Concurrent Sessions B: Reintroduction Efforts on the Upper Deschutes River - Successes and Challenges During The First 3-Years Of The Upper Deschutes Basin Downstream Fish Passage Assessment

Construction of the Pelton Round Butte Hydroelectric Project (rkm 100) in the 1960s, denied anadromous fish access to over 250 miles of stream habitat in the Metolius, Crooked and Deschutesrivers. Original dam construction included a fish passage system. However bottom withdrawal created confusing reservoir currents in Lake Billy Chinook, contributing to low numbers of smolts attracted to the forebay and fish collector. To remedy the poor attraction currents, and to manage downstream water temperatures, complementary selective water withdrawal (SWW) and fish collection facilities (FCF) were constructed in the Round Butte forebay. The SWW-FCF became operational in December 2009. In anticipation of fish passage, Oncorhynchus tshawytscha (Chinook) and O. mykiss (steelhead) fry have been out-planted in the Metolius, Crooked and Deschutes rivers and tributaries since 2007. We are using Passive Integrated Transponder (PIT) tags and Juvenile Salmonid Acoustic Telemetry System (JSATS) tags to evaluate passage through the reservoir and response to the FCF. In 2012, we PIT-tagged 2,755 smolts, 636 of these were successfully collected at the FCF. We tagged 196 smolts with JSATS tags. The JSATS-tagged smolts displayed a high level of indirect movement in the reservoir; 81% of steelhead and 57% of Chinook were located in multiple reservoir arms. Seventy-five percent of the steelhead and 45% of Chinook in Lake Billy Chinook entered the forebay, of these 54% of the steelhead and 79% of the Chinook were collected by the FCF. PIT-tagged and JSATS-tagged smolts were more likely to enter the FCF when flows were 3,000 CFS or greater. We will present a synthesis of the three years of data we’ve collectedto evaluate the FCF, and discuss the effectiveness of our evaluation program