ODFW and the BPA are looking at fish passage issues on several high flood control dams on the Willamette River basin.
These dams block ancient spring chinook spawning redds, fish passage would make these spawning beds available to reintroduced naturally spawning springer stocks.
ODFW has experimented with putting excess hatchery springer over the dams, what happened shocked many who thought that either the fish wouldn't spawn, or the fry would assimilate in the impoundment, and become trout creel.
These fish did indeed spawn on the ancient redds, and smolt outmigrated through the dam turbines, and then returned in numbers no one ever expected.
Getting smolt to bypass the turbines is being addressed in central Oregon at Lake Billy Chinook, where a new fish passage concept is showing sign of success at attracting smolt away from the dams turbines.