[5] Idaho Sockeye Will Get New Hatchery

With ESA-listed sockeye returning to Idaho in record numbers, the run is showing the benefits of an expensive captive broodstock program for the third year in a row.

The program will get a significant boost with BPA's purchase of an old trout farm in Idaho that will be transformed into a state-of-the art fish hatchery owned and operated by IDFG and designed to produce one million smolts a year.

"This purchase is an important tool that moves us from merely preserving this species toward rebuilding it," said Bill Maslen, director of BPA's fish and wildlife program in a July 23 press release. "The progress so far has come only through enduring commitments and close partnerships. We're determined to keep that going."

In 2008, 650 adult sockeye made it all the way back to the Stanley Basin, and more than 800 returned in 2009. With more than 2,126 counted already at Lower Granite Dam, and relatively cool migration conditions, more than half should make it back to the Redfish Lake region where most of the run began their journey as hatchery smolts. By Aug. 12, 701 adults had returned to the Stanley Basin.

A few adults have been trapped at the dam this year and trucked to the IDFG hatchery at Eagle, Idaho, to test the strategy that might improve broodstock numbers in other years when migration conditions are poor for the last 450 miles of their journey.

It looks like that strategy was a success this year. It was reported that the 19 sockeye trucked (only one or two at a time) are all resting comfortably at the hatchery. -B. R.

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