SacFM

Chinook Salmon

Roots, the food history behind Sacramento menus By , checked November 6, 2026

The Sacramento River’s king salmon, from the people who fished it first to the 2026 season, the first in three years.

Nur

The Winnemem Wintu Tribe calls salmon Nur. Its homeland runs from Mount Shasta, Buliyum Puyuuk, down the McCloud River, the Winnemem Waywaket. “When the Shasta Dam was constructed during World War II, it flooded our home and blocked the salmon runs,” the Tribe writes.

Downriver, the Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation remembers a homeland where “salmon ran in the rivers.” In the Sierra foothills, Nisenan elders describe runs so thick “you could ‘walk across their backs,’” according to HUṠWEJ, the nonprofit that carries out the wishes of the Nevada City Rancheria Nisenan Tribe. Silt from the gold mines, dams and poisoned water destroyed most of those runs.

The Winnemem Wintu are working to bring the Nur back above Shasta Dam. In the summer of 2022, 40,000 fertilized winter-run eggs were carried to the McCloud River, and in May 2023 the Tribe signed co-management agreements with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and NOAA Fisheries.

“We believe that when the last salmon is gone, humans will be gone too.”

Winnemem Wintu Tribe
H. L. Todd drew this quinnat, or Chinook, for G. Brown Goode in 1884.

Four Runs

Four runs of Chinook come up the Sacramento, each named for the season it leaves the ocean. NOAA Fisheries writes that the winter run has “a life-history strategy found nowhere else on the West Coast”: it spawns in the heat of summer, in the upper river below the dams.

  • Fall run Enters the river July to December. It is the most abundant run today, and most hatchery salmon are fall run.
  • Late-fall run Enters the river mid-October to December. It spawns from January to mid-April.
  • Winter run Enters the river December to early August. Listed as endangered in 1994, it spawns in summer in the upper river.
  • Spring run Enters the river late March to September. It was once the most abundant run, and was listed as threatened in 1999.

Dark months: when each run enters fresh water, from CDFW. This month is outlined.

Across From K Street

Newtown Landing at Rio Vista, engraved for the Historical Atlas Map of Solano County in 1878.

In the spring of 1864, Andrew Hapgood and the brothers George and William Hume began canning salmon at the town of Washington, in Yolo County, “opposite the foot of K street, Sacramento city.” It was the first salmon cannery on the Pacific Coast. The first pack came to about 2,000 cases, and R. D. Hume later wrote that “at least fifty per cent of the product spoiled.” San Francisco merchants “would have nothing to do with it for a long time.”

By 1866 there weren’t enough salmon in the Sacramento for the firm, and William Hume moved to the Columbia River. The river canneries kept growing anyway: in 1880, ten of them were at work in San Francisco, Benicia, Collinsville, Courtland and Sacramento, and together they packed 80,387 cases.

Gold country was filling the river with mud. Hume wrote that before hydraulic mining arrived in 1853 the Sacramento held more salmon than anyone could use, and that eleven years later it was “practically rendered useless for commercial purposes as a salmon stream.” In January 1884 a federal court barred the mines from dumping their debris into the rivers.

A can label in the manner of the first cannery’s, with words from Hume’s account.

Dams and Hatcheries

In August 1872, Livingston Stone came to the McCloud River to start the federal government’s first salmon hatchery, Baird Station. “Three white men, including the writer, with the help of one or two Indians, did all the work,” he wrote of that first season. Within a decade the station shipped nearly 14 million eggs in a season, to several countries, “of which New Zealand was the most remote.”

Baird Station stopped hatching fish in 1937, ahead of Shasta Dam, and now lies under Lake Shasta. When the dam was finished in 1945, the Bureau of Reclamation writes, “the natural migration of Chinook salmon and steelhead on the Sacramento River was blocked.” Hatcheries took the place of the lost spawning grounds: Coleman on Battle Creek in 1942, Nimbus on the American River with Nimbus Dam in the mid-1950s, and the Feather River hatchery at Oroville in 1967.

The winter run fell to about 200 spawners by the 1980s and was listed as endangered in 1994. The spring run was listed as threatened in 1999.

  1. 1872Baird Station
  2. 1942Coleman
  3. 1945Shasta Dam
  4. 1967Feather River

The 2026 Season

In 2026 the Sacramento River opened to salmon fishing for the first time in three years.

California closed all ocean salmon fishing, and salmon fishing in the Central Valley’s rivers, in 2023 and again in 2024. In 2025 the ocean opened for six days of sport fishing, and stretches of the American, Feather and Mokelumne rivers reopened, while the Sacramento’s main stem stayed closed.

For 2026 the Pacific Fishery Management Council forecast 392,349 Sacramento River fall Chinook in the ocean, up from 165,655 the year before. Commercial boats fished off California for the first time since 2022 and reached their limit of 83,000 fish on August 19. On the Sacramento from Woodson Bridge to the Carquinez Bridge the season for fall-run Chinook runs from July 16 to December 16, two fish a day; on the American above Ancil Hoffman Park it closed October 31. “It is a moment of genuine celebration for everyone invested in the health of our watersheds,” said Meghan Hertel, director of the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.

How many salmon came back to spawn this fall will be counted in early 2027.

  1. 2023Closed
  2. 2024Closed
  3. 2025Six ocean days
  4. 2026Reopened

See the Run

  • Nimbus Fish Hatchery

    2001 Nimbus Road, Gold River, on the American River

    The fall run comes up the fish ladder from early November through mid-December, while the hatchery takes eggs. Free tours run on the second Saturday of the month at 11 a.m.; the next is November 14. The visitor center is closed for now.

  • Feather River Fish Hatchery

    Oroville

    An underwater window looks into the fish ladder from mid-September through June, and spawning can be watched from mid-September to mid-November.

  • Ferrari Fisheries

    West Sacramento

    Sells hook-and-line salmon straight from the boat when it’s in season, usually spring and summer. Lou Ferrari bought a 28-foot trolling boat to fish for salmon in 1958.

Timeline

  1. Spring 1864 Hapgood, Hume & Co. starts the first salmon cannery on the Pacific Coast, at Washington in Yolo County, across the river from K Street. Fishing and canning
  2. 1866 William Hume leaves for the Columbia River, citing the scarcity of salmon in the Sacramento. Fishing and canning
  3. August 1872 Livingston Stone starts the federal Baird Station hatchery on the McCloud River. Dams and hatcheries
  4. 1880 Ten canneries around the river and the bay pack 80,387 cases. Fishing and canning
  5. January 1884 A federal court bars hydraulic mines from dumping debris into the rivers. Dams and hatcheries
  6. 1937 Baird Station stops hatching fish ahead of Shasta Dam; it now lies under Lake Shasta. Dams and hatcheries
  7. 1942 Coleman National Fish Hatchery opens on Battle Creek to replace spawning grounds lost to Shasta and Keswick dams. Dams and hatcheries
  8. 1945 Shasta Dam is finished, blocking the salmon’s way up the Sacramento and flooding Winnemem Wintu land. Dams and hatcheries · The tribes
  9. Mid-1950s Nimbus Fish Hatchery is built with Nimbus Dam on the American River. Dams and hatcheries
  10. 1967 The Feather River Fish Hatchery opens at Oroville. Dams and hatcheries
  11. 1994 Winter-run Chinook are listed as endangered. Dams and hatcheries
  12. 1999 Spring-run Chinook are listed as threatened. Dams and hatcheries
  13. Summer 2022 40,000 fertilized winter-run eggs are carried to the McCloud River above Shasta Dam. The tribes · Dams and hatcheries
  14. May 2023 The Winnemem Wintu Tribe signs co-management agreements with CDFW and NOAA to return salmon to the McCloud. The tribes
  15. 2023 and 2024 All ocean and Central Valley river salmon fishing in California is closed. Fishing and canning
  16. 2025 Six days of ocean sport fishing; parts of the American, Feather and Mokelumne reopen. Fishing and canning
  17. 2026 The Sacramento River opens to salmon fishing for the first time in three years. Fishing and canning

Sources

Checked November 6, 2026. The salmon at the top holds Newtown Landing at Rio Vista, engraved in 1878. Native history here is quoted only from the tribes’ own words.