Young Northwest salmon and steelhead migrating toward the ocean will benefit for the first time this year from easier, safer routes through all eight lower Snake and Columbia river dams.



The improved passage routes will help promote fish survival in what is expected to be one of the Northwest's driest years on record. Fish protection regularly takes priority over power generation in the daily operation of hydroelectric dams that provide much of the region's electricity. But the improvements also demonstrate extensive upgrades of dam facilities to benefit fish.



The new routes let fish stay close to the water's surface, where they instinctively swim. Young fish now survive their downstream trip through the dams at rates as good as or better than in the 1960s, when only four dams stood on the lower Columbia and Snake rivers. Survival now ...... http://kbkw.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=1620