[1] Important Fall Chinook Study In Limbo

An important study trying to determine the biological value of barging Snake River fall chinook will likely be derailed this year because too few fish were captured last year to provide broodstock for a new crop of study fish.

Officials of state and tribal fish agencies told members of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council last week that returning hatchery fish from Lyons Ferry Hatchery were culled at Lower Granite Dam for the study, but current sampling rates didn't allow technicians to capture enough broodstock to satisfy all their production needs. Those needs are prioritized through the U.S. v. Oregon process and included the provision to provide over 300,000 young fish for the transportation study. Unfortunately, fish needs for that study rated 12th on a list of 17 priorities, even though the study was rated a high priority in the current fish and wildlife program.

Corps of Engineers spokesman Witt Anderson told Council members the fish agencies' offer to provide 185,000 production hatchery fish for the study won't be worth the expense because these fish are much larger than the "surrogate" fish that researchers planned to use, which are raised to be smaller, closer to the size of wild fall chinook. These surrogates average only 74 to 77 cm. long, compared to the 69 cm. for wild fish and 96 cm. for well-fed hatchery fall chinook.

Anderson said the regular hatchery fish bear little resemblance to wild fish, and most migrate through the hydro system before wild or surrogate fish. In fact, most hatchery fish head downstream before the summer spill program in the lower Snake even begins.

But representatives of lower Columbia tribes said using eggs for producing regular fish had priority over the research. And they also complained that no long-term study design for that transportation research had yet been agreed upon by all parties.

After a plea by Washington Council member Larry Cassidy for the parties to "get it going," Columbia River inter-Tribal Fish Commission representative Bob Heinith said they have been trying to come to agreement over a study design for the past two years. "But we all want to be on the same page when we take off on this thing," said Heinith. "And we're not, and we have some significant issues, no facilities in place to embark on a full-scale surrogate program, the Nez Perce are concerned about marking fish--the smaller the fish you mark the more you're going to affect the SAR [smolt-to-adult return]."

But Anderson said the study, which began in 2005 to investigate SARS for transport versus inriver fish, has other elements as well. Post-release performance of the Snake/Clearwater surrogate fish and hatchery-reared fish will also be examined, along with scale analysis of returning adults to determine their life history. In the past few years, researchers have discovered that many fall chinook have a reservoir-type history and don't migrate much during the summer season when spill is in place.

Anderson also said the 2004 BiOp proposed the study's implementation once RSWs were in place at lower Snake dams, but the summer spill ordered by BiOp judge James Redden in 2005 and in place since then was not part of the original study plan. As for agreement over a long-term study design, he said the parties "aren't quite there." That may be a trifle optimistic, since it was reported that the Corps has already told other parties involved they will not support any plan that includes a comparison with a downriver stock.

For now, the Corps has asked for a mere 30,000 surrogate fish to investigate passage survival. "We think you need those surrogate fish to do a good analysis," Anderson said. "It's not worth the investment to just fund production fish this year."

Anderson said the Corps is continuing to discuss wild-fish capture issues with the Nez Perce Tribe, hoping that the study will be part of the next BiOp's proposed action scheduled to be completed at the end of July. His agency supports a review of the final study design by the Council's independent science board.

The Corps is implementing improvements at the adult fish trap at the dam, to improve broodstock collection, which is complicated by the large numbers of steelhead which are migrating upriver at the same time. Those improvements are expected to be completed by March, but whether the parties agree on a study design remains to be seen. They've been wrangling over these questions for months already in the BiOp remand process.

CRITFC staffer Stuart Ellis, explained the tribes' concern to Council members. "The tribes, and, I think, some of the other U.S. v Oregon parties," Ellis said, "were reluctant to go through the kind of agony of modifying things once again to make do to get another year of studies started without everybody having a full understanding of how these data are going to be analyzed."

He said the tribes are anxious to get agreement on a long-term study design, and said it would be "fantastic" from a tribal perspective if it were achieved before the BiOp is completed. But he said the tribes still have issues with the study over fish numbers, how well surrogates match wild fish, and questions about some data that shows surrogate migration similar to the timing of wild stocks. He also made mention of a downstream comparison, but didn't say whether it would be a deal-breaker.

WDFW staffer Guy Norman explained the logistics of fish sampling efforts at the dam that led to the shortfall, even though he said more fish were trapped and hauled back to the hatchery from the dam than the year before. Unfortunately, nearly half of the trapped fish turned out to be jacks (precious males that return a year early). Norman said consensus could not be reached by U.S. v. Oregon parties to amend the priority list "to entertain at least some level of the transportation program."

By session's end, some Council members still weren't satisfied why the study had stalled. "Frankly, I haven't heard a compelling explanation yet," said Council chair Tom Karier.

However, during the session, no one mentioned the fact that last summer, when the problem was first recognized, staffers from the NOAA Fisheries Science Center in Seattle had made suggestions to the agencies involved on how to boost sampling rates and trap more chinook without affecting run reconstruction formulas used by the U.S. v. Oregon participants. -Bill Rudolph

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NW Fishletter 224, December 20, 2006

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