The removal of the Glines Canyon Dam on the Elwha River from September 14th through November 4th in 2011 was the largest dam removal project ever attempted in the United States. It allowed the Elwha to flow freely for the first time in nearly 100 years. It also opened more than 70 miles of river and stream habitat to five species of Pacific salmon and steelhead who had all but disappeared.

Yesterday, the Los Angeles Times ran a story checking in on the fish. Here's an excerpt:

Biologists John McMillan of NOAA’s Northwest Fisheries Science Center and Raymond Moses, a Nez Perce working for the local Lower Elwha Klallam tribe, were checking one day in June on the steelhead they had tagged and planted in a pristine tributary above the old dam. In that tributary, known as Little River, they saw several of the fish they had transported with hopes the fish would spawn. And then they saw something else.

It was a male steelhead, about 5 pounds bigger than any of the 60 fish they had tagged and planted. It bore nothing to suggest it was anything but a wild fish that had, of its own accord, discovered new territory.

“Ray and I instantly realized he had no floy tag, no radio tag, and we knew from its size it was obviously something that had made its way on its own past the dam,” McMillan said this week.

 

Hopefully, the success of this project will help determine the fate of future restoration projects around the country and the world.

 

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