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Topic: Quest for 100k Willamette Springers  (Read 1618 times)

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In2Deep

  • Herring
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  • Location: Clackamas
  • Date Registered: Dec 2017
  • Posts: 24
I went to an interesting meeting tonight called "Quest for 100k" that was hosted by the Northwest Steelheaders.  I should note that I am not member or NW Steelheaders, but I was impressed by tonight's presentation and wanted to tell you what I learned.

Tonight's meeting was the kickoff of a political initiative spearheaded by the NW Steelheaders to double the number of spring chinook returning to the Willamette River.  They are collaborating with other fishing groups on this (Grant from NW Guides and Anglers Assoc spoke; Liz from NSIA was involved; and I saw a lot of CCA people).  The meeting was led by Bob Reese, but there were representatives from PGE, ODFW, and the district fish biologist involved in an open Q&A period.

In essence, the basis of the plan is to put political pressure where it needs to be in order to return the big Willie to the great fishery it was in the past.  As with all fisheries issues, there are multiple factors that need to be addressed in order to make this happen, but the plan seemed fairly simple and reasonably easy.

For background, they explained that before the dams were built on the Willamette and its major tributaries, the estimated annual springer return was approximately 300,000 fish.  When all of the dams were built, approximately 90% of the system's spawning and rearing habitat was blocked, and the government made up for it by planting millions of hatchery fish.  During the heyday of the hatcheries, annual returns were approximately 100,000 fish.  However, due to constraints imposed by the ESA in order to protect what few remaining wild fish are left in the systems, hatchery production has been decreased, and annual returns are now roughly 55,000 fish.  For those that follow this issue, I'm sure there are various opinions regarding what constitutes a "wild fish", but I'd rather keep that out of the discussion for now; the proposals are to work withing the framework of what is legally considered a wild population and within the many conflicting laws that affect our current situation.

The first major step of the plan is to deal with the sea lion predation problem.  As I'm sure all of you know, sea lions are protected under the federal "Marine Mammal Protection Act" which was designed to protect whales, polar bears, walrus, and possibly sea lions (I haven't seen evidence that sea lions were ever endangered, but I could be completely wrong on this point).  Anyway, since they are protected under the MMPA instead of the Endangered Species Act, there isn't a way to de-list them even though their populations are higher than at any time in known history.  The NW Steelheaders, CCA, and the tribal fishery representatives have been lobbying for some control of the problem sea lions, and it looks like they are making headway.  Besides a bill that is currently in congress, there is also an emergency injunction that looks like it will be passed this year to allow the removal of sea lions above the I-205 bridge on the Willamette.  This is based on a scientific report showing that some wild steelhead runs above Willamette Falls are 89% likely to become extinct in the next 10 years if the sea lions continue to block their passage.

The biggest problem with making sure that the sea lion issue is resolved is public perception.  Even though the ecosystem has become completely unbalanced due to human intervention (protection of an abundant predator at the cost of endangered prey species), it is hard to convince politicians to stand up to PETA types and vote to allow the killing of "big cute furry animals" in order to save a few slimy fish.  We need to do what we can to educate the public about the damage the sea lions are doing, and we need to give positive encouragement to our representatives in state and federal government that these measures need to pass in order for our iconic salmon and steelhead species to survive.

The second step in the "Quest for 100k" plan is to add wild broodstock programs to the hatcheries on the Willamette and its tributaries.  Wild broodstock programs on the coast as well as the Sandy River and Hood River have shown double the return rates of standard hatchery practices.  The average return from all of the hatcheries in the System is about 1% of the number of smolts released.  The average return from wild broodstock programs is 2% of the number of smolts released.  This "simple" change would meet the entire goal of having 100k+ adult spring chinook return to the system every year, but there is nothing simple about it.  The problem is that the wild fish stocks are too weak to remove enough wild fish to supply the broodstock eggs for the hatcheries.

The district fish biologist used the Clackamas River as an example of the broodstock problem.  It has lower than average returns of springers to the hatchery (approximately .5% of smolts released make it back to the Dog Creek hatchery; total of approximately 550 adults per year), but it has higher than average returns of wild fish (3-5% of outbound smolts return as adults; total of approximately 3,500 adults per year make it to spawn).  The hatchery has been using returning hatchery adults as the "parents" for each generation of smolts with no "wild" fish mixed in for over 30 years.  It takes approximately 600 adult fish to provide the eggs / milt for the next generation of hatchery fish, and they aren't allowed by the ESA to remove 600 wild fish for the broodstock program because they are still below escapement goals.  They are hopeful that the broodstock proposal will be approved by NOAA this year for the Clackamas because they can show rapidly increasing numbers of wild fish thanks to dam passage improvements by PGE, but the other tributaries to the Willamette have the same problem to a much larger degree.

Most of the tributaries to the Willamette River that have endangered salmon / steelhead runs have huge dams (over 250' high with no fish passage) blocking the fish from their spawning grounds.  Based on a federal "Bi-Op" (Biological opinion?  Biological Operations Plan?  I don't recall...), the army corps of engineers has 5 years left to implement adequate fish passage both upstream and downstream at 4 or five of these major dams.  If they do something similar to what PGE has done on the Clackamas (trapping and trucking the adults upstream; trapping and trucking the smolts downstream), and if they have similar success to that experienced on the Clackamas (90-96% captured and safely released in both directions), the wild runs should rebound quickly to sufficient numbers to reduce fishing restrictions in the lower Willamette and to implement broodstock programs on these tribs.

Wow, I didn't mean for this post to become a novel.  I apologize to everyone that fell asleep reading this.  Anyway, I was excited to learn that some progress is being made to improve our seemingly ever-declining fishing opportunities, so I wanted to share.  Let's hope it works!


Jrob

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  • Date Registered: Aug 2016
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Thanks for the great report on a very important topic!  I'm glad there are passionate people with time and influence to help make policy to protect our fish.  God bless Bob Rees and company!


MurseStrong

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  • 2009 OK T11 2016 Hobie Revo 13 2018 Hobie Revo 13
  • Location: Portland oregon
  • Date Registered: Dec 2013
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The second step in the "Quest for 100k" plan is to add wild broodstock programs to the hatcheries on the Willamette and its tributaries.  Wild broodstock programs on the coast as well as the Sandy River and Hood River have shown double the return rates of standard hatchery practices. 
 Based on a federal "Bi-Op" , the army corps of engineers has 5 years left to implement adequate fish passage both upstream and downstream at 4 or five of these major dams. 

THANK YOU for this update! I was unable to attend and it's important that we all are aware & active of this issues. They are just a few of many major steps in the right direction and will also improve the population for native steelhead survival. Habitat restoration, sea lion predation, and declining ocean conditions are some of the biggest factors in salmonid survival and I am curious to see how we continue to address these environmental issues in the future.
If You Know The Answer, Ask Bigger Questions

"You are killing me, fish, the old man thought. But you have a right to. Never have I seen a greater, or more beautiful, or a calmer or more noble thing than you, brother."
-The Old Man and the Sea


ndogg

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  • "Fists of Fury"
  • Location: SW Portland
  • Date Registered: Sep 2009
  • Posts: 1767
Thanks for the update.  Let's hope this initiative can get things moving in the right direction.
 


In2Deep

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  • Location: Clackamas
  • Date Registered: Dec 2017
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Oops.  I must have passed the number of posts required to view hidden boards on this site.  It looks like my post would have been more appropriate in the "environment and politics" section, but I didn't have access to that part of the site (or even know it existed) until today.


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Helium Head

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  • Date Registered: Mar 2016
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Thanks for the information, good stuff to know.
Hobie Revolution 13 olive
Hobie Revolution 13 yellow


Kyle M

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Great report, thanks! Hopefully, common sense will prevail. Seems so odd that we are trying to protect one animal at the expense of another. This has been the case of sea lions for years. If the salmon were also similarly protected, then it would be clear, but we want to kill some salmon. Too bad sea lions aren't viewed the same.


DTS

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Thank you for the report.  Yes I agree remove the problems to create a great future in the industry.  Sweet!
PROGRESS IS JUST BEING THERE!


Tinker

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At best, a feel-good initiative, ignoring sedimentation and the loss of suitable spawning grounds, competition from non-native fish, urbanization and pollution...

Blaming the decline of salmon in the Willamette on a simple two-dimensional concept of where the problems lie will get conservation groups a pile of money in the bank but not do much for the salmon.  It never does.
I expected the worst, but it was worse than I expected...


In2Deep

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  • Location: Clackamas
  • Date Registered: Dec 2017
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At best, a feel-good initiative, ignoring sedimentation and the loss of suitable spawning grounds, competition from non-native fish, urbanization and pollution...

Blaming the decline of salmon in the Willamette on a simple two-dimensional concept of where the problems lie will get conservation groups a pile of money in the bank but not do much for the salmon.  It never does.
There are thousands of miles of suitable spawning grounds if they deal with the fish passage issues.  They are working on passage at Detroit (draining the lake in 3 years to build passage before the time limit in the biop).  I don't know the status of the other tributaries.

I agree that there are many factors in equation (smolt outmigration through the lower river's weak flows, high temps, non-native predator fish such as bass and walleye, and predatory birds are the main area that this plan fails to address), and I don't think it is possible to rebuild the fish runs to their historic levels.  However, I do believe that these changes can meet the stated goal of 100k springers.  More importantly, I believe that the alternative of doing nothing because of pessimism will result in the continued decline of our fisheries.  I'd rather support a slight improvement than do nothing.



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Tinker

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And while I don't necessarily disagree, it seems to me that this article also discounts the methods by which conservation groups raise money.  Pick a news-worthy and photogenic issue, declare war on it and solicit donations and funding.  I have no problems with them doing that since they have employees and have to meet payroll like any other business, but it doesn't mean I buy into the idea that they're going to be able to make headway on issues that are under the control of the Federal government.

The Willamette passes through agricultural land from the Columbia through Salem and for miles East of Salem, and picks up a heavy load of agricultural pollutants many of which have a toxic lifespan of decades.  Taking on a couple of high-visibility issues isn't going to fix the over-arching problem: the Willamette is considered by many as being one of the most polluted rivers in Oregon, and many of the former spawning streams are no longer suitable for successful reproduction without extensive reclamation not just of the waterway but also of the surrounding land.

- http://koin.com/2015/04/16/willamette-river-tops-list-of-toxic-waterways/
- http://www.oregon.gov/deq/wq/Pages/Willamette-River-Report.aspx
- https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/01/11/577178180/government-scientists-say-a-controversial-pesticide-is-killing-endangered-salmon?utm_source=Outside+Magazine&utm_medium=email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=WYM-01122018&utm_content=WYM-01122018+CID_7a0070846c212129cde1f8ad04d21e62&utm_source=campaignmonitor%20outsidemagazine&utm_term=killing%20salmon

And like I said, this "new" effort it isn't going to do much for the fish, but neither is it going to hurt them.
I expected the worst, but it was worse than I expected...


In2Deep

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  • Location: Clackamas
  • Date Registered: Dec 2017
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Tinker-
Your first link wouldn't open, and I'm not sure the chemical issues in the third link are in the top five challenges to the Willamette river stocks, but your points are well taken.  As I think I eluded to in my original post, I agree that this is a matter of NWS latching onto improvements that are already in progress thanks to other groups, but I think there is a chance this could be positive in the long run.  If they can get enough publicity out of this on the benefits of restoring these runs (ecological, recreational, and economic), it will help with public perception of fishing when we are fighting other political battles.


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