It's spawning season again for Chinook salmon and in Oroville this morning the Feather River Hatchery opened the gates to its fish ladder.
"Like clockwork we open the ladder on the 15th of September and a week later we'll start harvesting the eggs from the fish."
Hatchery Manager Anna Kastner says based on the amount of salmon waiting to climb that ladder in the river below the hatchery, at least 10,000 fish will return over the next few weeks…the most since 2007.
"The last couple of years have been pretty low. This year, it seems to be a little different, at least at the Feather River. We've seen, like I said, more fish than we've seen in the last three years."
Kastner says that bodes well for Oroville's annual Salmon Festival later this month.
Chinook salmon return to their home rivers to reproduce after spending about three-years in the ocean. They die after spawning and are given to food banks and tribes.