[1] Idaho Wants Niners To Re-Hear BiOp Case
The state of Idaho has petitioned the Ninth Circuit Court to take another look at its April ruling that upheld the decision in Oregon District Court that threw out the 2004 BiOp, preferably by the full court.
It cited a June ruling by the US Supreme Court that overturned a 2006 Niners' panel ruling (NAHB v. Defenders of Wildlife) that said the ESA effectively trumps other federal statutes. Now, Idaho says the panel opinion conflicts with the Supreme Court's decision that says agencies can only apply the ESA to their discretionary actions.
The state was a defendant-intervenor in the litigation that led to Judge James Redden tossing the controversial hydro BiOp nearly two years ago.
Federal attorneys haven't decided yet whether to pursue an appeal. A spokesman from the US Solicitor General's Office told NW Fishletter last week that the Niners had given the government until July 30 to decide whether to petition for a rehearing itself.
The July 18 petition from Idaho says the 2004 BiOp reconciled obligations of the Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation over operation of the federal dam system in the Columbia and Snake basins--and went even further when it compared fish survival from proposed dam operations to a "reference" operation that included "non-discretionary" obligations to operate the dams for other purposes as well. The comparison was developed to determine if the proposed operations would appreciably reduce the likelihood of survival and recovery of the ESA-listed salmon and steelhead stocks.
But by adding these obligations to the reference operation, Idaho said the analysis overestimated the beneficial effects that could actually be achieved for fish, and hence, overestimated the gaps between current fish survivals and those that could be theoretically achieved.
In its ruling on the 2004 BiOp, the Niners' panel said the NMFS analysis was inconsistent with the Ninth Circuit's 2005 opinion in Defenders of Wildlife v. EPA, which expanded the concept of agency actions that are "discretionary" as "any action actually taken by an agency."
But Idaho said that idea has been "rejected squarely" by the Supreme Court in the Homebuilders case, which dictates that the Niners reconsider its opinion on the 2004 hydro BiOp.
Idaho argued that the Supreme Court's ruling is not limited to the Clean Water Act, the federal statute involved in the case, but also "many additional otherwise categorical statutory commands."
And that is why the state says that NMFS properly included the impacts from non-discretionary actions regarding dam operations in the environmental baseline of their analysis, rather than as effects of the action.
Idaho's petition went so far as to say that the Corps and Bureau have a mandatory duty to operate the dams for various purposes and cannot be prevented from that by any ESA requirements because operating the hydro system "is itself non-discretionary." The state argued that "it is hardly clear" that ESA consultation was even necessary under Homebuilders' analysis. In any case, says the state, the NMFS reference operation and gap analysis falls well within the Supreme Court's interpretation of Section 7(a)(2) of the ESA.
In the 2004 BiOp, the NMFS analysis found that the proposed dam operations did not jeopardize any listed ESU when compared to the reference operation, which both the Ninth Circuit and the District Court said did not satisfy ESA jeopardy requirements.
Idaho says the Ninth Circuit's panel opinion must be vacated and the NMFS analysis reconsidered in light of the Supreme Court's opinion and another case as well, the Ninth's precedent-setting 2004 decision in Ground Zero Center v. the US Navy, which ruled on the siting of nuclear missiles in Hood Canal. It said the Navy did not violate the ESA's Section 7(a)(2) by failing to consult over the potential impact on listed salmon from an accidental missile explosion because it would be "an exercise in futility" since any risk of explosion derived "solely from the President's siting decision."
Idaho said it would be equally futile to conduct an ESA consultation over impacts from the existence and operation of the federal dams for non-discretionary purposes. -Bill Rudolph
[2] Oregon Judge Says NMFS Dissed 'Best Available Science' In Coho Decision
A federal judge in Oregon has recommended that NMFS must take another look at its decision not to list Oregon coastal coho for ESA protection.
Judge Janice Stewart, a federal magistrate, said the agency didn't give enough credit to its own scientists, who found enough uncertainties in an assessment by Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife biologists to question its conclusion that the fish population is fairly healthy.
In a July 13 ruling, Stewart said NMFS must issue a new final listing by July 30, and if any objections are filed by that date, her findings and recommendations will be referred to a district judge and go under advisement.
She had ruled in 1998 that the original state plan for protecting and restoring Oregon coho was illegal, and that the plan, approved by NMFS, relied too much on voluntary and speculative actions.
The latest action was originally filed by Trout Unlimited, and seven other fish conservation groups who lined up against the feds, and defendant-intervenors Alsea Valley Alliance and the state of Oregon.
At the center of the ruling was an analysis of the coastal coho populations by Oregon state fish biologists. Their analysis concluded that, even though fish numbers had decreased, the populations were still "viable" at the lower abundance levels because fewer juveniles in streams where they spent a year rearing meant less competition for food in the remaining habitat.
NMFS's own Science Center in Seattle found the Oregon analysis full of uncertainties, but federal policymakers said it was only one part of the big picture they examined before making a decision.
The state's "viability" analysis was cited by the federal agency to support the sizable minority of NOAA Fisheries' own scientists who thought the coho did not need ESA protection.
Fifty-six percent of votes by the NMFS biological review team in 2003 supported the view that the coho were likely to become endangered, principally because of the loss of freshwater habitat. But 44 percent supported the position that increasing spawner numbers since the turn of the century was enough evidence to show the runs were resilient enough "to bounce back from years of depressed runs."
By 2000, Oregon wild coastal coho spawners had climbed to more than 230,000, from only 30,000 in 1997, after the runs had been hammered by a combination of over-harvesting and poor ocean conditions. For the past six years, spawning numbers have been more than 100,000, higher than any year since 1971.
However, some scientists are still concerned about productivity of the stock. Back in 1971, the 50,000 coho that spawned represented only about 20 percent of the run--about 80 percent were caught. But harvest rates have remained low since runs plummeted after the devastating 1993 and 1997 El Niños, and the run numbers have improved by two or three times as ocean conditions improved.
"This is a victory for good science and Oregon's future," said Earthjustice attorney Patti Goldman. "Restoring protections for these salmon today means a greener and economically vibrant Oregon tomorrow."
But Sonya Jones, representing intervenor Pacific Legal Foundation, said Stewart's interpretation of the science is wrong, and objections will surely be filed. She said the attorneys involved have not yet decided whether to consolidate their objections or file separately.
The coastal coho stock has been in court for years as the focus of a lawsuit that forced NMFS to change its ESA hatchery policy. But the Hogan decision from the U.S. District Court ruled that the feds were breaking the law when they only listed the wild component of the coastal coho for protection under the ESA.
NMFS did not dispute the ruling and spent several years developing a new policy, which has been challenged in court by both fish conservation groups and the Pacific Legal Foundation.
A recent ruling by a federal judge in Seattle has contradicted the Hogan decision (see NW Fishletter 232), and the case is headed for the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
PLF attorney Jones said the latest case over coastal coho was originally filed in federal court in Seattle "to keep it away from Judge Hogan," but the feds got a change of venue that put it back in front of Oregon judges.
The coastal coho have been a political hot potato for years, and environmentalists had accused the state of Oregon of making a secret deal with the Bush administration to de-list them in exchange for lifting land-use restrictions affecting the state's timber industry.
Sources said at the time that the Oregon timber industry, heavy contributors to the Republican Party, had gained presidential advisor Karl Rove's ear over the coho issue, and the ensuing fracas nearly cost NOAA Fisheries regional administrator Bob Lohn his job (See NW Fishletter 209).
Only after other Northwest Republicans like Slade Gorton and Bill Ruckelshaus weighed in at the White House in their support of Lohn did he survive the near coup. -B. R.
[3] Montana Takes Proposal On Reservoir Ops To The Mat
The state of Montana called for a meeting of federal agency executives (see story 4) after lower-level policymakers couldn't reach agreement on the timing and size of water releases from Hungry Horse and Libby reservoirs.
It was the first time in years that executives had been called to settle a policy question on hydro operations. The group had been idle for so long that it had disappeared from federal Web sites.
The issue has been vetted twice since June 12, when Montana made an official request to slow outflows from its largest reservoirs to benefit resident fish populations below the two projects. The water is released every year to help ESA-listed juvenile fall chinook migrating far downstream in the Columbia River.
But the state says a gradual rampdown, similar to last summer's operation, would provide better conditions for its resident trout, including ESA-listed bull trout, than the flow regime called for in traditional BiOp operations. The biological opinions have called for the reservoirs to be drafted 20 feet by the end of August.
Montana said a slower water release through September would boost the summertime aquatic productivity of the state's short growing season.
But some Columbia Basin salmon managers are still wary of the potential tradeoffs involving fall chinook, which led to another policy impasse and the state's appeal to the top level of the regional forum.
That top level is the federal executive committee--a remnant structure of the 1995 hydro BiOp, which called for a management structure that started at the Technical Management Team-level, where operational requests were first vetted.
If the TMT couldn't resolve an issue, it was bumped up to mid-level policymakers at the Implementation Team.
If no consensus was reached by IT members, then issues were sent to the executive committee, which included action agency heads and the regional NOAA Fisheries administrator.
The issue became even more complicated when regional salmon managers made their own system operational request [SOR] June 26 that called for drafting the Montana reservoirs 20 feet below full pool by Aug. 31, and then gradually ramping down flows through the first week of September.
The difference between the two SORs wouldn't mean much in Libby outflows in August--only 2 kcfs or so--but it would keep enough water in the reservoirs to allow flat flows of about 12 kcfs through September. The state also called for flat flows of 4 kcfs from Hungry Horse for the rest of the summer.
Jim Litchfield, Montana's representative at the IT's special meeting June 29, said it was an "issue of critical importance" to the state and that was why he requested the policy question be bumped upstairs to federal executives.
He said the request represented a compromise with operations called for in the Power Council's latest amendments to the fish and wildlife program, and is also supported by language in the 2004 hydro BiOp.
Furthermore, Montana didn't believe the flows requested by the salmon managers would have a measurable impact on the survival of Snake River fall chinook.
However, with little chance of any makeup water from Canada this year, and a lack of consensus for Montana's proposal, NOAA Fisheries' IT representative Ritchie Graves said his agency supported a 17.3-kcfs operation through the end of August that would get Libby to 20 feet below full.
Corps spokesman Eric Braun said his agency supported the Montana proposal in the council's mainstem amendments because the biology supported it. The flat flow regime is also included in the draft proposed action now being completed by action agencies after the last BiOp was thrown out by federal judge James Redden.
As for helping Snake fall chinook, Braun said the Corps' analysis showed that they were not likely to benefit "a whole lot" from the Montana water in August.
On the other hand, he said, his agency had to fall back on what the current BiOp says, and that the default operation calls for Libby to be drawn down 20 feet by Aug. 31.
Without consensus on the biology, the Corps was not prepared to implement the request at this time, he added, although it would be willing to consider new information by the end of July if it showed that the fall run was "basically over," or if water conditions or forecasts changed.
Montana representative Litchfield pointed out that there has been little biological debate over the issue and that no one has refuted the fact that the ISAB [Independent Scientific Advisory Board] has judged that any water from the Montana proposal would have no measurable impact on fall chinook.
"This doesn't seem to be a discussion about the biology," Litchfield said, "It does just seem to be about a reservoir elevation at a point in time, or flow. It doesn't really ever get tied back to, 'what about the fish . . . what are we doing to the fish?'"
He dared other participants to come forth with information showing the need for the reservoirs in Montana to be 20 feet lower by the end of August in all water years to support Snake River fall chinook.
CRITFC representative Bob Heinith left the chinook question alone, but said a 17-kcfs flow below Libby would create more "wetted perimeter" in the Kootenai River than the flows recommended by Montana.
Litchfield said that Montana's lead biologist on the issue has judged that 17 kcfs is too high, but 15 kcfs is optimal for the channel morphology in that area.
Montana had not asked for such a meeting since August 2003, when the state requested the evaluation of a proposal that called for summer spill and flow reductions.
That year, the executives--including BPA's Steve Wright and NOAA Fisheries' regional head Bob Lohn--were reluctant to support the Montana proposal, citing the opinion of Justice Department attorneys, who cautioned against changing BiOp operations while the document was being revised on a federal judge's order. Lohn said changing operations was "the judge's decision to make."
BPA's Wright also found himself agreeing with Lohn, pointing out that the power agency's attorneys had advised "exercising caution" when adjusting BiOp measures during the federal court remand. "We don't want to lose control of hydro operations," Wright said at the time. -B. R.
[4] Feds Say 'No' To Montana Plan For Late-Summer Reservoir Releases
Federal executives from action agencies--BPA, the Bureau of Reclamation, Corps of Engineers and NOAA Fisheries--have decided not to implement Montana's proposal for slowing flows out of Libby Reservoir aimed at improving conditions for resident fish.
The federal execs, who met in Portland July 17, said a court order would be required to change operations this year, and without a larger consensus among parties for the change, they thought it was not worth the effort. They expect a beefed-up plan to be in place by next year as part of the new BiOp, scheduled to be finished by Jan. 31.
Montana had called for last week's meeting after its proposal was turned down twice in meetings with state, federal and tribal fish agencies.
The state of Oregon, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and lower Columbia tribes didn't budge from earlier positions opposing the change because it would slightly reduce the amount of water added to summer flows for aiding juvenile fall chinook.
The tribes had put together a counterproposal calling for 20-foot drawdowns of Montana's largest two reservoirs by the end of August, unless water could be obtained from Canada.
Montana's plan called for extending water releases through September to benefit resident fish in the Kootenai River, which means flows out of Libby would have been in the 15-kcfs range and its reservoir would have been drafted by more than 20 feet by the end of September.
But the Corps of Engineers has been releasing about 17 kcfs to get the reservoir down to the BiOp-mandated 20 feet by the end of August in a flow pattern close to the tribe's proposal.
With the 2004 BiOp still guiding hydro operations, despite the fact it has been ruled illegal, its specific language allowed a change from the default operation of the 20-foot drafts, but the federal execs were not prepared to go there, despite a passionate plea from Bruce Measure, a Montana member of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
"Regardless of what the flow scenarios that are defined are, what we're really talking about is the federal resistance to pushing the envelope and risking litigation," Measure said.
He said the 20-foot draft limit was "purely an arbitrary spot" because there was no science from the mid-1990s--when it was chosen--that could really show whether it was good for either Montana's fish or downriver fish.
But since then, the Montana flow proposal has been supported by the Independent Scientific Advisory Group (ISAB), and was included as an amendment to the region's fish and wildlife plan that all four Northwest states supported.
"What you're arguing about," Measure told the feds, "these arbitrary positions that you put first in the 2000 Biological Opinion, and again in the 2004 Biological Opinion, and continue to put in now really don't have any basis in fact. The only good science dictates you go the other direction, and operate to the Montana operation."
With the Kootenai Tribe and the state of Idaho on his side (Washington was not represented at the meeting), Measure said some of the federal executives had an obligation to protect those impacted resident fish, the ESA-listed white sturgeon. He also noted the Snake River fall chinook, supposed beneficiaries of the extra Montana water, are already doing better than any other listed evolutionary significant unit (ESU) in the basin.
"What are you gonna do?" he asked the executives. "Are you just going to throw money at this issue every time somebody says, 'Boo'? Because that's what you've been doing so far. And I don't think it's going to get any better."
Measure said this year's proposal from Montana is actually a compromise from its position in the Council's mainstem amendments, which call for drafting Libby only 10 feet in most years, with a 20-foot draft only in the worst 20 percent of water years.
At one point, Measure challenged the right of Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission biologist Bob Heinith to speak for separate lower river tribes. He said that each spokesperson needed authority from a tribal resolution before he could represent a sovereign entity before the regional forum. Heinith remained silent, even after Nez Perce tribal attorney David Cummings supported him. "This is perhaps the silliest discussion I have encountered in a long time," said Cummings. "It certainly isn't helpful to the relationship between the tribes and the state of Montana."
Montana picked up some moral support from Corps spokesman Witt Anderson, who said his agency backed the Montana proposal in the upcoming BiOp because it provided the best balance between upstream and downstream fish needs. He said few Snake fall chinook are still migrating in August, anyway.
But before the next BiOp comes out, Anderson said, interim operations are still under the 2004 BiOp, which calls for a default operation at Libby of a 20-foot draft by the end of August--with the possibility of modifying it.
He said that since the 2007 hydro operations have been issued as a court order, the Corps would need a majority to support any deviation from that default operation.
"Clearly, there's lack of that broad support up to this point in time," Anderson said.
After some discussion over effects on listed sturgeon from flows dropping too fast in September (because it de-waters the banks of the Kootenai River, where food fish for the sturgeon live), Montana state biologist Brian Marotz said by releasing more water now, there will be less water later. "That's the simple fact."
And with a harder draft of the reservoir, and a short growing season from July through September, Marotz said, "We're going to lose a substantial portion of our growing season." He said an increased reservoir draft also had adverse impacts to shoreline food webs in the reservoirs.
NOAA Fisheries regional administrator Bob Lohn was sympathetic, and said he was persuaded by the ISAB report, which said the benefits to downriver salmon from the standard Montana operation were "immeasurable," and therefore insignificant.
Lohn said that it if was only a biological call, he could not make a case for benefits to the listed fall chinook, but the legal situation--with the 2004 opinion alone guiding operations--would allow for the Montana proposal to take place, since the ISAB report hadn't yet been completed until after the 2004 BiOp was in place. He said the new opinion would be more amenable to the state's concerns.
However, the new opinion hasn't yet been written, and Lohn said his attorneys have advised him that any change to operations that is "seen by others as significant" would likely require court review.
BPA administrator Steve Wright said he was more interested in creating a long-term solution, rather than spending a lot of time in court trying to create this one-year fix.
Wright had received a letter last week from Montana Sens. Jon Tester and Max Baucus saying their state's request "appears to be caught up in a federal legal strategy that puts lower river interests above those of the upper basin. Current operation of these dams sacrifices Montana's ESA-protected fish while producing questionable downstream benefits."
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service regional director Ren Lohoefener said he had no problems with either flow regime in the competing requests, which put him at odds with his own mid-level staffers who had supported the CRITFC proposal at the IT level.
By meeting's end, Measure said he was encouraged by the commitment of the federal agencies to the "long view," and hoped they would make sure the Montana plan would be part of the next BiOp. He also said he planned to meet with his state's biologists, the sturgeon recovery team and USFWS to discuss implications of the 2007 operations. -B.R.
[5] BPA Customer Groups Sound Off On Salmon Program
Representatives of several utility groups have told the Northwest Power and Conservation Council that they should wait until the next hydro BiOp comes out before they get serious about amending the region's fish and wildlife program.
The Council is poised to embark upon the amendment process next fall, and plans to have the new plan in place a year from then. The habitat-heavy program, paid for by the Bonneville Power Administration, is expected to be the future home for many of the habitat improvements expected in the next BiOp.
At the current pace of the remand, a draft BiOp is expected by Oct. 31 and a final version is scheduled to be in place by the end of January 2008.
At the July 11 meeting, John Saven, CEO of Northwest Requirements Utilities and chair of Northwest RiverPartners, said he wasn't arguing for any particular financial outcome.
"However, given the vast sums of money that are involved here, we are obligated to urge the Council and other decision makers to carefully plan the process for allocating resources," he said.
Saven said about 12 percent of the power rate is going to pay for direct fish and wildlife costs, with another $360 million a year in forgone revenues from fish passage strategies.
He recommended that additional time for collaboration over the next fish and wildlife plan be developed after the draft BiOp comes out.
Scott Corwin, new director of the Public Power Council, also called for starting the Council's amendment process a little later than scheduled, to build on the next BiOp. He said it was "critical" for developing confidence in the Council's program.
"And that's not just on our part, the customers," Corwin said. "That's a confidence and a defense against critiques from outside the region as well, that come against any massive effort like we have going on in the Northwest, on the fish and wildlife side."
Corwin said later he was referring to groups like the Washington, D.C.-based Taxpayers for Common Sense, which has waged a long battle against BPA. The group has supported dam breaching in a misleading campaign to save taxpayers' money.
He said postponing the amendment process could actually save time in the long run, if parties go into it with a partial settlement already in mind.
Dan James, PNGC vice president, told the Council that that the utilities were "really thrilled" about getting into the process from the start and finding areas where consensus with other parties could be established as the amendments are produced.
"While we don't know where the process will lead, we do see this as an opportunity to perhaps find some consensus or establish some areas of common ground," James said.
He said the Council's amendment process "could be the glue that holds the various fish and wildlife pieces in the region together, including non-listed species." '[It] could be the glue that holds the various fish and wildlife pieces in the region together.'
James said utilities want to be sure that the investments made will promote an efficient, cost-effective program with measurable improvements.
Larry La Bolle, from Avista and Northwest RiverPartners, said some utility folks were meeting on an ad hoc basis with members of the Columbia Basin Fish and Wildlife Authority to discuss biological objectives. CBFWA is the umbrella group representing many of the region's tribes, and both federal and state fish and wildlife agencies.
La Bolle said development of the biological objectives could be five years in the making.
"I know that sounds disheartening but the work on the front is important to get established," he said. "I think we can inform a sea change in the region, if you will, as we think in the future about the Council's fish and wildlife program role, as some day, as it should some day, be making subordinate the court's role in running the river system."
In the shorter term, La Bolle said, if they could go into the PFR [Power Function Review] process with much more agreement with CBFWA and others, "I think we land with much more unanimity on funding levels and a range of program reviews that make more sense and cause a lot less consternation in the region."
But the optimistic view may get bogged down in the most basic dispute of all among parties--just how many salmon should the fish and wildlife program aim to create?
The last iteration of the program called for restoration efforts in the Columbia Basin to produce 5 million salmon by 2025.
A recent report by consultants BioAnalysts Inc., produced for the Pacific Northwest Utilities Conference Committee, says that the goal is unreasonable for a variety of reasons. The April report says that number of fish hasn't been observed since fish counts began in 1938 at Bonneville Dam.
Instead, counts between the years 1938 and 2006 have averaged about 690,000 fish, ranging from a low of 211,000, on up to 1.99 million.
"Furthermore," the report notes, "if this historical variability in run size holds in the future, to achieve an average of 5.0 million fish we would need to observe run sizes ranging from 1.52 million to 14.4 million adults passing Bonneville Dam."
The report pointed out that the 14.4-million fish figure is only slightly less than the Council's own estimate for the basin's historical run size. "Given the loss in both the quantity and quality of habitat, and increased harvest that has occurred throughout the Columbia River Basin since the 1800's, observing run sizes of this magnitude appears highly unlikely."
The report also mentioned that the current fish and wildlife program never specified the proportion of different salmon species to aim for, nor how much hatchery fish should contribute to the goal.
But that's only one issue raised by the report, which included more than a dozen serious questions, and noted that abundance objectives developed by other agencies like the NMFS technical recovery team are substantially less than the Council's 5-million fish and CRITFC's [Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission] 4-million fish goals.
These goals include hatchery fish, which means a huge increase in artificial production--from the current 130-million-fish releases, to around 700 million--a strategy unlikely to pass muster with agencies administering ESA medicine like NMFS, and an interagency group that is developing a hatchery-reform effort.
The report also noted another basic inconsistency that should be addressed in the Council's future program. When the consultants added up expected benefits from the subbasin planning effort overseen by the Council after the 2000 program was finalized, they found an expected gain of only 600,000 fish--principally natural-origin fish.
The report said federal estimates of a 20-year time frame to determine whether fish objectives have been met, may be too optimistic. In fact, they say, given Bonneville Dam fish counts since 1938, it's hard to tell whether fish production has increased or decreased since then, "let alone determine its cause. In fact, if the last 5 years of data were not considered, Bonneville Dam counts in 1938 and 2000 are nearly identical."
The big difference since the late 1930s, says the report, is the dramatic shift in proportions of hatchery and wild fish.
Maybe returning fish numbers at Bonneville Dam is not such a realistic goal after all, said the report, if the region cannot easily determine how many of them get back to each one of the basin's ecological provinces, where specific Council efforts are focused.
Further confusion develops because federal efforts to improve ESA stocks don't use the provincial boundaries in their analyses, but rely on the distribution of "evolutionarily significant units" for analyzing fish productivity and abundance.
Even the independent panel of scientists who reviewed the F&W program in 2001 was confused about it. It noted that the program "laid out" a vision and scientific principles and biological objectives at the basin level, but that most implementation would occur at the subbasin level, with projects picked for funding prioritized through a planning process.
But the panel said the mechanism was "unclear" for just how those priorities determined by the planning process resulted in actions on the ground. -B. R.
[6] Scientists Say Ocean Is Full Of Fish
Federal scientists who have been monitoring ocean conditions off the West Coast are cautiously optimistic that this year's crop of juvenile salmon may return to the Columbia River in much higher numbers than their recent predecessors. After the blockbuster returns in the early part of the decade, ocean conditions took a turn for the worse in 2004 and didn't start to bounce back until last year. But thanks to cooler waters, more plankton and no large schools of hake to pick them off on their way to the Gulf of Alaska, the spring run could easily double or triple this year's return.
Ed Casillas, a NOAA Fisheries researcher based in Seattle, told NW Fishletter last week that the annual June trawl survey off the mouth of the Columbia River showed plenty of small chinook with plenty for them to eat. "Numbers were high, but not the highest we've seen," said Casillas, who put this spring's data in the upper third of the information collected over the past 10 years.
He wasn't prepared to get too quantitative, since the numbers are only preliminary and won't be officially reported until September. But it means scientists expect a pretty sizable jack count for chinooks at Bonneville Dam next year--which could signal another blockbuster year that compares with the 2003 adult spring chinook run of 230,000 fish.
But their trawl surveys last year would have ballparked this year's Bonneville Dam jack count at around 14,000, while it actually came in over 20,000--more than a 40-percent difference and a world away from the 3,800 jacks counted last year.
The scientists are careful to stay out of the numbers game, and rely on a green-yellow-red system for estimating biological and physical parameters, with green meaning conditions are good, yellow for caution and red for poor.
Their latest findings say sea surface temperatures are cool enough to go into the green, along with coastal upwelling, spring transition date (when upwelling begins), and deep water temperature and salinity.
Another good sign is the appearance of large amounts of copepods, food for young salmon, and the special kind that show when upwelling conditions have brought nutrients from the deep ocean to feed the plankton blooms upon which many species of fish and birds ultimately depend.
And large schools of hake (whiting), which are normally associated with warmer currents, are gone. In fact, they weren't around much in 2005 and 2006 either, when the scientists expected to see them. They have speculated that the predators moved north early in the season to Canada, with impacts limited to Columbia River juvenile salmon migrating in May.
But the unseasonably wet and cool weather that much of the Northwest experienced over the past week or so put a temporary halt to the upwelling conditions--which are triggered by northerly winds. Now that the southerly storms have dissipated and the high pressure is once again building with the breezes from the north blowing along with coast, upwelling is expected to begin again soon.
Last spring, the coast experienced a hiccup in good conditions as well, when upwelling didn't really begin until late May and remained weak until late June, but picked up once more and continued strong through September. This year, the blip came a month later.
The scientists said biological conditions in 2006 also showed mixed signals with copepod biodiversity high all summer (a bad sign), but northern (cold water) copepods were abundant later in the summer (good sign) and a biological transition to a more productive regime that did not occur until May 30, after juvenile salmon had entered the sea.
They said 2006 catches of juvenile coho in September and spring chinook in June were "just below average, ranking 6th out of 9 years. Taken together, our indicators suggests that adult returns of coho in 2007 and spring Chinook in 2008 will likely be near to, but slightly below, returns averaged over the past decade."
They are not sticking their necks out--but average spring chinook adult returns to Bonneville Dam over the past 10 years have been in the 180,000-fish range. That's 225 percent better than this year's spring return. Chances are next year's return will be a lot higher than that--since this year's Bonneville jack count ended up 250 percent better than the 10-year average.
However, Casillas said one must exercise caution with the jack counts, since they are not always good predictors of the following year's run. He pointed out that 2004 jack counts were high, but the run fizzled the following year, which points to higher mortality for the chinook beyond their first year of foraging in the ocean. -B. R.
[7] Nearly 350,000 Fall Chinook Expected Back To Columbia
Columbia Basin harvest managers are expecting another good run of fall chinook, though down from recent years, with all components adding up to 347,500 fish. That's down about 18 percent from last year's return.
Lower Columbia hatchery and wild stocks are expected to come in at about two-thirds of the 10-year average, while Bonneville Pool tules are only figured to return at about one-quarter of the 10-year average.
About 185,000 Upriver brights are expected to be heading for the Hanford Reach and above, at about 75 percent of the 10-year average. And mid-C brights are predicted to return in the 69,000 fish range, about 80 percent of the 10-year average.
Steelhead are expected in numbers that compare to the 10-year average, nearly 315,000 altogether, with the A-run index making up about 242,000 of that number, with 42,000 wild. About 56,000 B-run index (78 cm. and longer) fish are expected to be heading for Idaho, including about 11,000 wild fish.
Managers also expect about 367,000 coho to return to the Columbia this year, close to last year's 384,000 fish, but less than the 10-year average. Early run coho will be making up about 294,000 of the total, with late run numbers predicted to be down considerably, with less than half the 10-year average expected.
Treaty Indian fisheries are allotted about 23 percent of the upriver bright returns, with non-Indians getting 8.25 percent. Sport fishermen get a little more than half of the non-Indian share, and are expected to land about 15,000 chinook in the mainstem fishery, while gillnetters are slated to harvest about 20,000 fall chinook in the mainstem--with commercial fishing time scheduled in both early and late August
All together, Columbia River fisheries were given nearly 5 percent of the 42-percent exploitation rate for lower Columbia chinook allowed by NMFS, a reduction of 14 percent from the 2002-2006 exploitation rate.
Inriver fisheries are allotted about 7 percent of the 20-percent wild coho exploitation rate for ocean and non-Indian inriver fisheries. -B. R.
Subscriptions and Feedback
Subscribe to the Fishletter notification e-mail list.
Send e-mail comments to the editor.
THE ARCHIVE :: Previous NW Fishletter issues and supporting documents.
NW Fishletter is produced by Energy NewsData.
Publisher: Cyrus Noë, Editor: Bill Rudolph
Phone: (206) 285-4848 Fax: (206) 281-8035
