[1] Science Panel At Odds With New BiOp Over Barging
The independent science panel that weighs in on various Northwest salmon recovery issues has recommended that spill be maintained while barging fish in May, a finding that's at odds with planned BiOp operations.
The new BiOp calls for shutting down spill at collector dams for two weeks, from May 7 to 21, to maximize benefits from transporting steelhead.
It's a controversial operation that has drawn fire from plaintiffs in the ongoing litigation over hydro operations.
But the feds say their passage survival model used to judge the relative merits of different options shows a definite benefit for ESA-listed steelhead from the action.
The model, called COMPASS, had already received a favorable review from the ISAB panel.
However, in its Sept. 17 report, the Independent Scientific Review Board called for maintaining spill-transport operations similar to those used in 2006 and 2007 during the barging season, "long enough to determine how much influence such operational changes have on downriver migration and total adult returns. Continuing recent spill-transport operations is advised to improve future evaluations of the trade-offs associated with spill and transport decisions."
The finding may lead to some headaches for federal attorneys. Last month, at a BiOp status hearing in Federal Judge James Redden's Portland courtroom, Justice Department attorney Coby Howell successfully argued against implementing a science panel to look at the new BiOp.
Plaintiffs had wanted such a review before the judge ruled on the validity of the newest salmon plan, but Howell argued that the ISAB had already looked at important elements of the BiOp and was almost finished with their report on the new BiOp's max transport strategy in May, where the issue was being "fully vetted."
On the new barging strategy, Howell told the judge, "We're convinced we're right."
But now that the science panel review has not supported the feds' May barging strategy, Howell may have some more explaining to do.
The ISAB made things even more confusing at a presentation on the new report last week when ISAB member Prof. J. Richard Alldredge, a statistician from Washington State University, briefed the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
He said the panel's findings agreed with the results of the feds' COMPASS model. It was a rushed presentation before the council adjourned for lunch.
So if the feds are using the COMPASS model to justify their operations, how come the science panel came up with a different recommendation, especially since the ISAB had previously reviewed the COMPASS model and called it a valuable tool.
In its latest report, the ISAB still called COMPASS a valuable tool, and in its current state, the model "should yield rough indications of a good balance between transportation and spill, and once reliable data become available for more projects and configurations, it will be possible to better evaluate project and hydro system survival under various water management scenarios."
The panel's support for more spill counters the COMPASS model's results that shows the max barging/no spill strategy for a couple of weeks in May would boost returning steelhead stocks five or six percent over the old BiOp (not the court-ordered operation). Just about everyone agrees that steelhead runs always seem to do better when the juveniles are barged, no matter what part of the spring.
Generally, spring chinook returns improve as well, when the later part of the juvenile migration is barged. The two-week window of max barging beginning May 7 was a change in proposed operations from the draft BiOp, after federal scientists decided the steelhead stocks would do better if the new policy started a week later.
The ISAB review recognized that the steelhead would benefit from barging, but they pointed out that more spill would likely improve inriver survival of migrating salmonids, especially sockeye, and maybe even lamprey, even though they noted that "definitive data are lacking."
The review pointed out that the major portion of the sockeye run would pass lower Snake dams during the no-spill period. That meant the fish would have to negotiate either turbines or bypass systems where the sockeye seem to exhibit relatively high levels of descaling--a condition that can easily lead to future mortality.
It also pointed to some evidence that barged fish had higher rates of straying when they returned as adults.
Also noted was evidence that as inriver survival increased from increased levels of spill, the benefits of transportation decreased. "Terminating spill would eliminate the possibility of learning about the effect of partial spill during this critical period, thereby reducing opportunities for improved decision-making in the future."
But the feds say the COMPASS results are the best available science, and it seems likely they will stick with their proposed policy, though no federal representative would comment on the record. By barging fewer steelhead, the feds might not be able to meet the new BiOp's performance standards, which play an important role in providing a "reasonable prudent alternative" to older hydro operations that the feds concluded jeopardized ESA-listed salmon and steelhead runs.
They are still convinced by the COMPASS analysis that found a maxed-out fish barging from lower Snake dams in early May would boost survival of ESA-listed steelhead over the current court-ordered operation. The feds' computerized crystal ball says the change could boost steelhead returns by 18 percent over BiOp judge James Redden's temporary prescription.
Last May, when the new policy was announced at the time the final BiOp was unveiled, NOAA Fisheries hydro branch chief Ritchie Graves said the survival model found that moving the no-spill window up a week from the draft BiOp's operation would capture more steelhead.
At the time, Graves said the new BiOp's barging plan would transport about 76 percent of the steelhead and 60 percent of the spring chinook.
He pointed out that the spill operations added over the past three years (ordered by the court after environmental and fishing groups convinced the judge that it was a better alternative), haven't been fully analyzed since most adult fish have not yet returned from those outmigrations.
If future returns show more benefits from that high spill strategy, he said, NMFS would change its recommendation, because the agency is committed to an adaptive management policy.
But the ISAB has obviously taken a more cautious tone in its own analysis, after doing some of its own number-crunching. The board's report contains several graphs showing smolt-to-adult returns for inriver migrating spring chinook and steelhead improve as the spill percentage goes up.
However, the correlations are weak--with r2 only .35 in the best case, which means that 65 percent of the variation in the results can be explained by other variables. Most researchers don't consider a correlation very useful until it hits the 70-percent level.
The ISAB also suggested that by keeping more fish inriver, the overall rate of predation would actually decrease, which might account for their finding that the benefits of barging decreased as spill percentage increased.
But the ISAB was clear about one thing. In his Sept. 17 presentation, Prof. Alldredge told NWPPC members that barging improved chinook and steelhead returns in 75 percent of the years they had examined. -Bill Rudolph
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