August 28, 2026 — Threatened Hood Canal summer-run chum salmon represent a bright spot in Pacific salmon recovery. According to preliminary data from the Hood Canal Coordinating Council, average annual returns have nearly tripled since 2022. They’ve climbed from about 11,600 fish per year between 2018 and 2021 to roughly 32,600 between 2022 and 2025. That’s up from a low of less than 1,000 spawners in the early 1990s.
Scientists say several years of favorable ocean conditions have contributed to the recent rebound. Cooler ocean temperatures increase the food available to salmon and improve their survival at sea. But those conditions won’t last forever. Experts believe restoring river habitat will help summer chum remain resilient when the Pacific Ocean inevitably shifts back to a warmer phase in its natural cycle.
One of the healthiest summer chum populations is returning to one of the region’s most degraded rivers. The number of chum spawning in the Big and Little Quilcene rivers has quadrupled in the last 4 years. This despite 2 miles of the Big Quilcene being straightened, scoured of spawning gravel, and cut off from its floodplain.
NOAA Fisheries’ Office of Habitat Conservation, the Hood Canal Salmon Enhancement Group, and the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe are restoring salmon habitat at two locations on the Big Quilcene River–Moon Valley and the Lower One Mile. The projects will:
- Create spawning and rearing habitat for Hood Canal Summer chum and threatened Puget Sound Chinook salmon and steelhead
- Improve the Quilcene Bay estuary, where juvenile salmon make their first transition to salt water
- Stop the flooding that has plagued the town of Quilcene for generations
The restoration should finish by September, just as the summer chum return to spawn.
“Restoring the Big Quilcene River has taken tribes, nonprofit organizations, local communities, state and federal agencies, and NOAA all working toward the same goal,” said NOAA Marine Habitat Resource Specialist Chemine Jackels. “Together, we’re giving one of Hood Canal’s most important summer chum populations a healthier river and a better chance to thrive for generations to come.”