Snake River Fall Chinook

1. Snake River Fall Chinook William Young Glen Mendel Debbie Milks

2. Overview • Introduction • Legal Mandates • Historic & Current hatchery operations • Snake River fall Chinook performance • Harvest • Conclusions • What do we know? • What do we not know?

3. Why Start a Hatchery ? Average Fall Chinook Adult Returns to Snake River Basin by Decade = Natural/wild Origin = Hatchery Origin ?

4. Historic and current distribution

5. Legal Mandates The hatchery programs in the Columbia Basin are producing fish to mitigate for the development and operation of the hydrosystem. As long as the dams are in place there is a legal obligation to provide fish. Congressionally mandated mitigation obligations associated with the FCRPS are substantial and are not supplanted by the need to comply with the Endangered Species Act

6. Legal Mandates Legal MandatesSnake River Fall ChinookHatchery Production • Lower Snake River Compensation Plan – Public Law 94-587, 99-662, 103-316 • Idaho Power Company Hells Canyon Settlement Agreement • Nez Perce Tribal Hatchery - Pacific Northwest Electric Power Planning And Conservation Act 16 U.S.C. § 839-839h • U.S. vs. Oregon 2008-2017 Management Agreement • Columbia Basin Treaty Tribes Accords • ESA/Hatchery Genetic Management Plan

7. Legal Mandates Lower Snake River Compensation Plan • Lower Snake River Compensation Plan • Mitigation based on return goals • 9.16 million subyearlingsmolts (101,880 lbs) • In-place, in-kind = endemic Snake River Chinook

8. Legal Mandates 1980 Idaho Power Company Hells Canyon Settlement Agreement(IPC, ID, OR, WA, NMFS) • Requires IPC to “contract with appropriate state and federal agencies or otherwise provide for the trapping of sufficient fall Chinook salmon and the fertilizing and eyeing up of sufficient eggs to permit raising up to 1,000,000 fall Chinook salmon smolts.” (FERC, 1980). • Approximately 2,700 adults to the project area

9. Legal Mandates Nez Perce Tribal Hatchery • “to protect, mitigate and enhance the fish and wildlife, including related spawning grounds and habitat, of the Columbia River and its tributaries, particularly anadromous fish.” • 1.4 million subyearlingsmolts • Adult return goal – 3,750 back to the project area

10. Legal Mandates U.S. vs. OregonHarvest/Production Relationship • 1995 agreement – Argument over 18 fish. Parties agreed to constrained in-river fisheries harvest rate on natural Snake River fall Chinook (for all fisheries). • In exchange the agreement provided, for the first time, off-station releases of Snake River fall Chinook above Lower Granite Dam.

11. Legal Mandates Columbia Basin Treaty Tribes Accords “…The Action Agencies understand that that Tribes’ willingness to accept spill operations as outlined above is directly related to their expectation that the Lyon’s Ferry production program remains stable and substantially unaltered than as currently designed for the term of this Agreement. Should that fundamental expectation be upset, the Tribes will consider this a material change and grounds for withdrawal from the Agreement, and may, after notice to the Action Agencies, advocate for spill actions that deviate from those contemplated in this Agreement…”

12. Legal Mandates ESA/Hatchery Genetic Management Plan • HGMP completed and submitted collaboratively in 2011 • BiOp & Sec 10 Permit received in Oct 2012

13. Hatchery operations Hatchery Operations Past and Present

14. Hatchery operations Cooperative and Joint Management Effort

15. Hatchery operations Current Snake River fall Chinook Salmon Production Goals

16. Lyons Ferry Hatchery Nez Perce Tribal Hatchery

17. Broodstock Collections (~4,000 adults needed to meet full production) Hatchery operations Nez Perce Tribal Hatchery Oxbow Hatchery

18. Hatchery Facilities and Release Locations Nez Perce Tribal Hatchery Irrigon and Umatilla Hatcheries Oxbow Hatchery

19. Captain John Rapids Acclimation Facility Pittsburg Landing Acclimation Facility Captain Johns Acclimation Facility Big Canyon Creek Acclimation Facility

20. Acclimation Sites Nez Perce Tribal Hatchery Irrigon and Umatilla Hatcheries Oxbow Hatchery

21. Hatchery operations Broodstock Collection History

22. Hatchery operations Hatchery-Origin Fall Chinook Marking Strategy

23. Hatchery operations Age at Release

24. Hatchery operations Release Location in Snake River Basin

25. Performance Subyearling/yearling comparison • Subyearling • Older ocean age • higher jack return (< 61 cm) compared to naturals • Lower average SAR • Reservoir-rearing life history • Overwinter and emigrate as yearlings, increased survival • Yearling • Younger ocean age • high proportion of “jacks” • 1 ocean, > 61 cm • Higher average SAR

26. Performance Fall Chinook Salmon Escapement to Lower Granite Dam Draft Management Escapement Goal (39,110) 14,875 ICTRT minimum viability threshold = 3,000 5,160

27. Performance Number of Fall Chinook Redds Counted Upstream of Lower Granite Dam

28. Performance 5 year average redd distribution

29. Harvest Snake River wild fall Chinook river mouth run size and total in-river harvest rates Ave. pre ESA harvest rate 56% Ave. post ESA harvest rate 24% * *ESA listed

30. Harvest Snake River Fall Chinook Salmon 2010 Adult fall Chinook disposition estimates, hatchery + natural Conservation 50% 5% 15% Consumption* 50% 15% 46% 20% *Non-selective fisheries

31. Harvest Snake River Fall Chinook Salmon Harvest LSRCP mitigation goals • Conclusions • Met project area goal, not harvest goal

32. Harvest • Snake River Fall Chinook Salmon Harvest • Idaho Power Corp. mitigation goals – • Mitigation goal – 1,000,000 subyearlings • Conclusions • Undefined adult return goals – significant contribution to harvest

33. Harvest Snake River Fall Chinook Salmon Harvest Nez Perce Tribal Hatchery mitigation goals • Conclusions • Return to project goals were not met, significant contribution to fisheries *minimum estimate, not expanded

34. Things we now know • Adult abundance has increased significantly • Getting closer to meeting in and out of basin mitigation goals • Natural-origin adult abundance near delisting criteria. • However, total abundance is well below historic levels and current management goals. • Adult distribution via annual aerial redd counts. • 70/30 rule between Snake and Clearwater. • Large number of hatchery fish on the spawning grounds • Significant mainstemstate and tribal harvest via coded-wire tag recoveries and creel surveys.

35. Things we now know, and don’t know • Fall Chinook abundance has increased • changes in management or environmental improvements? • Management effects? • Hatchery production/Supplementation • Finally met full broodstock objectives • increased number of naturally-spawning hatchery fish • Reduced proportion of out-of-basin strays • Smaller size and age at return • Decreased ocean and lower Columbia River harvest rates • Allowed for increased adult returns to the Snake River • Corridor improvements = survival benefits • summer transport/spill • Environmental effects? (ocean, long-term weather patterns) • Increased SARs/productivity - similar to other stocks/species

36. Things we don’t know • The level of contribution to increased adult abundance from supplementation compared to contributions from large increases in total hatchery production & higher SARs • The contribution/influence of hatchery fish on natural fish productivity • The productive capacity of remaining habitat • Whether hatchery programs are affecting the life history structure of the natural population • Long-term viability of an ESU with only a single extant population spatial structure and diversity

37. Questions?