Crews work to save life in Rogue River
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Rising out of the Rogue River muck like a river version of Stonehenge, the waterlogged timbers of the original Gold Ray Dam glistened in the Thursday morning sun for the first time in 106 years, much to Scott Wright's delight.
The crib dam and the concrete version immediately downstream were exposed Wednesday when demolition work at the dam unexpectedly drained about two-thirds of the upstream impoundment.
Large logs jammed into the bedrock formed an arc, with each log pointed downstream in a 45-degree angle.
Atop sat large planks, fastened with iron spikes driven by the swings of sledgehammers from a long-gone era.
"You can see how all these old pieces came together," says Wright, whose River Design Group has spearheaded the dam's $5.6 million removal. "It's pretty neat to see 100 years of history."
One day after a sand spit washed away during the draining of Tolo Slough, construction crews worked to stabilize the muddy landscape and continue removing Oregon's worst remaining fish-killing dam.
Crews spent Thursday rescuing adult and juvenile salmon trapped behind the dam when turbid flows spewed through the failed sand spit, leaving the fish ladder dry and the dam exposed.
Armed with fish-shockers, crews netted and released salmon and small lampreys. Construction crews even used a jack hammer to pound a hole through the concrete dam's base so thousands of spring chinook salmon smolts released this week from Cole Rivers Hatchery could swim free.
"Instead of us carrying them, we let the water carry them downstream," says Pete Gruendike, River Design Group's main fish-salvage biologist. "It's what's best for the fish."
Dozers built a road from the river's north bank to the edge of the temporary coffer dam near the Rogue's south bank, exposing the wooden and concrete dams for demolition and removal.
The Rogue churned muddily down a new channel hugging the south bank, flowing over remnants of the old crib dam and other debris.
By this weekend, crews were expected to draw down what's left of the impounded upstream water and smooth out the rough, steep rapid present Thursday, Wright says.
"We're going to do what we can do to get things cleaned up and get fish moving through it," Wright says. "We'll get it to be as wild a river as we can."
It's a specter that dam supporter Dalton Straus cannot stomach.
The Sams Valley rancher who runs cattle on land just upstream of the dam was part of a failed attempt to get land-use regulators and a federal judge to spare the dam and preserve it as a historic site — a move the dam's owner, Jackson County, deemed too expensive and created too much liability.
"I just can't stand to watch it," Straus says. "I've tried not to keep up with it. It makes me sick to see it happen."
The 79-year-old Straus grew up in the sloughs and backwaters upstream of the dam. As a kid, he and a cousin lashed logs together for a makeshift raft they used to explore Tolo and Kelly sloughs.
"We'd pole through those little sloughs and pretend like we were Huck Finn," Straus says. "It was a freedom we never realized before.
"After it's all done, I'll go shed a few tears and be thankful I was able to see it the way it was."
The only way Rogue Valley residents will see the demolition will be from the banks of Gold Ray Road.
The waters 1,000 feet upstream of the dam site and 500 feet below the dam are off-limits to boaters until mid-October because of unsafe conditions there.
Jackson County sheriff's deputies Wednesday closed the TouVelle State Park boat ramp to downstream traffic, and warned boaters not to attempt the dangerous rapid now present there.
Reach reporter Mark Freeman at 776-4470, or e-mail at mfreeman@mailtribune.com.
