More Warm Water

More than a quarter million sockeye returning from the ocean to spawn are either dead or dying in the Columbia River and its tributaries due to warming water temperatures.

Federal and state fisheries biologists say the warm water is lethal for the cold-water species and is wiping out at least half of this year's return of 500,000 fish. Authorities say 80 percent of the population could ultimately perish.

Elsewhere in the region, state fisheries biologists in Oregon say more than 100 spring chinook died earlier this month in the Middle Fork of the John Day River when water temperatures hit the mid-70s. Oregon and Washington state have both enacted sport fishing closures due to warm water, and sturgeon fishing in the Columbia River upstream of Bonneville Dam has been halted after some of the large, bottom dwelling fish started turning up dead. Idaho Fish and Game Chief of Fisheries Jim Fredericks: "There have been mortalities observed in the Columbia River in Washington so I'm not going to say that is not related to warm water or something else but we haven't seen it. It is very possible that what they are seeing down there is related to a combination of warm water but then water quality. Maybe there is something else that is factoring into it other than simply temperature with dissolved oxygen levels or something else. So in that case, yes they decided that doing anything to try and minimize stress on Sturgeon was appropriate. I understand that.