Protecting Fish during a Drought - Lake Kachess Bull Trout 2015

Box Canyon Creek in Washington State is a small and cold tributary to Lake Kachess, which is one of five reservoirs feeding the Yakima Reclamation Project irrigation system.  In 2015, the Yakima Project was experiencing severe water shortages, and all reservoirs were tapped to near-minimum elevations.  At Lake Kachess, low lake elevation had closed recreational access to the lake, and by the end of August the mouth of Box Canyon Creek extended thousands of feet across the lake bed.  August and September are the usual times for ESA threatened bull trout to migrate out of the lake and up Box Canyon Creek to their spawning grounds, so fish managers were monitoring passage conditions closely through the late summer.  Eventually, concerns about shallow water led fish managers to pursue means for fish to migrate out of the lake and into Box Canyon Creek.  Funded by U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife teamed up with Yakama Indian Nation staff and volunteers from local fish conservation organizations to build a temporary fish passage flume.  Daniel Garrett's amazing videography documents how staff and volunteers used basic supplies to channel flow into the flume, thereby creating sufficient depth to enable fish migration.