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Wednesday November 17, 2021

Westport News

As the Biden administration prepares to make the biggest investment in U.S. infrastructure in more than a decade, there’s much discussion about how systems like roads, bridges and electric power grids affect people’s daily lives. Here’s an angle that’s received less attention: Wildlife depends on infrastructure too.

I’m studying how human-made structures affect salmon migration between freshwater streams and the Pacific Ocean. Washington state is home to five species of Pacific salmon: chum, pink, and the locally endangered sockeye, coho and Chinook. Salmon are commercially, environmentally and culturally important to the Northwest, and many people here follow their migrations.

To travel out to the sea and back inland to spawn, salmon have to pass through thousands of culverts – tunnels that carry streams beneath roads or railways. When culverts fall into disrepair or are blocked, water might still be able to pass through, but fish can’t. This can be a death sentence to fish that migrate.

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