More rain and the improved snowpack around Dworshak Reservoir and the Lower Snake River dams could give salmon managers more flexibility this year.

Last month, salmon managers expected to trap most of the salmon and steelhead at Lower Granite, Little Goose, Lower Monumental and Ice Harbor Dams and barge them to the Columbia River estuary.

But the increased precipitation may allow managers and the Army Corps of Engineers to spill water at the dams to flush some of the fish to sea.

A federal salmon recovery plan approved three years ago requires that some juvenile salmon be barged and others left to migrate on their own. But the strategy applies only when river-flow forecasts predict sufficient flows for the fish.

"The month of March has been very, very good to us as far as recovery of the snowpack from what looked like disastrous conditions," said Steve Pettit, a fisheries biologist for the Idaho Department of Fish and Game.

Even with the increased snowpack, predictions for spring runoff levels are still bordering the threshold that allows dam operators to spill water for the fish.

Salmon managers and dam operators will meet Wednesday to try to decide how much water will be spilled. The salmon managers also will be asking the corps to manage Dworshak Reservoir conservatively, leaving some water available to help push juvenile fish downriver in late spring.

"It's the kind of year we think would be appropriate to try to keep a little more water in the reservoir," said David Wills, a fisheries biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service at Vancouver, Wash.

The corps is spilling about 8,000 cubic feet of water per second from the reservoir and may increase flows soon to guard against flooding later this spring, according to Cindy Henriksen at the corps' reservoir control center at Portland, Ore.

Henriksen said there is nearly a 100 percent chance Dworshak Reservoir will completely refill by the end of June.