Klamath dams

Less than a month after four towering dams on the Klamath River were demolished, hundreds of salmon made it into waters to spawn in cool creeks.

Biologists from Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and The Klamath Tribes have discovered several salmon in a tributary of the Klamath River in Oregon, above the site of four dams that were removed earlier this year.

The move to remove the dams marks a major victory for tribes in the region who fought for decades to free hundreds of miles of the Klamath River.

For the first time in more than a century, salmon will have free passage along the more than 400 miles of the Klamath River and its tributaries.

Bull trout have populated the Klamath Basin for thousands of years. But, they’ve nearly been wiped out by competition from non-native fish. The 30-year recovery of this trout is proving to be a rare success story among endangered species.

Representatives from dozens of Indigenous nations came together at the Muckleshoot Reservation in Auburn, Washington, for the sixth National Tribal Leaders Climate Summit.

The next big phase of the Klamath River Dam removal started this week. It's the largest dam removal in U.S. history and is expected to last through 2024.

The Klamath dam removal is uncovering painful history for the Shasta Indian Nation. But the tribe’s leaders also see a chance to recover some of their lost lands, restoring ceremony, language, and community in the process.

Rafting the Upper Klamath River is possible through the summer thanks to releases of water from the J.C. Boyle Dam, which will be removed next year. When guides return to the Upper Klamath in 2025, this stretch of the river will be forever changed.

For over a century, four hydroelectric dams along the Oregon-California border have cut off habitat to fish swimming up the Klamath River from the ocean. Now, researchers are in the midst of a project to learn how fish will use this ecosystem once the dams are removed.