehaydukeiii6396 I’m not familiar with area at all but if Steelhead once went up that river past those dams and the river retained its wild rainbows chances are the genetics still exist above the dam sites and some of the resident bows will revert back to their Steelhead genetics. The Elwha saw it with the Summer Steelhead.
@@boblove6865 The Klamath is a super diverse and productive system. The red band rainbow is a resident form and it's evolutionary genetics are still being disputed. I have caught both anadromous and resident rainbows well over 10 pounds in the Klamath. I'm sure the genetics are still there, and the steelhead form will flourish.
@@georgehaydukeiii6396 if they leave it alone. I’m not sure what the management plan is but if they do any sort of stocking it should be brood stock based.
@@Not.The.Avg.SmittyWho do you think paid for the dams in the first place? Taxes and hikes on energy costs. Why is it only a bad thing when tax payers spend on healing nature, you don’t seem to have an issue with them cutting off century old ecosystems in order to make very little energy.
@@crowpvpgod4537 200mw to you is very little. I bet it powered a ton of teepees or as you know it nowdays... trailers. When tribes are allowed to use gill nets to catch thousands a day blocking a river flow for fish.... you're telling me that's good for the ecosystem? After all hydropower is clean energy but people like yourself can't compute. "HOW We want land" is all this is.
Absolutely not surprised. My work and many others' over the decades have demonstrated that once an ecosystem is allowed the resources and freedom to exist, it tends to restore itself miraculously rapidly, like the healing of a scratch. I wasn't directly involved but recent large scale cases include the Owens and Elwha rivers. All that was done in those valleys were restoring the water flow. In the first year, *everybody* started coming back.
This disproves what I was taught, that each salmon returns specially to its personal spawning location. I never believed this limitation of options existed. I am glad my ole teachers were wrong.
Someone explained to me that the scent profile (mineral content etc) of the water is what they follow. If this is the case, they would/could smell the upper tributaries as juveniles but just not access them. Once they can access them, it is believed they'll just keep going up until they find suitable spawning habitat.
I thought this as well. It turns out it is mostly correct, some salmon will look for new spawning grounds this spreads genetic material and prevent inbreeding. As a rule the vast majority of salmon return to their spawning grounds.
It won't be long before Happy Camp CA will be the Steelhead Capital of the world again. The sport fishing eventually return to what it was before the dams, and the local guides will prosper as a result. It makes me laugh, because many of the locals that are in opposition to this project, are the ones that will benefit the most! They're just too dumb to realize it.
Not associated with tribes, but concerned with the living organisms as themselves, not as exploitable human resources, some of us worked and advocated beyond 20 years ago for this recovery. This dichotomy occurs with other native species, and other priceless environments. The essential problem is, of course, the delusion of everything existing for human arrogance. We are a mere mid-level omnivore, terrified when alone, our trophic level about that of pigs and sardines. Until the hubris of believing that all exists for us, is replaced by the knowledge of our being a small, limited part of life, we remain nothing more than narcissistic, scheming psychopathic exploiters. We take too much, returning little to nothing in our exploitative greed.
The dams blocked the Salmon's migration up river, but the water was able to flow downriver over the dams. So the salmon can "smell" and "remember" that water coming from upstream, they just couldn't swim up there until now. Before the dams were built, they spawned all over up there.
@@georgehaydukeiii6396 I think it’s great to remove these dams for the salmon who seem to be in a big decline. From what I understand these dams had been generating electricity . Lately the media talking about how much electricity we are going to require for AI and electric cars push. And how we are looking at the need to generate much more electricity in the near future. To do this some want to star up/ build nuclear plants again , which I think is a mistake. So my comment was, Taking away these free clean energy producing dams on the Klamath isn’t going to help with the need for more electricity.
Hard to believe thise fish were just hagin around the mouth of that river waitn all those years for the dam to be removed so they could move up stream.
Why is the footage showing clear water? It is not clear at all. I was kayaking there last weekend. 😢 the clay mud is choking the river and local radio says the clay clogs their gills. Doesnt seem honest.
The water is clear because those images were of tributaries that flow into the river. any images of the river itself were well above the dams! I was there the other day. The river above the dams is clear. I'm not sure exactly where you were kayaking, but I guess it was well below the dams.
They migrate individually. They come in groups only because salmon which came from the same spawning area have the same migration pattern. Within the group of salmon migrating to a oarticular river, there will be individual variation in how far up the river they move.
They don't go back to the exact little patch of gravel they were spawned in. when a biologist says the salmon go back to where they were born, they mean the same stream. Those fish have been spawning above the dams for tens of thousands of years. Even though the dams were in place for a hundred years, they're evolved instinct is to go back the tributary their ancestors came from.
@@georgehaydukeiii6396 well, yeah, sure. So despite the dams a few salmon got through. So removing the dams will substantially increase the spawning return? Was that the point?
@@ericsonhazeltine5064 Yes! More spawning grounds, flowing water, better water temps will all mean more salmon and also equate to a healthier river. A healthy river is good for everyone.
What exactly are you calling BS? The Indians catch a small amount of fish for their traditional ceremonies. They are not the problem! The dams were the problem! Seriously, you need to get in touch with reality.
