The California Dept. of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) successfully completed the release of more than two million Fall-run Chinook salmon smolts into the Klamath River .
May 15, CDFW released 1.3 million Chinook just below Iron Gate Dam and CDFW carried out another release of approximately 800,000 smolts last week.
The smolts were trucked about seven miles from the Fall Creek Fish Hatchery. The fish were coded with wire tags and their adipose fins clipped to later identify them as hatchery origin providing scientists with valuable data and the success of the release.
The salmon are about six months old and average just under 3 inches in length. The releases were accelerated due to warming temperatures in the Klamath Basin and Shasta disease concerns of freshwater parasites native to the Klamath.
An additional 250,000-300,000 yearly Fall-run Chinook are scheduled to be released, later this year, as the three remaining Klamath River dams are targeted for removal- JC Boyle, Copco 1 and Iron Gate- are all being actively deconstructed.