[water murmuring] ♪ VANESSA: The river is our lifeblood.

It was our food, our way of life.

It was everything to us.

The dams were built in the early 1900s and they were built to create power.

We saw the fish populations decline to where we weren't sure how long we were going to be able to feed our people.

Fighting for the dam removal was a long and grueling process of my ancestors.

[explosion booming] I wish they could see it now.

See what has happened here and how our lands have been healing.

My people can be proud that we have been a part of this.

♪ ♪ NARRATOR: It is said that every river tells a story, and here in Washington State, one waterway speaks to the story of an entire region, America's Pacific Northwest.

It's known as the Elwha.

The Elwha flows from the snow-capped peaks of the Olympic Mountains and winds its way through dense old-growth forests to the sea.

It once teemed with all five species of Pacific salmon until a little over 100 years ago when the Elwha, like so many other rivers in this region, was dammed.

♪ KIM: There was a time in our history that we wanted to control nature and we wanted to harness the power of a river.

NARRATOR: In the early 1900s, hydroelectric dams powered booming industries but most were built without regard for the enormous impact they'd have on river ecosystems.

VANESSA: Back in those days, they didn't take into account all of the things under the water when they harnessed the power.

We saw the fish physically bumping their heads against the dams until they would die and they would not spawn.

So it was over time becoming an emergency.

NARRATOR: As dams went up across the Pacific Northwest salmon numbers plummeted, harming both the wild habitats and the human communities that depended on them.

VANESSA: We knew that we had to save the salmon.

♪ NARRATOR: From the outset, Indigenous people pushed for the dams to be removed.

Over time, as the dams aged and became costlier to maintain they won over allies and passed new laws.

Finally, in 2011, they won a monumental victory [explosion booming] and the Elwha dams came down.

♪ [explosion booming] It was the largest dam removal in world history.

[explosions booming] And it posed a crucial question for the many other dammed rivers here, across the US, and beyond.

Could an ecosystem disrupted for a century return to its former glory and health?

10 years on, the answer is now coming into focus.

Thanks in large part to the same people who led the fight to tear down the Elwha's dams, the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe.

VANESSA: We are Elwha Klallam because our village was here at the mouth of the river.

Our people were here because of the salmon and we decided to call this home because it was so rich in these nutrients.

NARRATOR: For the tribe, the removal of the dams was just the beginning.

Over the past decade they've driven the effort to document the river's recovery.

VANESSA: As a people, we continue to monitor our river and our fish populations and we are doing the work to help restore the river.

NARRATOR: The tribe forged partnerships with government agencies and conservation organizations.

They also hired and work alongside a team of leading scientists like Kim Sager-Fradkin.

Kim embraced what she saw as a once-in-a- lifetime opportunity.

Starting even before the dams came down.

KIM: We were facing this unprecedented dam removal and so there was really a grassroots effort of biologists and scientists that started researching everything from the plants to the sediment to the fish, like we need baseline data.

[speaker speaks indistinctly] KEITH: Male chinook, holding.

ASSISTANT: 780!

NARRATOR: The researchers have tracked many species over the years.

KEITH: Female chinook, holding.

ASSISTANT: 630!

NARRATOR: But they've paid closest attention to salmon.

KEITH: One of the biggest questions coming up the dam removal and after dam removal is how is this gonna affect salmon populations?

Salmon need to swim upstream in order to spawn.

The first dam is at river mile five.

The second one was at river mile 13.

Neither one was built with any fish passage facilities so there was very limited natural spawning area for the fish.

NARRATOR: Before the dams went up, about 400,000 salmon returned from the ocean to the Elwha each year to spawn.

By 2011, that number had fallen by over 99% to fewer than 4,000.

VANESSA: Every year we saw the numbers decline, the river turned to all cobblestone, and there was no fine pebbles for them to lay their nest in, and it created a crisis for the habitat of the river.

NARRATOR: The Elwha's woes reflected a wider trend.

Salmon have gone extinct in at least 40% of their original range across the Pacific Northwest, and their disappearance has be en felt by many other species.

KEITH: Salmon out-migrate in the Pacific Northwest because the rivers do not have much nutrients in it.

They can't get big in the river.

They have to go to the ocean.

So they come back with all these nutrients and they deposit those in the freshwater ecosystem and hundreds of different species consume those fish: eagles, otters and bears.

They've even picked up the signal in the trees next to the river.

Marine-derived nutrients from the salmon just filter out into pretty much any corner of the ecosystem you can think of.

NARRATOR: Some call this process the nutrient express and it's how the fish function as a keystone species supporting biodiversity in rivers and the surrounding ecosystems.

KIM: It really changes things when you put a huge impediment like a concrete wall on a river.

NARRATOR: When those great walls finally fell, scientists searched for any sign of a salmon comeback but they saw something else first.

MIKE: One of the most dramatic things we saw immediately after dam removal was the amount of sediment that the river was moving through.

The river deposited 3 million cubic yards of material in the estuary and transformed itself from a sediment-starved system dominated by very large cobble to then getting this shot of sediment of smaller sizes, lots of gravel, so forming new spawning areas.

And so that was a really cool thing to see.

♪ NARRATOR: This transformed riverbed seemed primed for an onrush of salmon, but surprisingly, salmon weren't the first fish to take advantage of it en masse.

KEITH: Without a doubt, the fish that has shown the most hopeful and the fastest recovery is steelhead.

NARRATOR: Steelhead start life as ordinary rainbow trout.

Many of these fish spend their whole lives in fresh water.

But in free running rivers, some rainbow trout mature into steelhead, fish that, like salmon, migrate to and from the sea.

For a century, the dams blocked their route.

KEITH: There were rainbow trout trapped above the dams pre-dam removal and now we see the river is just full of wild steelhead.

NARRATOR: Steelhead's full lifecycle has been restored.

And now the salmon are following suit.

MIKE: What we're seeing is a resurgence of a number of species.

2021, the most recent year we have, we had over 6,000 coho salmon return to the river.

NARRATOR: That's almost twice as many as two years earlier.

MIKE: In the case of the Chinook those fish are spawning in the river.

We've had some signals from pink salmon.

And so I'm super positive.

The fish are resilient.

Mother Nature is resilient.

If humans just let natural processes proceed there's no reason we can't recover these animals.

NARRATOR: Restoring natural processes does take time and for those whose livelihoods depend on salmon it requires major sacrifice.

VANESSA: During the dam removal they placed a moratorium on the river so we are not able to fish our river right now.

And we agreed to that to help the ecosystem rebuild and revive itself and to heal.

NARRATOR: The hope is that the return of salmon will reignite the nutrient express.

It might be slow going but already the salmon's impact may be visible to those who know where to look.

♪ SCOTT: I'm Scott Walters.

I am a PhD candidate at Western University and what we're doing is we're gonna be setting up some mist nets, which are a type of fine mesh netting that you string between poles for the purpose of catching American dippers.

NARRATOR: Dippers are songbirds that capture their prey in a most unusual way.

It's what first got Scott interested in studying them.

SCOTT: This is my favorite species of bird.

When I was in undergrad, I went to a beautiful canyon.

I went hiking and on my way out I saw this very interesting bird doing this little bob motion dipping which is what gives it his name, and it flies underwater in order to catch its prey.

And when you first see the species doing that it's incredible, especially for me, it just blew me away, and I just fell in love instantly.

NARRATOR: Dippers often feed on insects but they also have a special taste for salmon offspring.

SCOTT: Dippers eat the salmon eggs and they also eat the small fry, the little juveniles of salmon.

They themselves are terrestrial so they are sort of a link that connects the aquatic realm into the terrestrial ecosystem.

NARRATOR: The dippers could be an early sign that the nutrient express is kicking back into gear.

To confirm that, Scott and his colleagues need to see if the Elwha's resurgent salmon are ending up in dippers' diets and that requires studying them hands on.

SCOTT: Tom, we caught a bird.

Would you please come and join us?

Actually caught two at once.

NARRATOR: The nets are soft and don't hurt the birds.

SCOTT: It looks like we have some sort of thrush in the net as well over there.

NARRATOR: Scientists have found that the birds in this area are doing very well lately, laying two clutches of eggs each season instead of their usual one.

Scott wants to determine if a salmon rich diet is the reason for it.

SCOTT: And so I just know from my notes that this is the male, this is the father of the birds in this territory.

NARRATOR: Turns out this is the exact bird Scott was hoping to capture.

A male believed to have father two broods this season.

SCOTT: First thing I'm gonna do since it's already banded is I'm gonna take its weight, 56.9.

Okay, I'm gonna go ahead and start the process for bleeding.

NARRATOR: The blood samples will enable Scott to study the source of this male's success.

SCOTT: So I'm gonna be looking at the fatty acid profile.

What fats are in the bird, how much of each of those fats and which fats came from where, the ocean, from a salmon, just from local stream or whatever.

NARRATOR: The team is finding high levels of ocean nutrients in the dipper's blood.

A strong signal that the return of salmon is giving these birds a boost.

SCOTT: When they have these ocean-derived food resources they're more successful at creating additional nests so the species can propagate better.

KIM: The ability to actually measure change is a game changer because we can demonstrate that.

We can tell you that these animals now have these marine-derived nutrients in their systems.

We can see it in their claws, in their feathers, we can see it in their blood.

NARRATOR: Scott and his team will continue to study how the salmon's comeback here benefits other animals.

♪ But some researchers are taking a more proactive approach trying to help the local plant life reroot.

ALLYCE: Welcome to the former Aldwell Reservoir.

This used to be a lake and that got dewatered once the lower dam came out.

So now we are in a former reservoir that we have re-vegetated.

NARRATOR: Replanting native vegetation that grew here a century ago is a priority for the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe and its partners, including Olympic National Park.

ALLYCE: You can't have a thriving fish community without a habitat.

You can't have a wildlife community without a habitat.

So re-vegetating and restoring it back to the environment that it was is the basis of healthy ecosystem.

♪ With all of this planting we've had some pretty cool things happen like a huge colonization of river lupine.

Some of us call it the champion of the Elwha because it lays down a lot of organic matter on the ground which provides soil and nutrients for other things to grow.

NARRATOR: Other things include native trees like cedars and grand firs, but also invasive species.

ALLYCE: So invasive species will encroach on native plants' habitat.

They're extra good at reproducing and growing.

So here we have some Herb Robert that's going to encroach on this grand fir and cedars habitat.

We'll pull it and we take it out because if we don't take it out, then it'll reroot and grow where we put it on the ground here.

So it's important for us to remove it.

NARRATOR: Restoring native plants and purging invasives is an arduous task.

But the hard work is paying off.

ALLYCE: Just seeing things pop up on the ground and grow and filling this barren landscape with a forest again is so inspiring and awesome.

KIM: These are lush forests now in a system that 10 years ago was just mud.

It is green, green, green, and purple if the lupines are blooming, it is alive.

So happy to see the lupine out here today.

VANESSA: Yeah, it's beautiful.

All right, you want to do data?

KIM: Yep.

VANESSA: Sure.

NARRATOR: Now that native vegetation is taking root again in the Elwha River Valley, many are wondering if its native wildlife will be next.

Camera traps are the tool of choice for this investigation.

VANESSA: There's 904 photos.

KIM: 904, okay.

VANESSA: And battery is at 100%.

KIM: Great.

NARRATOR: The cameras have captured a variety of creatures in an area that 10 years ago was entirely underwater.

KIM: We're really looking at how all of those animals have moved back into the Elwha after dam removal and after these two reservoirs were dewatered.

NARRATOR: Recently, both herbivores and carnivores have been spotted here.

Their presence bodes well for the ecosystem and could serve to widen the reach of the nutrient express.

KIM: These animals can bring those carcasses away from the river, drop the carcasses on the ground, and thereby fertilize the surrounding trees.

So now everything in this system has access to these nutrient- rich little packets that come in the form of salmon and thereby impact the surrounding habitats.

NARRATOR: The Elwha River Valley is showing signs of renewal.

♪ It's become a beacon of hope for other river ecosystems and a rallying point for those fighting for similar results elsewhere.

KIM: The Elwha provides a great model for dam removals in the West.

PROTESTERS: Stop salmon extinction!

NARRATOR: Over 800 dams have come down in the decades since the Elwha was set free.

LEADER: When do we want action?

PROTESTERS: Now!

NARRATOR: In California and Oregon, dams along the Klamath River are expected to come down soon.

They'll eclipse the Elwha as the largest dam removals in history.

And there's a major new proposal gaining support across the political spectrum, the Columbia Basin Initiative, which aims to remove four big dams on the lower Snake River.

If approved, it would rewild thousands of miles of rivers across the Pacific Northwest.

PROTESTERS: Stop salmon extinction!

KIM: There are scientists all over watching us.

I think that the more dams that we can take down, especially antiquated dams, the better.

♪ KEITH: Regardless of what you feel about ecosystem restoration and removing the dams for the fish, just the lifespan of these concrete structures is coming to an end.

And then there's this sort of added bonus of like, hey, we can do a lot of positive things for the environment here and also make the financially sound choice.

NARRATOR: The arguments for dam removal are growing stronger, and for those who have fought for it the longest and the hardest, dam removal isn't just about reviving ecosystems and smart economics.

It's also about restoring a way of life.

VANESSA: Seeing this ecosystem come alive again is a beautiful thing.

And rewilding this territory from the removal of these dams is a step in the right direction for our people to heal.

Keep your eyes peeled.

NARRATOR: Every year, the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe organizes a summer camp with the educational group Nature Bridge.

ZOE: Found it.

VANESSA: Oh, Zoe found it.

SARA: Oh, nice.

Good job, Zoe.

VANESSA: Nice chay.

NARRATOR: Many of these kids are members of the tribe.

They're the first generation in over a century never to have seen the Elwha dammed.

♪ Over the course of this trip they'll spend time on the river and on all the new playgrounds that dam removal has created along the Elwha's path to the sea.

♪ PARKER: I'm just mesmerized because it's a really nice river.

JAMES: We're finding out what do salmon eat.

GIA: I wanna like swim in it.

BRADLEY: I feel like I'm at home.

NARRATOR: For their counselors, members and employees of the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe and other S'Klallam tribes nearby, it's essential to share these types of experiences with the next generation.

JONATHAN: To have both science and culture intertwine is important.

We are a salmon people, and so with the removal of these dams, we're gonna have a stronger connection to the natural world as our ancestors did.

ANGELINA: For me, I just feel like I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing and I'm honoring our people.

Cedar, that's holy.

It's gonna be hard to strip it.

What gives me the most hope is that I feel like I'm keeping our culture alive.

I get to bring back those teachings that had not been passed down for a long time.

♪ My dad always says, if I am able to inspire one kid, then I did my job right.

♪ NARRATOR: Thanks to the work of several generations, the future is looking bright for the Elwha River and the Elwha people.

♪ And today, the tribe and its scientists are building on their successes, inspiring others in the Pacific Northwest and around the world to follow their lead.

KIM: Working for the tribe on something that was so important for them has just been a huge honor to be able to document the change in that system.

♪ Just being able to stand on the dam and the awe that I feel now in seeing the transition from them being reservoirs to these muddy sediment- covered moonscapes to now these lush forests that I know are full of wildlife is pretty impressive.

♪ VANESSA: I love that my people were the ones who were able to win the first fight for dam removal, and I hope that there are many more that come because of this.

♪ KIM: The message of that place is hope, nature will recover itself if given the opportunity.

And to me, that's hopeful.

♪ ♪ ♪