{"id":28108,"date":"2025-06-18T17:56:56","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T17:56:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wildsalmoncenter.org\/?p=28108"},"modified":"2025-06-18T17:56:56","modified_gmt":"2025-06-18T17:56:56","slug":"for-the-makah-wwii-is-still-a-problem-for-salmon-streams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wildsalmoncenter.org\/2025\/06\/18\/for-the-makah-wwii-is-still-a-problem-for-salmon-streams\/","title":{"rendered":"For the Makah, WWII is still a problem for salmon streams"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Makah Tribe has cleaned up after the U.S. military for decades. A partnership with Wild Salmon Center could speed this work for salmon.<\/h2>\n\n\n
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Makah Tribal Habitat Division Manager Stephanie Peterson Martin is responsible for stewarding the health of fish and wildlife across all 54 square miles of her sovereign nation at the northwesternmost corner of the contiguous United States. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

One sunny August afternoon in 2024, two fish ecologists dipped hands in a small creek framed in tall beach grass. In an eddy, finger-length wild fish darted through the clear water\u2014coho salmon, the ecologists marveled, or possibly steelhead or cutthroat trout.<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At this early stage of life, it can be hard to distinguish these wild fish species without closer inspection. But despite their tiny size, it was clear that these adventurous young fish weren\u2019t afraid to taste salt. They tested the water just yards from where tiny Wa\u2019atch Creek meets the Pacific Ocean, following its short, steep descent through Olympic Peninsula rainforest<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

From Seattle, the nearest major city, it takes more than four hours by car to get to this craggy beach<\/strong>. This is Makah Territory, and Makah Tribal Habitat Division Manager Stephanie Peterson Martin is responsible for stewarding the health of fish and wildlife across all 54 square miles of this sovereign nation at the northwesternmost corner of the contiguous United States. Now, thanks in part to Peterson Martin\u2019s guest that afternoon\u2014Wild Salmon Center Fish Habitat Specialist Nicole Rasmussen<\/a>\u2014she and her team will bring that focus on fish directly to Wa\u2019atch Creek.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen Nicole approached me about projects, it\u2019s like, man, I got this whole list!\u201d Peterson Martin recalls. \u201cI said, I could keep you guys busy for a long time. But let\u2019s start with one.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cWhen Nicole approached me about projects, I said, I could keep you guys busy for a long time. But let\u2019s start with one.\u201d<\/p>\nMakah Tribal Habitat Division Manager Stephanie Peterson Martin<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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Wild Salmon Center Fish Habitat Specialist Nicole Rasmussen dips a hand into Wa’atch Creek on Makah Territory in the far northwestern corner of the Olympic Peninsula. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Wa\u2019atch Creek runs more than seven miles from headwaters to ocean. But for the young fish darting in the summer eddy, it\u2019s much, much shorter<\/strong>. Just a quarter-mile upstream, these fish meet a formidable relic from World War II: a squared-off tunnel that looks more like a hallway for humans than a route for small fish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

World War II was a particularly fraught period of history for the Makah. In the early 1940s, during wartime heights, the U.S. Army abruptly commandeered strategic locations across Makah Territory\u2014building roads, radar stations, office compounds, and myriad other heavy infrastructure<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n

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Looking upstream into Wa’atch Creek’s World War II-era box culvert on Wa’atch Creek. Built without fish passage in mind, this 30-foot-long square concrete tunnel turns into a firehose in the winter while spreading summertime streamflow fingernail-thin across its flat floor: much too low and slow for fish. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The presence of U.S. armed forces didn’t end with the war; it wasn\u2019t until 1988 that the U.S. Air Force finally withdrew its last stationed personnel<\/strong>. To this day, Makah Tribal experts are still working to clean up military debris\u2014from asbestos siding to a warren of old, cracking water pipes, soil contaminated by leaky underground fuel storage tanks, garbage dumps, and even shipwrecks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The military aftermath includes the Wa\u2019atch Creek box culvert: a massive concrete tunnel installed by the Army when it paved Cape Flattery Road around the peninsula\u2019s most remote corner.<\/strong> The culvert\u2014squared on all sides and 30 feet long\u2014turns into a firehose in the winter: shunting water through too fast for fish to navigate. In summer, the culvert\u2019s flat floor spreads the flow fingernail-thin across the concrete: much too low and slow for fish. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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To this day, Makah Tribal experts are still working to clean up military debris\u2014from asbestos siding to a warren of old, cracking water pipes, soil contaminated by leaky underground fuel storage tanks, garbage dumps, and even shipwrecks.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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A poster documenting former U.S. military sites on the Makah Reservation hangs in a Tribal administrative office on Cape Flattery Road. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

For the Makah, the problems here don\u2019t end with fish passage. A beach ball-sized dip in the road above offers clear evidence that the box culvert is also starting to fail structurally, taking the road with it<\/strong>. <\/strong>It\u2019s a \u201cticking time bomb,\u201d says Peterson Martin, with serious consequences for her community. Cape Flattery Road is the first Tribally-owned scenic byway in the United States, and essential to the Makah\u2019s growing tourism economy. It\u2019s also a key evacuation route for Tribal members in the event of a tsunami.<\/p>\n\n\n

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A long warp across Cape Flattery Road shows that the box culvert beneath it is starting to fail structurally. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

All of this makes fixing Wa\u2019atch Creek\u2019s box culvert a top priority<\/strong>. But for years, this work has felt logistically out of reach. Work on Cape Flattery Road is subject to a morass of conflicting federal and state road standards. There are funding issues, and permitting and labor constraints. But Peterson Martin knew of Wild Salmon Center\u2019s success in partnering with Washington Coast Tribes to find federal salmon recovery dollars<\/a> for critical infrastructure projects. Why not try out a partnership, she thought\u2014test the saltwater a bit, like those baby fish<\/strong>?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI knew that Wild Salmon Center has approval to work here,\u201d Peterson Martin says. \u201cSo the question is, can we get it done?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From summer 2024 and into fall, plans evolved from conceptual to concrete. The two teams worked out a timeline that spanned initial design to boots-on-ground construction. Rasmussen tapped her Wild Salmon Center colleagues to help secure grant funding for initial project designs from the Resources Legacy Fund Open Rivers Fund and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cI knew that Wild Salmon Center has approval to work here. So the question is, can we get it done?\u201d<\/p>\nMakah Tribal Habitat Division Manager Stephanie Peterson Martin<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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Peterson Martin and Rasmussen at the mouth of Wa’atch Creek, just a quarter-mile downstream from the fish-blocking box culvert under Cape Flattery Road. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

In December 2024, Rasmussen and Peterson Martin bushwhacked down to the banks of Wa\u2019atch Creek with Tribal staff and KPFF engineers. The field visit formally kicked off plans for replacing the concrete box culvert with an arched and far wider steel bridge span<\/strong>. By this summer, Tribal and Wild Salmon Center staff will review designs with engineers: designs that they can take back to agencies like NOAA to fund boots-on-ground construction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once full funding is secured, it will take three years, at least, to complete the Wa\u2019atch Creek Project. Tourists taking camper vans to the Cape Flattery Trail and lighthouse overlook will need to endure construction delays and detours, as crews repave a dip-free road on top of the new bridge. Peterson Martin and Rasmussen will also need to exercise patience, to see if Chinook salmon, coho, steelhead, and cutthroat trout eventually find their way under the new bridge to the upstream habitat the project will reopen. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both ecologists know that for wild fish, every new mile counts. Research<\/a> shows that small creeks like Wa\u2019atch can play an outsized role in the long-term resilience of salmon and trout in the Pacific Northwest and beyond. Each new stretch of cold, clean water gives wild fish more room to adapt and thrive in a time of rapid climate change<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf this project is successful, I think it opens up the door for conversations about other projects that we also need,\u201d Peterson Martin says. \u201cSo we are super excited about this partnership.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Already, she and Rasmussen are scoping out other fish passage projects across Makah Territory. Many of them are barriers created by World War II’s military buildout and the long federal presence that followed. Project by project, the Makah are reclaiming their land from this unwelcomed legacy. Project by project, they\u2019ll also be welcoming more salmon home<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cIf this project is successful, I think it opens up the door for conversations about other projects that we also need. So we are super excited about this partnership.\u201d<\/p>\nMakah Tribal Habitat Division Manager Stephanie Peterson Martin<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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When the box culvert (entrance pictured here, in center) is ultimately replaced with a fish-friendly steel bridge, Wa’atch Creek’s wild salmon and steelhead will be able to freely access miles of quality habitat upstream, no matter the season. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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