PENDLETON, Ore.-Recently secured federal funding will advance alternative fish passage solutions at McKay Creek Reservoir Dam.
According to the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW), the $1 million federal investment will support an alternatives analysis and engineering design for potential fish passage solutions at the dam on McKay Creek, a tributary of the Umatilla River about six miles south of Pendleton.
“These funds provide a critical first step in evaluating fish passage options and improving water and flow management to support the recovery of salmon and steelhead populations,” said Taylor McCroskey, ODFW’s Umatilla district fish biologist.
Oregon Senators Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden helped secure funding for the project that is the result of years of work between the ODFW, the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation (CTUIR), the Bureau of Reclamation, and other federal partners.
“The continued work to restore fish passage above McKay Dam is another strong example of what coordinated and collaborative efforts between the CTUIR, State of Oregon, and federal partners can achieve towards projects aimed at restoring these populations to healthy, abundant, and harvestable levels, providing cultural, ecological, and harvest benefits to the region,” said Jerimiah Bonifer, CTUIR Fisheries Program Manager.
Built in 1927, McKay Creek Reservoir Dam blocks 108 miles of upstream habitat for migrating fish, including 25 percent of the suitable steelhead spawning and rearing habitat in the Umatilla Basin.
Fisheries managers have been studying how fish would use McKay Creek if passage were restored since 2020, with radio-tagged steelhead being released above the dam to identify barriers and determine if spawning would occur.
According to ODFW, these efforts resulted in the first documented steelhead spawning above the dam since it was built.
Since 2021, when fisheries managers with the CTUIR and ODFW worked with the Bureau of Reclamation to lower a weir at the mouth of lower McKay Creek that had blocked adult salmon and steelhead, biologists have counted 182 salmon and steelhead redds in the lower creek.
“Restoring fish passage at McKay Dam Reservoir is a win for Oregon’s rivers, our tribal and federal partners, and the communities that depend on healthy fisheries in the Umatilla and Columbia rivers,” said McCroskey.
