Schwatka Lake

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Schwatka Lake is a reservoir created by the damming of the Yukon River in Whitehorse, Yukon, completed in 1958. The dam provides electrical power generation and is operated by the Yukon Energy Corporation. The White Horse rapids, which gave the city its name, are now under the lake. The lake was named after Frederick Schwatka, a US Army Lieutenant who was first to explore the total length of the Yukon River.

A fish ladder has been constructed around the dam to allow the passage of Chinook salmon to their spawning grounds upstream of Whitehorse. The Chinook salmon that pass the dam have the longest freshwater migration route of any salmon, over 3,000 kilometres to the mouth of the Yukon River in the Bering Sea.

There is a float plane base on the lake.

External link

[Exploring the Whitehorse Fishway] (PDF)

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