Freshwater Fishes of the Columbia Basin
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Extirpated Fishes: Family Salmonidae

Oncorhynchus tshawytscha (Walbaum)	Chinook Salmon
Oncorhynchus=hooked snout tshsawytscha=Russian vernacular

Chinook are one of the most prized and culturally renowned salmon species on the Pacific Coast of North America. At one time the Columbia River was home to the world's largest runs of Chinook and other Pacific salmon species. The anadromous Chinook would make annual natal migrations of nearly 2,000 kilometres from the mouth of the Columbia River at Portland, OR, into the upper portions of the Columbia River in British Columbia. In 1809, explorer David Thompson recorded the presence of Chinook Salmon weighing up to 16 kg (36 lbs) at Kootenae House, the first trading post established in the Columbia River Basin, near Windermere, B.C. (Holbrook 1956). Archaeological evidence suggests that the Chinook runs in the upper reaches of the Columbia Basin were an important winter food source for Ktunaxa/Kinbasket First Nations people. By the mid 1880s some of the last major First Nations' salmon harvests were conducted in the Upper Columbia near the river's source at Columbia Lake, and the populations have been in steady decline ever since (Heitzmann 1999; Milne and Godfrey 1964). There have been some reports of Chinook in the Okanagan River (McPhail 1994), but it is thought that these runs were impeded from migration passage since the construction of the Grand Coulee Dam in 1941 (Myer et al. 1998; US Army Corps of Engineers/Bonneville Power Administration 1998).

Today, wild runs of Chinook Salmon are extinct in the Canadian portion of the Columbia River. Extensive impoundment, harvests and other anthroprogenic disturbances in both Canada and the U.S.A. have prevented the passage of successive runs of spring, summer and fall migratory Chinook populations. There has been little attention or rehabilitation effort directed at the Canadian Columbia River Chinook populations. In an age where conservation programs and managers are directing their focus at within species diversity (e.g. salmon stocks) we find that 'species' as a whole are becoming extinct on a regional basis.

Chinook have been since re-introduced into the lower Columbia at Roosevelt Lake (reservoir) in Washington State, and some Chinook are occasionally found in the lower reaches of the Columbia River below Trail, B.C. Juvenile Chinook can be distinguished from other young salmonids by the presence of a clear, unpigmented adipose fin and by the position of parr marks arranged in evenly spaced bars extending above and below the lateral line.