Welcome to The Great Wild Salmon Run

They just want to come home . . .

For millions of years, that’s what they’ve done ~ come home. This handsome, mysterious fish is born in cool, fresh water hundreds of miles from the sea in small tributaries. They would come home to the exact spot of their birth after spending much of their life at sea if that exact spot were still there. Unfortunately, the combination of physical barriers, poor water quality, industrial pollution, agricultural run-off and destruction of wild salmon habitat has combined to keep the Great Wild Salmon from getting home.

The Great Wild Salmon have run the streams of the Pacific Northwest for millions of years. Their cycle of birth and death has tied us to the sea. Their remarkable journey has nourished the forest, fed its wild life and for the last 12,000 years defined the cultural heritage of our region. The Great Wild Salmon have graphically shown us the fragility of our planet and given voice to the old saying, “we all live downstream” as everything finds its way to the ocean.

In the past, the Great Wild Salmon runs were so great and the fish so prolific, we thought the abundance of this great fish would last forever. Sadly, that is not the case. “For the five species of Pacific salmon (chinook, chum, coho, pink, and sockeye), it is a long, strenuous, desperate race against time, with every obstacle taking its toll.” The last fifty years of poor environmental stewardship and appalling habitat destruction has brought several Great Wild Salmon species to the brink of extinction.

Our spokesfish ~ Dr. Salmagundi

Is there any good news in all of this? Yes. The good news is that many, many people and dozens of groups are actively working to protect the Great Wild Salmon. It’s a complicated task. And, in these difficult economic times, it’s a costly one.

The Great Wild Salmon Run is a nonprofit formed to raise money for groups working to save the Great Wild Salmon. The Great Wild Salmon Run is a perfect combination of original public art and private auction with proceeds going to benefit nonprofit groups working on issues related to the Great Wild Salmon ~ protect, restore, educate, support.

                          You can help. Join us.
                 www.greatwildsalmonrun.org