Salmon get a traditional hello

OLYMPIA – About 100 people gathered Saturday at Heritage Park to witness something that hasn’t occurred in a long time: a group of South Sound tribal members dancing and singing to welcome salmon on their return trip up the Deschutes River.

Saturday’s two-hour celebration coincided with the final weekend of Here Today, the city’s monthlong program devoted to temporary public art, including eight colored-glass salmon that appear to be twisting and turning as they jump out of the lake. The leaping salmon display, called Beauty Swim Skins, was created by LisaNa Red Bear, an Apache woman, Olympia resident and graduate of The Evergreen State College.

Red Bear was on hand for Saturday’s celebration, as were about 12 members of tribal groups, including the Nisqually, Puyallup, Squaxin and Skokomish tribes. Nisqually tribal member Anthony Sanchez, who played a hand drum during the performance, said the group sang ancestral prayer songs.

After talking to local tribal elders, Red Bear said she thinks this was the first such multi-tribal gathering near the mouth of the Deschutes River since presettler days.

The state Department of Fish and Wildlife forecasts a return of about 10,700 chinook salmon to the Deschutes River this year, down slightly from the 13,000 that returned last year but within the range of 8,000 to 15,000 fish in recent years, said Hal Michael, a district fisheries biologist with the state agency.

The Deschutes River salmon are milling about at the Fifth Avenue Bridge. They come much to the delight of people who can catch a close-up glimpse of chinook salmon – also called king – as they finish the final leg of their saltwater journey and slip through the fish ladder at the dam to be captured and spawned at the Tumwater Falls Hatchery.