Indian Cultural Organization

Help us restore endangered winter-run Chinook salmon to their spawning grounds above the dams!

On May 1, 2023, the Winnemem Wintu Tribe signed an historic co-stewardship agreement with California Department of Fish and Wildlife and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to restore winter-run Chinook salmon to the Winnemem Waywaket (McCloud River). We have designed new tanks for the fertilized eggs being brought to our river, which allow them to incubate in a system that more closely replicates a natural river. Tribal members are working alongside CDFW and NOAA scientists and officials to monitor, trap, and release the salmon below the Shasta and Keswick Dams.

But there is more work to be done. The Winnemem Wintu Tribe, along with our Tribal Historic Preservation Office, continues to fight to bring salmon eggs from New Zealand, where descendants of our nur (salmon) have thrived for decades. We continue to explore means of creating a volitional passageway around Shasta Dam to ensure the salmon can return all the way up to the cold waters of the Winnemem Waywaket. In addition, we are working with experts holding traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) to help us restore the waterways along our river and the Nomtipom Waywaket (Sacramento River) through planning and training of tribal members.

From Buliyum Puyuuk (Mt. Shasta) to Redding, our forests and watersheds must be returned to health to restore our endangered species, preserve our common history, and safeguard the water all of California depends on. Every drop is sacred, to us and to the salmon. We are salmon people, and we share their destiny.

Your donation will help us resist the obliteration of sacred natural sites, protect the history of the north state, and keep the original rich culture of our region going for generations to come.

Hii chala beskin! Thank you!