Upcoming Salmon Festival to raise awareness

This Sunday, Nov. 1, MHCC’s geography department will sponsor an annual Salmon Festival next to the Multnomah Falls Lodge, along with the U.S. Forest Service.

Geography and criminal justice instructor Chris Gorsek said the point of the festival, which is free to the public, is to raise awareness about wild fish populations in the Pacific Northwest, which seems to entail more and more than comes to mind at first glance.

Gorsek said there are the obvious effects humans have on water quality, and the hard-to-miss obstructions, such as dams. But there are more subtle effects, too, like soil erosion smoothing out riverbeds where salmon used to lay their roe (eggs) in gravel, or seals and sea lions waiting behind dams where fish back up, creating “dueling protected species,” he said. Portland’s hotter summers lately have been hurting salmon populations: Since water moves more slowly behind dams, those areas actually get too hot for some fish to live in. And to top it off, a lot of storm runoff goes straight into rivers, carrying “oil, radiator fluid [and] industrial run-off”.

The festival isn’t all doom-and-gloom, however. Gorsek emphasized that it is entirely possible to change this scenario.

“There are things that we can do to make these streams cleaner, and clearer,” he said.

Multnomah Falls reliably attracts weekend crowds, and Multnomah Creek is a great place for viewing salmon this time of year as the fish migrate up the Columbia River Gorge to spawn. Mt. Hood students will help explain the ways of salmon and threats their population.

MHCC initially got involved in the Salmon Festival after the previous event that was hosted at Oxbow Park on the Sandy River for close to 25 years dissipated.

This year’s festival runs from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday. Barney, Mt. Hood’s mascot, and Smokey the Bear are both expected to be in attendance. Students from Mt. Hood’s cosmetology will be doing face-painting.

“I hope people realize there are things we can do to make the water quality better,” said Gorsek, about what attendees should be thinking on their way out.