You have the capability to decide which ONE dam is the next to be decomissioned, upper watershed opened back up to salmon & steelhead... what hallowed waters will once again thrive with wild fish, that you can hopefully fish for again soon. Go.

Well given the Elwha dam deconstruction was actually a group of dams, then can we remove a group? I would say each one on the Snake River (but if it had to be just a few then the Hells Canyon Complex).

http://www.nwcouncil.org/history/HellsCanyon.asp
The Pacific Fishery Management Council has estimated that prior to 1850, when Euro-American people began to settle in the Northwest, the Snake River Basin produced about 1.4 million Chinook, 200,000 coho and 150,000 sockeye annually. Steelhead numbers are harder to estimate, but one researcher estimated in 1970 that steelhead habitat existed throughout the Columbia Basin at a ratio of about 1.7 to 1 compared to coho habitat. Thus, the Snake Basin probably produced about 340,000 adult steelhead per year, an estimate based on the estimated abundance of coho. Based on the Pacific Council’s estimate of salmon and steelhead production in the entire Columbia Basin, this means that the Snake produced 41 percent of all Chinook salmon, 16 percent of all coho, 16 percent of all steelhead, and 23 percent of all sockeye. Expressed another way, Peter Hassemer, an Idaho Department of Fish and Game biologist, wrote in 1992 that before the Federal Columbia River Power System in the Snake and Columbia rivers was completed in the mid-1970s, the Snake River produced about 40 percent of the adult spring Chinook salmon, 45 percent of the adult summer Chinook salmon and 55 percent of the summer steelhead that returned from the ocean each year to spawn.

Tossup between the Cowlitz dam(s) and Wynoochee.

It would be intriguing to also remove a Snake/Columbia dam but there are so many damn dams on those systems, removing one would do little to improve the overall scheme of things there.....maybe remove the one that would restore the most free-flowing river?? Got me which one that would be.

damn fantasy---kate upton/grand coulee

oh

Skagit

Snake system too

With so many to choose from.... ONLY ONE????

YGTBFK, right?

That's like handing someone a bag of Lay's potato chips and saying.... Ah - ah - ah .... just ONE.

Hmm... I suppose if conditions were right one could take out a system of dams by pushing over the top domino... or dam... a snowball effect getting bigger and bigger as each downstream dam is consumed and more water volume is added to the mix.

Could be a mess downriver though...

I guess this isn't the best fantasy LOL

i want to stop one from being built on the chehalis. cheaper not to build one than to tear one out

Remove the one that will significantly improve the negative impacts it has created and not significantly change any of the benefits it came with.

Howard Hanson.

You're forgiven Chuck!

Hoover dam.

All those skinny women want us to think that she is too fat. Right.

Wynoochee, although I'm afraid the habitat upstream isn't in great shape, and the lake is a beautiful place.

Only one dam? I'm pretty sure that with a one dam removal the biggest increase in habitat access and restoration would come with removing Dworshack on the NF Clearwater. If it could be one system of dams, then as mentioned, Hell's Canyon, Oxbow, and Brownlee would restore access to the greatest amount of habitat.

Wynoochee was mentioned, but only about 10 miles would be recovered. And removing Howard Hanson, which I'm beginning to think is a good idea because the Corps has totally screwed up its downstream fish passage obligation, would restore about 36 miles. These are pretty small potatoes recoveries when compared to the Snake and Clearwater.

Sg

RD,

The Corps had a $130 million budget for the HHD fish passage system. They have spent $99 and have a hole in the ground and a fishway foundation to show for all that money. The Corps is developing a modified plan, which remains confidential for now. It should be released this spring. I don't think any agency or the Tribe will like it.

Sg

The Pacificorp dams on the N Fork Lewis, without a doubt. Would open up tons of spawning grounds all the way up to the Lower Falls. Woodland would once again have serious flooding issues though..............

Maybe Shasta? But lots of issues there too

Grand Coulee...but only if large parts of it would wash downstream and take out Chief Joseph dam, too.

Fish on...

Todd

No, put you on a gigantic hamster wheel.

Fish on...

Todd