CDFW News

Pilot Project Returns Spring-Run Chinook Salmon to North Yuba River

Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:17:34 GMT

Media Note: Download photos, video and interviews involving CDFW’s salmon work in the North Yuba River.

Salmon are swimming again in the North Yuba River for the first time in close to a century. The fish are part of an innovative pilot project to study the feasibility of returning spring-run Chinook salmon to their historical spawning and rearing habitat in the mountains of Sierra County.

In late October 2024, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), in partnership with the Yuba Water Agency, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries and the U.S. Forest Service, injected spring-run Chinook salmon eggs over a 12-mile stretch of gravel riverbed of the North Yuba River along Highway 49 just east of Downieville.

The fertilized eggs arrived in coolers from CDFW’s Feather River Fish Hatchery operations in Oroville. Using a proven technique used by other agencies but never before attempted by CDFW, fisheries scientists created dozens of man-made salmon redds, or nests, using a hydraulic injection system to clear the intended nests of silt. Scientists then carefully deposited the eggs up to a foot and a half deep within the gravel to mimic the actions of spawning adult salmon. The intent is for the salmon to emerge from the gravel and grow as wild salmon would.

Four months after hydraulic egg injection occurred in the North Yuba River, salmon have begun to hatch and have turned up in a rotary screw trap installed several miles downstream of the egg injection sites to collect out-migrating juveniles. The first young fish were seen in the trap on Feb. 11. The young fish are being trucked downstream of Englebright Lake and released into the lower Yuba River to continue their migration to the Pacific Ocean.

“The North Yuba represents a really unique location for us. Between the mainstem and its tributaries there is somewhere around 40 to 50 miles of habitat that is ideal for spring-run Chinook salmon for holding, spawning and rearing,” said Colin Purdy, Fisheries Environmental Program Manager for CDFW’s North Central Region. “If we can develop this pilot effort into a full reintroduction program, we would be able to more than double the amount of available salmon habitat in the Yuba River watershed. And that’s a huge win for spring-run Chinook salmon.”

Central Valley spring-run Chinook salmon are a state and federally listed threatened species. They’ve been locked out of the North Yuba River’s cool, clear waters since the construction of Englebright Dam in 1941 and the subsequent construction of New Bullard’s Bar Dam in the early 1960s. The North Yuba’s cool waters are perhaps the most high-quality and climate-resistant habitat in the Central Valley for this species.

Spring-run Chinook salmon, once the most abundant of all of California’s various salmon runs, have a unique life history that makes them especially vulnerable to warming conditions on the Central Valley floor. After growing to adulthood in the ocean, the fish typically return to freshwater in the spring, seek out cold water habitat upstream as far as they can go, and hold over the summer months before spawning in the fall. Many tributaries that historically supported spring-run Chinook salmon now have dams and other barriers, and the salmon trapped below dams must now survive the Central Valley’s scorching summer heat. Juvenile spring-run Chinook salmon, meanwhile, can spend up to a year in freshwater before out-migrating to the ocean.

All the eggs and resulting salmon in the North Yuba River pilot project have been DNA tagged for identification, a practice known as “parentage-based tagging.” Every individual salmon in the North Yuba River can be identified and linked genetically to the exact set of parents that produced it during spawning at the Feather River Fish Hatchery in September.

“This is habitat that salmon haven’t been into for a long time so we have very little data to understand how salmon will respond,” Purdy said. “By injecting these eggs into multiple locations in the North Yuba River, we’re going to be able to look at how long it take for eggs to hatch and turn into yolk sac fry, how do they rear, how fast do they grow, when and where do they rear as juvenile salmon in this new habitat. So there are a number of different things that we’re going to be able to learn from this.”

The North Yuba River pilot project is one of a number of major initiatives underway in California to return salmon to historic, cold-water habitat upstream of dams and other fish barriers, which is seen as critical to their long-term survival in California and a key priority of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s California Salmon Strategy for a Hotter, Drier Future (PDF) and NOAA Fisheries’ actions that will support the recovery of this species.

The reintroduction of endangered winter-run Chinook salmon to the McCloud River above Shasta Reservoir and removal of dams on the Klamath and Eel rivers are three other major salmon initiatives.

Unlike the Klamath and Eel rivers, there are no plans to remove dams on the Yuba River as they still serve critical water supply and flood protection functions.

Any formal, ongoing reintroduction of spring-run Chinook salmon to the North Yuba River would require a trucking component as occurs now with winter-run Chinook on the McCloud River and as takes place in the Pacific Northwest.

In addition to supporting reintroduction, a framework agreement among CDFW, NOAA Fisheries and the Yuba Water Agency calls for improved fish passage past the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Daguerre Point Dam lower in the watershed, which would significantly improve passage for all migratory fish species in the lower river and open up an additional 12 miles of healthy holding and spawning habitat for both green and white sturgeon, salmon, steelhead and rainbow trout.

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Media Contacts:
Colin Purdy, CDFW North Central Region, (916) 358-2943
Peter Tira, CDFW Communications, (916) 215-3858

Joint News Release: Agreement reopens Yuba River to salmon and sturgeon, launching ambitious river restoration

Tue, 16 May 2023 15:58:02 GMT

Upgraded facilities and protections promote the return of Chinook to North Yuba River

A framework agreement between state, federal and local agencies will reopen miles of habitat to multiple native fish species and promote the return of imperiled spring-run Chinook salmon to their native habitat in the North Yuba River for the first time in more than 100 years, in one of the most ambitious watershed recovery efforts in California.

This collaboration between California through the Newsom Administration’s Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), Yuba Water Agency and NOAA Fisheries will resolve years of conflict and includes major actions to help recover imperiled fish:

Construction of a new fishway – a channel resembling a natural river that salmon, steelhead, sturgeon and lamprey can follow to get around the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Daguerre Point Dam to reach more than 10 miles of healthy spawning habitat.
Construction of a modernized water diversion at Daguerre Point Dam to supply irrigation water south of the lower Yuba River that will protect fish passing the intake.
The initiation of a comprehensive reintroduction program to support recovery efforts of spring-run Chinook salmon with a goal of returning them to their original habitat in the North Yuba River above New Bullards Bar Reservoir as soon as 2025.

The agencies agreed in principle to the terms, a comprehensive restoration plan and initial funding that will, together, provide the ingredients of a final settlement. The agreement will restore unimpeded access for fish to the full reach of the Yuba River from the confluence with the Feather River up to Englebright Dam for the first time in nearly a century. The parties agreed to future coordination related to ongoing federal license proceedings for Yuba Water Agency’s existing hydropower facilities and to support the agency’s Yuba Accord instream flow proposal. That would provide more reliable and consistent river flows, increasing the chances the species will again spawn and rear in the habitat.

“Where dams once broke up this important habitat, we can now use a holistic approach in returning anadromous fish to this important part of their native habitat in California,” said CDFW Director Charlton H. Bonham. “This agreement envisions a much-improved big picture of a restored watershed, with surging rivers and healthy fish populations once again.”

Agencies all contribute

The agencies have already committed at least $60 million, with part of the funds coming from funding proposed by the Newsom Administration and appropriated to CDFW by the California Legislature for river connectivity and salmon benefits.

California’s Central Valley once saw annual returns of spring-run Chinook numbering close to 600,000, greatly contributing to the fisheries and economy of the West Coast. The Yuba River was a Chinook salmon stronghold, supporting many miles of spawning grounds from its confluence with the Feather all the way up to the snow melt tributaries of the North, Middle and South Yuba rivers.

Currently, two federal dams built to control the devastating impacts of Gold Rush-era mining prevent native fish species such as Chinook salmon and green sturgeon from reaching their historic spawning grounds in the Yuba River watershed. Daguerre Point Dam (built in 1910) currently allows only limited passage for some fish species and Englebright Dam (built in 1941) is a complete barrier to fish passage to the upper Yuba River watershed. Both dams are owned and operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The agencies’ collaborative implementation of the restoration plan announced today will promote Chinook salmon and other aquatic species recovery by improving access to currently limited habitats in the Yuba River watershed. This will be accomplished through the construction of a nature-like fishway around Daguerre Point Dam for volitional passage to spawning and rearing habitat in the lower watershed and by promoting the reintroduction of Chinook salmon into their ancestral home in the upper watershed above New Bullards Bar Reservoir through a comprehensive reintroduction program.

“We all want salmon to be part of California’s future. These actions will help make that happen: They will increase the resiliency of native Chinook salmon to the extremes we are seeing with climate change,” said Jennifer Quan, Regional Administrator in NOAA Fisheries West Coast Region. “Reliable river flows and diverse habitat including access to previously blocked areas help the species adjust to changing conditions. This agreement represents the best of what we can do together when we find common ground.”

“Yuba Water’s commitment to collaboration and environmental stewardship runs deep,” said Willie Whittlesey, General Manager of Yuba Water Agency. “Today’s historic announcement builds on the success of past partnerships, including the Lower Yuba River Accord and North Yuba Forest Partnership, which show that – when we work together and think creatively – we really can advance our missions of water supply reliability, flood risk reduction and zero-carbon hydroelectric generation while also supporting the needs of salmon and other native fish species.”

The agreement sets in motion a joint plan to return spring-run Chinook salmon and other aquatic species to their historic habitat in the North Yuba River above New Bullards Bar Reservoir and enhance habitat functionality in the lower Yuba River. The agencies are prepared to hit the ground running by immediately initiating implementation of the agreement with the goal of reintroducing spring-run Chinook salmon in the North Yuba River by 2025. In combination, the actions in the restoration plan represent an unprecedented effort to improve habitat conditions and contribute to the recovery of historic fish runs to this waterway.

“These actions, taken together, will bring a much-needed watershed approach to protecting and expanding spawning and rearing habitat,” Bonham said. “We will see the benefits in the form of increased populations of state and federally listed spring-run Chinook salmon and other aquatic species.”

CDFW, Yuba Water Agency and NOAA Fisheries expect to finalize a settlement based on the framework agreement by the end of 2023.

For more information:

Term Sheet for Framework of Settlement Agreement for Yuba River Habitat Restoration Plan

Draft Framework North Yuba River Spring-run Chinook Reintroduction Plan

Lower Yuba River at Daguerre Point Dam Nature-Like Fishway and Water Supply Facilities Preliminary Restoration Plan

Media contacts:
Jordan Traverso, CDFW Communications, (916) 212-7352
DeDe Cordell, Yuba Water Agency, 530-741-5028
Michael Milstein, NOAA Fisheries, 971-313-1466