We all know that Prineville Reservoir filled this past winter and the Wild & Scenic section of the Crooked River below Bowman Dam has had good flows this spring and summer. Of course, this section of the river is rarely a problem during irrigation season. The river mostly suffers from low flows, sometimes lethally low, during storage season. Last week, the US Fish & Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service released their “final recommendation” for how to release the water stored in the reservoir for the remainder this year and through next winter. I’ll provide some discussion, but the bottom line is that if this plan is approved and implemented by the Bureau of Reclamation, reasonable amounts of water should be released into the Wild & Scenic section all winter. As usual, the problem on the Crooked River will be below that section.

To really understand how this all works you need to know a little about the Crooked River Collaborative Water Security and Jobs Act of 2014, a.k.a, the Crooked River Act or CRA. At full pool, roughly half the water in Prineville Reservoir is under contract, primarily to Ochoco Irrigation District and a little to North Unit Irrigation District and the City of Prineville. The CRA says that as the reservoir fills the contracted water allocation is filled first. Any additional water is uncontracted. This uncontracted “fish water” is to be released with the goal of providing maximum biological benefit to fish and wildlife. There’s a ton more detail, but that’s a good enough overview for this discussion.

This year the “ag water” bucket should to be full enough to allow good deliveries during the entire irrigation season. This will benefit the Wild & Scenic Section, the 8 miles below Bowman Dam, before irrigation withdrawals begin. In addition, the “fish water” bucket is full enough to allow for releases of 100 cfs during non-irrigation season and still have some in reserve for pulse flows next spring. Pulse flows are used to encourage steelhead and salmon smolts to head down to Lake Billy Chinook and then out to the ocean.

There is a big problem, however, one that we have known about since before the CRA was finalized almost a decade ago. “Fish water” is supposed to be for the benefit of fish all the way to Lake Billy Chinook. Unfortunately, it is not protected for that purpose. In addition to OID and NUID, there are many water users who have “live flow” water rights. This means that water in the river in excess of what is being withdrawn by OID and NUID can be diverted. The result is that the 100 cfs of fish water may be significantly reduced as it travels downstream.

WaterWatch identified this problem over a decade ago and requested that the Bureau of Reclamation apply for a water right to protect the fish water. Unfortunately, the BoR and the Oregon Water Resources Department have been dragging their feet on this for years. As usual, fish and wildlife continue to suffer as the river has had lethally low flows and high temperatures in various places for a number of years in a row.