2015 Okanagan sockeye fry release

[sly_karma]

May 20 will be a historic day for salmon restoration in the Okanagan. That will be the release of the first of about 2 million sockeye fry into the Okanagan River channel in Penticton - the product of the first operating season of the new k't'palk'stim hatchery. The ceremonies happen 10 am at the confluence of Shingle Creek and the river. The ONA has been busy, in addition to successfully getting a new hatchery startup going, they also opened fish passage into Shingle Creek, to the west of the hatchery. This gives full access to over a dozen kilometres of high quality spawning habitat on the Penticton Indian Reserve that had previously been blocked by an irrigation weir.

 

[tubber]

How do the fry get below/over/around OK Falls and the adults get up?

 

[Clint r]

Don't quote me on this, but I've heard rumours my whole life that there's a small run of springs that spawn in Whiteman creek at the north end of the lake. FN buddy tells me they come up the canal in Penticton. Don't know if it's true though as I've never seen one. Do know there's a lot of FN fishing that creek in the fall.

 

[Fisher_dude]

I've also heard of springs in the osoyoos oxbows. We need to push them harder for a fish ladder into okanagan so the sockeye will run into the lake.

 

[sly_karma]

Discussions with DFO regarding opening passage into Okanagan are still ongoing. Their chief objection is cross breeding with the kokanee population. ONA has DNA data that show this is already happening anyway (and probably always did), since each year a small number of aggressive sockeye make it over the Penticton weir and into Okanagan on their own. That makes it a moot point, but there is still bureaucratic reluctance. Even the comparatively simple dam removal on Shingle Creek took several years to clear red tape, despite reams of studies showing how good the habitat was upstream. Anyway that is done now and the upside for sockeye should be enormous. Shingle Creek and its tributaries represent 37 km of shoreline spawning habitat now available to sockeye and steelhead.