I have worked here since 2011 telling stories of the Earth as preparation for a history of the Intermontane Grasslands of Central Cascadia and the rainswept coast that keeps them windy and dry. Now I am presenting this history, step by step, as I have learned it, often from the land itself. The history of this region includes the Canadian colonial space “The Okanagan Valley”, which lies over the land I live in above Canim Bay. The story stretches deep into the American West, into the US Civil War, the War of 1812, and the Louisiana Purchase, as well into the history of the Columbia District of the Hudson’s Bay Company. In all, the story spans the Chilcotin and Columbia volcanic plateaus and the basins that surround them. In this vast watershed lie homelands as old as 13,200 years (Sequim) and 16,200 years (Salmon River.) That’s how far we are walking together here, who are all the land speaking.
This is the other side of the wine and fruit industry of the Okanagan. This is the price.
Okanagan Okanogan 
I thought the dams were to control water levels in the american hydro dams do they not control the water level?
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The dams serve multiple purposes, including regulating flow south into the U.S. The ones on the Okanagan River also regulate water flow for the irrigation systems of the Canadian South Okanagan and to control flooding. The flooding in question is in an area of mostly abandoned hayfields, with a few small farms and a few houses. Not worth the loss of the salmon, in my opinion, neither spiritually, culturally nor economically.
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