Idaho Fish and Game crews welcomed the first sockeye of the summer back to the Stanley area on Tuesday, July 19. The fish completed a 900-mile journey that included crossing through eight dams and swimming 6,500 vertical feet of elevation from the ocean to Stanley.
Hopefully, it will be followed by more sockeye. Through July 19, an estimated 1,029 sockeye bound for Idaho had crossed Bonneville Dam on the Columbia River. Of those, 730 had crossed Lower Granite Dam on the Snake River, which is about 25 miles downstream from Lewiston and the last dam the fish cross before reaching Idaho.
After crossing Lower Granite Dam, the fish still have to swim about 400 miles to return to their spawning grounds in the Stanley area.
Last year, a heat wave warmed temperatures in the Columbia River to lethal temperatures that killed about 99 percent of the sockeye run. The rivers are cooler this year and migration conditions more favorable, but it's still a perilous trip for the fish.
Since 2009, survival from Bonneville Dam to the Stanley Basin, has ranged from a low of 1 percent last year to a high of 60 percent in 2010.
Here's where you can read more about Idaho's sockeye: https://idfg.idaho.gov/conservation/sockeye