In 2017, fewer than 1,000 winter steelhead returned to the upper Willamette Basin. That number has exploded to more than 7,600 so far this year. The returns are the highest since 2004. Zach Urness is the outdoors editor for the Statesman Journal and hosts the “Explore Oregon” podcast. He joins us with more on what’s behind the increase.
The following transcript was created by a computer and edited by a volunteer:
Dave Miller: From the Gert Boyle Studio at OPB, this is Think Out Loud. I’m Dave Miller. We talk so often about diminishing fish returns in the Northwest that good news reports of increases can come as a big surprise. But that is exactly what happened with winter steelhead in the Upper Willamette Basin. Their latest numbers, according to the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, are the highest they’ve been in 20 years. Zach Urness is the outdoors editor for the Statesman Journal and hosts the “Explore Oregon” Podcast. He joins us now with the details. Zach, welcome back.
Zach Urness: Hey Dave, thanks for having me back.
Miller: I want to start with the real basics because we haven’t actually talked about steelhead for a while. What are steelhead?
Urness: Steelhead are trout that migrate to the ocean and then return to spawn. It varies but they often spend about two years in freshwater rivers then two years in the ocean before coming back. And because they head out to the ocean and they’re feeding out there, they come back a lot stronger, a lot larger than the trout that stay home.
So as an angler, I think catching a steelhead is one of the great thrills because they’re just a big, fast, powerful, beautiful fish. I mean, I spent a lot of my younger years trying to catch steelhead on a fly rod with sporadic success. They’re sometimes known as the fish of a thousand casts because you have to work hard for them. But when you hook them it’s really quite an experience.
Miller: Depending on the time of year, if you are gonna get lucky enough or talented enough to hook one, you might either catch a wild one or a hatchery one. How do folks tell the difference?
Urness: Sure, so hatchery steelhead, which have been planted, are missing their adipose fin. They have it clipped off, so they’re actually missing a fin. So you can just look at the fish and tell whether it is hatchery or wild pretty easily. You can also get a hint from the size. The wild fish tend to be large. Then the time of year. So in the North Santiam River, where I do a lot of fishing, the summer run of steelhead are hatchery fish and the winter run are wild native fish.
Miller: What are the different rules that govern the different runs?
Urness: That’s gonna depend on exactly where you’re fishing. But in general, you’re almost always able to harvest a hatchery fish or two while there are typically stricter rules on wild native fish. So to go back to the North Santiam, as an example, you can harvest a few hatchery summer steelhead, but you always have to release wild winter steelhead, which in this basin, are protected as threatened under the Federal Endangered Species Act.
Miller: Your recent story focuses on wild winter steelhead in the Upper Willamette Basin. Can you just give us a sense for the area we’re talking about?
Urness: Sure. The Upper Willamette Basin includes everything above Willamette Falls. So, from around Oregon City all the way to Salem and Eugene on the main Willamette. And then the Basin includes major tributaries like the Santiam, the Molalla, the Yamhill, where the steelhead go to spawn.
Miller: What were their historical numbers like?
Urness: There’s not a reliable estimate that I’ve seen from the really old days like way back. But it’s fair to say they were just numerous and widespread. I’ve heard the number, hundreds of thousands, tossed around. It’s hard to verify. But as far as counting numbers, by the 1960s and ‘70s, their runs would regularly be above 20,000 fish, sometimes up to 30,000 fish. But then by the 1990s, they really started to decline rapidly, down to just a few thousand. By 1999, they were listed as a threatened species. And then by 2017, their numbers really crashed all the way down to just 822 fish returning that year. It hasn’t been as bad in recent years, mostly around 2,000 to 3,000. But it hasn’t been great either.
Miller: So, I mean, not long ago, scientists were talking about an “extinction vortex” for winter steelhead. What does that phrase mean?
Urness: It just meant that at the low population that they had reached and the rate they were declining and how it was going, it was clear that they might not be able to replicate their numbers. They might just wink out or go extinct. So, yeah, they were at threat for just being gone.
Miller: What are the various reasons for their decline?
Urness: It’s a complicated issue. But the long-term answer tends to refer to what fish biologists call “the Hs” [H plural]. The first one is just over-harvesting of fish, which happened over a long period of time. Another one is habitat loss in rivers. A third one is hydropower dams or just dams, which cut off massive amounts of spawning habitat, create abnormal water temperature and conditions in the rivers. So those are some of the big ones. People also talk about interbreeding with hatchery fish being a problem. I think you have to include climate change and changes to the ocean. And then there are local issues for specific basins in our state. Sea lions were an issue in the mid-2010s.
Miller: Let’s turn to this year – the most returning winter steelhead in 20 years. One reason that was put forward was improved ocean conditions. What does that mean? What actually got better for the steelhead?
Urness: Yeah, and I did want to highlight how great this year has been. Again, they dropped all the way down to 822 fish. And this year, the last numbers I looked at, just this morning, were 8,000 fish. And it should keep growing, which is really great. For the first time in a long time, anglers were catching and releasing them here and there. But you asked about ocean conditions. In a nutshell, that just means there is more food in the ocean for the fish to eat. So they tend to do better. Back in the bad years, around 2017 and earlier, a lot of those fish had to deal with the notorious “blob” of warm water that was in the Pacific, leading to the very poor ocean conditions meaning less food to eat, so harder in those years.
Miller: You mentioned sea lions. What role has the culling, as we’re calling it, but I don’t know, I still feel like killing is more accurate and I like accuracy. What role has the federal government saying, “Yes, you can kill sea lions”... What difference has that made?
Urness: It made a big difference. But I’ll give just a little bit of backstory there. In the mid-2010s, the fish numbers were already way down. There developed a kind of troop of sea lions who had discovered that if they hung out by the fish ladder at Willamette Falls, they could just kind of have an all-you-can-eat buffet of steelhead. It was really easy for them to just scarf down a lot of them.
Fish biologists estimated that they ate over 25% of the entire steelhead run for the Upper Willamette Basin, in a couple of years. So the State went through a legal process to actually get approval to kill the sea lions that were feasting on the fish. And that’s what they did. The State killed 45 sea lions all totaled. And it hasn’t been a problem since. Because I think they’ve discovered it’s sort of a learned behavior. So, once the sea lions that have become habituated to this are killed, other sea lions don’t necessarily come in to take their place. So it’s worked out pretty well, in their opinion.
Miller: All right. So we talked about improved ocean conditions, the culling, the killing of sea lions. What else might have played into the increase we’re seeing now? I mean, 10 times more than eight years ago?
Urness: When you talk to fish biologists, they definitely say ocean conditions play the biggest role. That’s the single biggest thing. There have been better drought years, especially recently. So that does help. There’s more water. It’s a little healthier. Then again though, the class of fish that were returning this year came of age during a pretty brutal 2021 drought, the 2020 Labor Day Fire. So they didn’t have a cakewalk. You could just say they’re a tough, resilient fish and this is a good year.
Miller: You wrote, back in December, about another species returning. Coho salmon numbers had smashed their earlier record. Is there a connection between these two increases?
Urness: I would say again, in talking to the fish biologists, that in general, the better ocean conditions have been good for most of Oregon’s ocean going fish. Salmon and steelhead numbers have been up statewide. Not universally, but in general, the runs have been better, compared to recent years, in a lot of different locations, not just here.
Miller: Is there a reason to believe, whether we’re talking about steelhead or coho, that this is more than a temporary increase? I mean, is there a meaningful reason to hope?
Urness: That depends how optimistic a person you are. I mean, when you look at historic numbers, it’s pretty normal to see good ocean conditions leading to good runs of fish. But then when ocean conditions drop back down, the runs drop back down as well. If you’re an optimist, you could point to efforts to improve dams and make them friendlier for fish that are ongoing. That’s a huge entire other story in the Upper Willamette Basin. With wild fish, the point is that if we just make rivers a little friendlier for fish, then improve habitat, better dam management, at least we give them a chance to thrive. And that’s all they’re looking for.
And there is some evidence. The Clackamas is one that people talk about a lot, where if you just do a few things better for fish, then they’ll thrive. Given that opportunity they will. So they’ve held on this long, fighting against the odds. So why not be an optimist? I think it’s a lot more fun no matter whether that ends up being true or not. I truly choose to believe that it is possible for these runs to survive and thrive.
Miller: And it also seems like being an optimist is part of being an angler to begin with.
Urness: Yes, especially when you’re fishing for steelhead.
Miller: Zach, thanks very much.
Urness: Thanks, Dave.
Miller: Zach Urness is the host of the “Explore Oregon” podcast and the outdoors editor for the Statesman Journal. He joined us to talk about the biggest returning numbers for winter steelhead in the Upper Willamette Basin in 20 years.
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