DARREN FRIEDEL
JOYCE — In the late 1940s, low water levels in Salt Creek left juvenile coho salmon marooned along a stretch of the stream running through John McFall’s property.
Using buckets and a wheelbarrow, McFall scooped up the small salmon and transferred them to a nearby tributary flowing with water.
“Three years later, I started seeing salmon return to the tributary where I placed those fish,” said McFall, whose family has owned and worked land in the Salt Creek watershed for about a century.
“To this day, I can take you up there around Thanksgiving time and show you spawning salmon.”
During the past several decades, McFall has done his part to help salmon and restore habitat on his property along Salt Creek.
But elsewhere throughout the watershed, which is near Joyce and about 15 miles west of Port Angeles, more work is needed.
With the help of local landowners, the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe and the North Olympic Salmon Coalition are taking on the task of identifying what can be done to improve fish habitat.
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