Published on February 21, 2018
Midas Gold Idaho wants to keep the community informed about the work we are doing at the Stibnite Gold Project site. The Ask Midas blog series gives the experts in our company a chance to answer some of the community’s most frequently asked questions and help clear up any misconceptions around the project.
As we talk about the Stibnite Gold Project, we often talk about the future and what the site will look like once it has finally been restored. One of the things I am personally most excited about is our ability to bring salmon back home to their native spawning grounds. This week, I get to explain exactly how we will make it happen in our Ask Midas series.
HOW WILL MIDAS GOLD RECONNECT SALMON WITH THEIR NATIVE SPAWNING GROUNDS?
Critical chinook salmon migration routes were blocked in 1938 with the construction of the Yellow Pine Pit. Today, the East Fork of the South Fork of the Salmon River dumps into this abandoned mine pit and fish can’t swim past it. By redeveloping the Stibnite Gold Project site, we are going to reconnect fish to their native spawning grounds.
We want to reconnect fish as quickly as possible. In order to do this, during the early phases of construction, we are going to build a temporary 0.8-mile tunnel that bypasses the existing pit and has lighting to mimic night and day and a flow pattern that gives fish resting pools. This will allow fish to get back upstream before mining ever begins. Midas Gold will then re-mine the remainder of the ore out of the Yellow Pine pit and when we backfill it during year seven of operations, we will rebuild the natural channel of the East Fork of the South Fork of the Salmon River – permanently allowing fish to swim upstream to their native spawning grounds. This will open up at least 3.4 miles of fish habitat that is currently being blocked off by the existing pit, and there is the potential to revitalize much more. At Midas Gold, we are working on designs that could add up to 25 miles of new habitat for the fish.
If you have a question you would like us to answer, please email it to [email protected].
