Update: I forget to include this presentation on adult returns in the post. You can find them all here.

The annual Deschutes Fisheries Workshop hosted by Portland General Electric and the Confederated Tribe of Warm Springs occurred on July 18th. I have attend approximately the last 15 of these meetings and always appreciate getting the updates. Presentations were made by scientists from a variety of agencies and once again it is clear that the Lower Deschutes is in great shape. Just ignore what the tin foil hat crowd continues to say, as usual they were not in attendance to hear real science. As usual, ODFW’s annual surveys confirm that redband trout are in great shape and there is some good news on the effort to reintroduce steelhead into the Upper Deschutes Basin. Water quality continues to meet the overall targets set for the project, with some minor seasonal variances that are not negatively impacting fish health or abundance. The keynote was a talk from the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration which I found information and perplexing. Keep reading for a few highlights.

ODFW’s annual reports on fish health and abundance are always one of the highlights of the workshop from my perspective. Trout populations remain robust. Bass continue to move up from the Columbia River, where populations are exploding, mostly into the lower 12 miles of the Deschutes during summer months but there is no evidence of reproduction there. After a decent return in the 2022-2023 season, steelhead returns above Sherars Falls fell dramatically in the 2023-2024 season. In contrast, while still small, 2022-2023 returns above Lake Billy Chinook were records. Wild spring chinook returns are critically low but fall chinook returns are robust. Coho populations, a relatively new entrant to the Deschutes, are growing dramatically.

Back to the tin foil hat crowd. There is a vocal group who continues to harp on Lower Deschutes water quality. Of course, years ago their lawsuit was dismissed for lacking “material fact” but that has not dissuaded their continued harping on the issue. As I wrote way back in 2017, target statewide pH levels do not reflect the specifics of the Deschutes and do not reach levels considered hazardous to salmonids. An independent scientific study in 2019 stated that pH levels should continued to be monitored, which is ongoing.

The keynote by the NOAA scientist gave a broad overview of ocean treads and our limited understanding of the behavior of some anadromous fish once they enter the salt, particularly steelhead. Clearly, the Pacific Ocean is being impacted by global warming, but it is only one of the factors that are affecting anadromous populations. The speaker believes that increased predation, particularly at sea, is a significant factor along with loss of freshwater habitat. The surprise for me was the seeming contradiction with the current widely cited collapse of the food web. I have heard from many biologists and read papers claiming that a warming ocean reduces the organisms at the bottom of the food chain, which ripples upwards. Studies have seemed to show that lack of food is impacting steelhead populations overall and returning adults are often smaller. This presentation stated that over the past few years the total biomass at the bottom of the food web has actually increased. When I asked him to reconcile this observation with current dogma he acknowledged the seeming contradiction but did not have an explanation. This is area to keep tracking.