Thursday April 27, 2023
Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife —
The Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe (Tribe), Olympic National Park (ONP), and the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) announced that the tribal ceremonial and subsistence fishery for coho salmon on the Elwha River will be open for a limited time during fall 2023. Additionally, the Tribe, ONP, and WDFW agreed to extend the closure of other recreational and commercial fisheries in the Elwha River for another year.
For more than 100 years, the Elwha River dams blocked salmon access to over 90% of the river, devastating the once abundant salmon population in this system. Since the start of dam removal in 2011, the Tribe, ONP, and WDFW voluntarily suspended all fish harvest on the Elwha River so that salmon populations could recolonize their former habitats and rebuild their populations. In the nine years since the complete removal of the Elwha River dams, multiple salmon species have shown positive signs of recovery.
Coho salmon recovery has been a success story, thanks to the Tribe’s hatchery and fish relocation efforts during and after the dam removal process. The Tribe will conduct a harvest with a limited amount of adult coho salmon at the ceremonial and subsistence fishery on the lower three miles of the Elwha River in October of 2023. The timing of this fishery is designed to minimize impacts to non-target salmonid species, particularly federally listed Chinook salmon and steelhead.