Coho salmon
On August 10, 2025, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) announced:
“Wild coho regulations: The 2025 forecasted ocean abundance of Oregon coast natural coho is 289,000 fish, up from about 233,000 last year and the largest forecast since 2012. Proposed wild coho fisheries for 2025 are similar to 2024, with additional fishing days in some rivers due to the strong forecast. One exception is the Umpqua River, where no coho fishery is proposed as coho returns remain very low due to the Archie Creek Fire and other wildfires, drought, warming streams and non-native predators.
It would appear that the North Umpqua was the black sheep of the rivers of Oregon. But there’s a reason ODFW isn’t saying the quiet part out loud.
ODFW is presently involved in a $27.5 million lawsuit brought by the Oregon Department of Justice against the Winchester Water Control District (WWCD), owners of the condemned and disintegrating Winchester Dam on the North Umpqua River, for a laundry list of permit violations and one of the biggest fish kills on record. Seven generations of Pacific lamprey—550,000 fish— were slaughtered during botched “repairs” of the 135-year-old dam in August 2023.
This is why ODFW isn’t putting all of its cards on the table. The agency isn’t going to invest any money or resources into the North Umqpua fisheries until the infamous Winchester Dam and its crumbling 80-year-old fish ladder is removed.
This means that until Douglas County citizens and their elected officials are unified in their support to remove Winchester Dam, we can kiss our fishing seasons and our fishing tourism goodbye.
ODFW considers the Winchester Dam to be the worst manmade obstacle to fish on any river in Oregon.
Fish counts at Winchester Dam continue to diminish.
It appears that wild migratory native fish are on their way to extinction in the North Umpqua River. Populations have decreased significantly since 2005:
Summer Steelhead have diminished 77%.
Winter Steelhead by 31%.
Coho by 71%.
Spring Chinook by 64%.
Providing no hydroelectricity, irrigation, or flood control, the derelict and uninsurable Winchester Dam’s sole function is to create a mile and a half long private waterski lake for a few dozen well-connected and well-heeled speed boat owners at the exclusion of the public.
This is an extreme example of the needs of the few and the needs of the many—the 110,000 residents of Douglas County and the hundreds of thousands of potential fishing tourists who yearn to fish the North Umqpua—the number one steelhead stream in North America.
Each year, intrepid would-be fishing tourists purchase ODFW fishing permits, only to have a the agency close the fishing season midsummer, due to embarrassingly low fish counts.
The loss of fishing tourism costs poor, clearcut, bankrupt Douglas County tens of millions of dollars in fishing tourism revenue each year, all because the dangerous and illegal Winchester Dam has not been removed.
ODFW has repeatedly explained how the 17-foot Winchester Dam is too high for wild migratory fish to jump, and the fish ladder is on the wrong side of the river, 400 feet from the mainstream, making it hard for fish to locate.
Would that the problem of diminishing fish counts were restricted to the North Umpqua River. A recent study finds a catastrophic 81% decline in the global population of wild migratory fish since 1975. One out of four of these species are freshwater fish.
On July 5, 2025, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries listed 28 species of salmon and steelhead on the West Coast (below link) as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act (ESA).
Tragically for the citizens of Douglas County, the three Douglas County Commissioners and State Senator David Brock Smith and State Representative Virgle Osborne are unanimous in their steadfast and ill-considered opposition to the removal of the Winchester Dam.
Although Oregon law ORS 541.386, created in 1980, prohibits construction of any new dams or hydroelectric projects on the Umpqua River from Soda Springs Dam all the way to the Pacific Ocean, Brock Smith and Osborne advocate for building hydroelectric dams on the North Umpqua.
But this appears to be merely a performative stance. As recently as 2010, the WWCD looked at having Coastal Hydropower install 5 turbines along Winchester Dam. At peak river water flow during the winter, the 5 turbines would have produced a combined 2.5 megawatts, enough electricity to power 2,500 homes for 6 months. But during the low river flow summer months, electrical generation would drop to almost zero.
Coastal Hydropower determined in 2010 that the regulatory hurdles and low 17-foot height of Winchester Dam made installation of electrical generation a profitless pursuit. Consequently, Winchester Dam remain an unwelcome and destructive icon of that long ago era when the needs of the few outweighed the needs of the many.
Many people don’t realize that the Winchester Dam can be removed—and the Winchester Water Control District won’t have to pay for it.
An April 1, 2020 letter sent to the Winchester Water Control Board (WWCD) offers to permanently remove the Winchester Dam “at little or no direct cost to the District [WWCD]” and to “end ongoing harm to fisheries and water quality in the North Umpqua River.”
The letter was signed by the leaders of Steamboaters, North Umpqua Foundation, Umpqua Watersheds, Inc., Umpqua Valley Fly Fishers, Northwest Sportfishing Industry Association, Northwest Guides and Anglers Association, Pacific Coast Federation of Fisherman’s Associations, Oregon Wild, Port Orford Sustainable Seafood, Rogue Flyfishers, Pacific Rivers, Native Fish Society, Cascadia Wildlands, American Whitewater, and McKenzie Flyfishers.
It’s a standing offer that WWCD refuses to acknowledge.
In a graphic example of the pathology of wealth and power. In 2023, the wealthy property owners in WWCD collectively decided to spend more than $3 million of their own money to repair the long ago condemned Winchester Dam, in order to retain control of their private water ski lake, rather than allow river advocate groups to remove the dam at no cost to the WWCD.
Ironically, if the dam was removed and the river returned to its normal, lower water level, lakefront property owners in the WWCD would gain additional acreage. Some properties would more than double in size and increase in value.
Maybe it’s time to bring down the Winchester Dam and bring fishing tourism back to Douglas County—and the better jobs that come with it.
Think about it.
