 Contact: Patricia Graesser, (206) 764-3760
April 20, 2001
SEATTLE—The large lock chamber at the Chittenden Locks in Ballard will be closed in five-hour periods on as many as 21 different days this May through July. The closures will allow scientists to monitor the effectiveness of smolt passage flume operation and slower lock filling rates at reducing entrainment of young salmon and steelhead into the lock filling culverts. The small lock chamber will be operational throughout these test periods.
The large lock closures will occur during mid-week days—Wednesdays and Thursdays.
Closures are scheduled for the following days:
May 9, 10 a.m. - 3 p.m.
May 10, 10:30 a.m. - 3:30 p.m.
May 16, 4 p.m. - 9 p.m.
May 17, 5 p.m. - 9:30 p.m.
May 23, 9:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m.
May 24, 10 a.m. - 3 p.m.
May 30, 3 p.m. - 8 p.m.
May 31, 7:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m.
June 6, 9:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m.
June 7, 10 a.m. - 3 p.m.
June 13, 2:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m.
June 14, 3 p.m. - 8 p.m.
June 20, 8 a.m. - 1 p.m.
June 21, 9 a.m. - 2 p.m.
June 27, 2 p.m. - 7 p.m.
June 28, 3 p.m. - 8 p.m.
July 5, 6 a.m. - 8 a.m.
July 11, 1 p.m. - 6 p.m.
July 12, 1:30 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.
July 18, 7 a.m. - noon
July 19, 8 a.m. - 1 p.m.
Scientists from the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife are cooperating to perform the tests with scientists from the Seattle District, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which operates the Locks.
Biologists will catch young salmon in the lock chamber to evaluate the effect of slow lockages and smolt passage flume operation on reducing juvenile salmon entrainment. The tests this year will help determine more precisely how effective these measures are.
Additionally, scientists will evaluate the survival of young salmon since the Locks maintenance staff scraped barnacles from inside the culverts. Some of the injuries young salmon receive when they pass through the conduits are scrapes, cuts and descaling from hitting the barnacles that line the culverts.
Again this April, the Corps installed the four new smolt passage flumes in the two southernmost spillway gates. These devices allow outmigrating smolts to pass out to sea without injury. Smolt flumes can safely pass as many as half a million smolts each season.
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