Description:The Columbia Rivers is the largest river in the Pacific Northwest and, with a length of 1214 mi (1953 km), the 15th longest in North America. From its source in Columbia Lake at an elevation of 26500 ft (809 m) in Canada's Selkirk Mountains it first flows northwestward through central British Columbia, then turns southward across central Washington where it is joined by the Snake River. The Columbia then turns westward to form the border between Washington and Oregon until it enters the Pacific Ocean near Astoria, Oregon.
The Columbia ranks sixth in North America in terms of runoff after the Mississippi, MacKenzie, St. Lawrence, Nelson, and Yukon. Its drainage covers 259,000 sq mi (671,000 sq km) making in 32nd among rivers of the world in area drained. The major tributaries to the Columbia are the Kootenai and Flathead/Pend Oreille rivers draining southeastern British Columbia, western Montana, and northern Idaho, the Snake River draing western Wyoming, most of Idaho and eastern Oregon, and the Willamette River of western Oregon.
Comments: American shad were introduced to the Pacific Coast by Seth Green in 1871. Green released 10,000 shad fry directly into the Sacramento River near Tehama, CA. By 1876, shad were captured near the Columbia River and off of Vancouver Island. In 1880, icthyologist David Starr Jordan, confirmed the shad's invasion of the Columbia and sent a mature specimen to Spencer Baird of the Smithsonian Institution, where it is preserved to this day(Specimen Number USNM 27322). By 1885, August C. Kinney, M.D., a tuberculosis researcher in Astoria, Oregon informed Baird that "[shad] are becoming more plentiful year by year. I do not think it necessary to stock this river with shad." Today, with a population of about 5 million, the Columbia River has largest American shad population worldwide.
Columbia River Management Group. 1996. Columbia River Water Management Report: Water Year 1995. U.S. Army Corp of Engineers. Portland, OR.
Green, S. 1874. Fish culture. In Report of the [New York] Commissioner of Agriculture for the Year 1872. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., pp. 248-274.
Welander, A.D. 1940. Notes on the dissemination of shad, Alosa sapidissima (Wilson), along the Pacific coast of North America. Copeia 4: 221-223.