STEELHEAD GHOSTS OF THE SNAKE.

Bill McMillan is doing some deep dig research on the history of Columbia River salmon and steelhead runs and the places where they use to be. This is article is not recommended for those that are not resistant to flashes of anger and malice.

I came on an interesting historic reference from Evermann (1896) from discussions he had with commercial fishermen on the Snake River system and tributaries in 1894. The report is in a U.S. Fish Commission Bulletin, Vol. XV, for 1895, by Marshall McDonald, Commissioner, from the Government Printing Office in 1896. 2.--A Preliminary Report Upon Salmon Investigations in Idaho in 1894.

From the information provided, it appears that Snake bound sockeye, spring chinook, and steelhead all began to collapse from 1878 onward. This was also documented from several sources at Kettle Falls and on the Spokane River for fish bound to the Upper Columbia. The collapse particularly plummeted from 1883 onward. Regarding magnitude of collapse, at Big Payette Lake sometime in the 1870s there was a harvest by one commercial fisherman at the lake of 75,000 sockeye. Other fishermen were salting down 30,000-40,000 pounds each year to feed the mining camps in the 1870s (avg. cleaned sockeye weighed 2.5 lbs so 12,000-16,000 sockeye per fisherman). One fisherman interviewed who had been there the entire time indicated repeatedly there were "millions" of sockeye that returned to the lake. There were minimally 100s of thousands and his claim of millions may not be much of an exaggeration. 1894 was the first return of any numbers of sockeye for several years, although only a few thousand were observed.

In the same Payette system, steelhead also returned and were harvested primarily in Payette River but also many spawned at outlets of the several Payette Lakes. Of particular interest was the size of the Payette steelhead. From the report of Mr. W.C. Jennings who lived in the headwaters of Payette River and was a commercial fisherman, he described its steelhead:

"The salmon trout come up Payette River about April when the water is high. Never saw any above the lake. They will bite a hook occasionally. They will weigh from 5 to 30 pounds; have heard of them weighing as much as 40 pounds, but they probably do not average more than 10 pounds. I think they come up from the sea and that they do not die, but return to the sea or at least go down stream when the water gets low."

These would most certainly be B-run type steelhead typically identified with the North Fork Clearwater River historically. The Payette is entirely a different system from the Clearwater.

In other areas of the Snake system:

Mr. F.C. Parks, Sawtooth, Idaho, describes more typical A-run type steelhead of upper Salmon River:

"The salmon trout come to the Alturas Lake region about May 5, and are seen up to about June 10. Some spawn in Salmon River and Alturas Lake outlet, while others go up into the inlets where they probably spawn on the same gravel bars used later by the redfish...Their noses get hooked and some sores appear later. Have seen some dead ones, but do not think many die. They are of various sizes, not in two sizes as the redfish are (he is referring to 10" kokanee compared to 4-5 lb sockeye). The largest I have seen would weigh about 14 pounds, the smallest about 2 pounds, while the average weight is probably nearly 8 pounds. They are becoming less abundant each year. The small ones are very scarce. We catch them with spears and grab hooks. They will sometimes take a hook baited with their own spawn tied up in mosquito bar. About one-third of those we get are females. Their eggs are about the size of those of redfish. Color: Along middle of side as red as the redfish; back, steel-color; the female has less red and is more silvery."

Mr. B.S. Brown of Bliss, Idaho in the headwaters of the Salmon River indicates the more typical A-run steelhead in the Redfish and Stanley Lake region:

"The salmon trout arrive April 1 or earlier. They spawn in April, going up into the outlets of the lakes and sometimes using the same spawning-beds which the dog salmon (local name for spawning chinook) use in the fall. They stay here at least until May 15. The largest I ever saw weighed perhaps 12 pounds, the smallest 4 or 5 pounds. I never saw many dead ones; they probably all go back to the sea."

Another fisherman, Mr. William O'Brien, of Weiser reported from the Weiser River and Snake River (northwest of Boise) where the steelhead were not so large:

"I first noticed these fish here about 18 years ago, but they are now more abundant than the chinook salmon (that had gone into severe decline). They come up early in September and remain in Snake River until about April 10, when they run up into the smaller streams to spawn. Do not think they spawn in Snake River. I think they spawn from April 15 to about May 10. Never caught any ripe salmon trout in the river. Six years ago my catch of salmon trout was about 18,000 pounds, or about 2,250 fish, the average weight being about 8 pounds. Since then they have decreased, so that last year I got only about 8,000 pounds, or 1,000 fish. But there are more fisheries now than there were a few years ago, so that the decrease in salmon trout is more apparent than real. We get them in the river from September 1 to December 1, and again in April..."

There are many more interviews in this interesting paper that provides a pretty good picture of the Snake River situation and the chinook, sockeye, and steelhead that once returned to areas where they are now extinct. The rapidity of the decline from the 1870s to the 1890s is phenomenal.

It would appear from the descriptions that the steelhead were particularly abundant near the areas of sockeye productivity (Weiser River had some reports of river sockeye, but none otherwise and seemed to have less steelhead than the Payette and upper Salmon). It is possible the steelhead declines were as much related to loss of sockeye as from harvest. The steelhead numbers, nevertheless, did not decline as dramatically as did sockeye and chinook in most areas of Idaho from what I gather from this early paper from Idaho. Bill McMillan

--Native Fish Society

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