The Sooes River, also known as the Tsoo-Yess River, rises in the northwest foothills of the Olympic Mountains and flows 16 miles (26 km) through private timberland and the Makah Reservation before reaching Makah Bay, roughly 120 miles (193 km) northwest of Seattle and about 4 miles (6 km) southwest of Neah Bay, Washington. The river drains an area of roughly 14,524 acres (5,878 ha) of densely forested watershed that has long been managed intensively for timber production, with the heaviest logging occurring in the 1970s.

The Makah Reservation occupies Cape Flattery, bounded on the north by the Strait of Juan de Fuca and on the west by the Pacific Ocean. It covers about 30,080 acres (12,150 ha) and is home to roughly 1,500 residents, the largest community being Neah Bay. The Makah are the southernmost people of the Wakashan language family and the only member of that family living within the United States; its other branches are First Nations peoples on the west coast of Vancouver Island, British Columbia. The tribe’s main sources of income are forestry, fishing, and tourism.

The Makah National Fish Hatchery sits on the Sooes River, about three miles (5 km) upstream from the river mouth. It belongs to the National Fish Hatchery System, a network of 71 federal hatcheries dedicated to fish restoration and recovery. The Makah hatchery works to conserve native stocks of fall Chinook and coho salmon and winter steelhead, while producing enough smolts to support area tribal, commercial, and sport fisheries. Returning adults are sorted and either spawned or passed upstream, depending on stock needs and program goals. Read more here and here. Explore more of Sooes River and Makah Bay here: