Large amounts of Chinook salmon fry die near Iron Gate Dam

SISKIYOU COUNTY, Calif.– Thousands of Chinook salmon fry in Siskiyou County died recently because of gas bubble disease in the Klamath River.

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife said they released over 800,000 salmon fry near the Iron Gate Dam on February 26th.

CDFW said the fish they released had a large mortality rate based on data monitoring downstream.

Experts believe the cause of the die-off is gas bubble disease that could have been caused by a pressure change while the fish were traveling through a tunnel in the Iron Gate Dam.

CDFW Spokesperson Jordan Traverso said, “the good news is that we have enough fish, we will meet our production goals, and all of this infrastructure will be removed by next year so these fish won’t have to deal with this in coming years.”

Traverso said they will release fish further downstream in the future to prevent incidents like this from happening.

The Iron Gate Dam is expected to be removed completely by next fall as part of the Klamath River Dam Removal Project.