All of my former contacts at the US Fish & Wildlife Service are now gone (thanks Elon) but I was finally able to talk to the person now in charge of making decisions on releases from Bowman Dam this fall and winter. Last Friday the official “2026/2027 Annual Flow Recommendation” was released. Given the low water levels in Prineville Reservoir, releases will not be optimal for ecosystem health, but should be better than I feared. Note that these flows are subject to change under the characterization of “adaptive management”.

Tomorrow, September 21st, Ochoco Irrigation Districts’ board will meet where it is anticipated they will vote to end irrigation season on October 5th. Until then flows in the Wild & Scenic section below the dam should stay close to where they are now, around 100 cfs. Note that for a little while now flows below the irrigation diversions near Prineville have been around 20 cfs. This is well under the 80 cfs that the Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife considers the minimum for a healthy river ecosystem, and is undoubtedly having a negative impact on chinook that are currently spawning in the river, but it’s better than what OID has reduced the river to at times in the past.

35 cfs will be released from the reservoir from October 5th (or the last day of irrigation season) to November 1st. Again, this is well under what ODFW considers minimal for the ecosystem, but it’s better than the 10 cfs that occurred a few years ago.

50 cfs will be released from the reservoir from November 1st to April 1st, the anticipated start of the 2027 irrigation season. Of course, this will be dependent on precipitation over the winter. Let’s hope the super El Nino brings lots of rain and snow rather than more drought. The models currently indicate that it could go either way in Central Oregon.

Overall, I guess anglers should be happy as the plan could be worse for fish, but there will not be any water for spring “pulse flows”. In the past, USFWS has released higher flows for a few days in the spring to simulate natural springtime conditions and encourage steelhead and chinook smolts to begin their journey to Lake Billy Chinook and out to the ocean. Also, this plan leaves no water margin for fish.

Prineville Reservoir is managed to provide 100% of irrigation needs. The principle is called “first fill”. Irrigators get all their water first. Fish only get water if there is more than the amount contracted to irrigators. With this release plan, there will be no water left for fish at the end of this winter unless the reservoir significantly refills. This is significantly different than what happens on the Deschutes River where minimum flows for fish are required.