FY 2001 Columbia Gorge proposal 199802100

Section 1. Administrative

Project location

Reasonable and Prudent Alternatives (RPAs)

Section 2. Past accomplishments

Section 3. Relationships to other projects

Section 4. Budget for Planning and Design phase

Task-based budget

Outyear objectives-based budget

Outyear budgets for Planning and Design phase

Section 5. Budget for Construction and Implementation phase

Task-based budget

Outyear objectives-based budget

Outyear budgets for Construction and Implementation phase

Section 6. Budget for Operations and Maintenance phase

Task-based budget

Outyear objectives-based budget

Outyear budgets for Operations and Maintenance phase

Section 7. Budget for Monitoring and Evaluation phase

Task-based budget

Outyear objectives-based budget

Outyear budgets for Monitoring and Evaluation phase

Section 8. Estimated budget summary

Itemized budget

Total estimated budget

Cost sharing

Reviews and recommendations

This information was not provided on the original proposals, but was generated during the review process.

Comment:

Fundable. Further ISRP response review is not needed. This watershed effort is a good example of a well run Watershed Council process. With the addition of the document delivered at the meeting, Hood River Fish Habitat Protection, Restoration, and Monitoring Plan, the ISRP's concerns were addressed.

Many of the ISRP's FY2000 review comments remain pertinent to our present review of this project. This is a complex project involving substantial funding from a large number of sources. It is linked to a number of other projects within the subbasin. The cost share looks attractive; the rationale looks appropriate. The proposal would have benefited from more presentation of biological gains, even at this relatively early juncture in the project's proposed tenure. We recognize that the project is relatively new and that benefits to fish and wildlife from habitat improvement projects take time to accrue and measure. Nevertheless, the project sponsors generally tended to describe past accomplishments in terms of actions completed without discussing the biological benefits gained from the action (some of which could have been measured even at this early stage).

The weakest part of the proposal is the lack of a clear evaluation methodology for assessing long-term success of the alterations. How will success/failure be defined? For example, "spawning ground surveys will be completed annually to assess the upstream passage/spawning benefits." What level of adult returns will be used to define success? How will variability be addressed? Time lags? At this cost, the project sponsors need to assure that the work is providing measurable benefits to fish and wildlife. They need to better document the interaction of this project with 1988-053-03, the monitoring and evaluation component of the HRPP. See General Issues and comments on the need for an integrated approach to M&E in the Province across all subbasins. Given smolt yield as a possible response variable to watershed rehabilitation, is the Hood River a candidate for detailed monitoring or routine monitoring, and compared to what?

General comments on Hood River Production Program:

The Hood River Subbasin Summary was well written and thorough. The Hood River group is on the right track with their watershed assessments and rehabilitation plans listed by priority of action. Concerns are with the hatchery program and the issue of passage at the dam.

Summer and winter steelhead stocks have been in decline during the 1990s, and are now down to less than 200 and 300 fish, respectively, and far below the escapement goal of 2,400 fish. A crude recruitment analysis, assuming these fish were, on average, 4 years-old at return, suggested both stocks are below replacement. The abundance of each seemed correlated, suggesting factors in the decline are affecting both stocks, now down to less than 1or 2 fish/km. It is not possible to separate the freshwater from the marine factors in the decline since no data on wild smolt yield is given. However, the decline is likely related to marine conditions, as found elsewhere. Data on smolt yield exists (five rotary screw traps in the watershed) so an analysis of overall smolt yield and return may be possible. Survivals on hatchery steelhead seemed peculiar in that winter-run hatchery releases faired worse, at less than 1% from 60,000 releases, than summer-runs, which apparently had survivals near 3%. Something is odd about this difference - either the release numbers have varied, summer and winter runs are misidentified, or summer runs are doing something different (migration pathways?). A more thorough treatment of the stock assessment information available is required.

The use of wild brood stock for hatchery purposes, while commendable and correct at the best of times (i.e., when survivals warrant it), is likely depleting the limited wild stock without increased return, given these poor survival rates. Furthermore, supplementation is focusing on the wrong life stage if the current limitation is in the smolt-to-adult stage. It is difficult to separate the "supplementation" from the fish released for harvest. All fish for harvest should be released below the dam. A review and justification of the supplementation program is required.

The comparisons and conclusions on acclimation (Figs. 11 and 12 in the summary) suffer from having no within-year control, and were not in agreement with the presentation on this issue which indicated there was no benefit to acclimation. Fish released from these facilities will compete with wild parr and smolts, particularly if a large portion residualize. Half of the males (perhaps as many as 15,000 of 60,000 releases in this watershed) may fail to migrate, and compete for food and space with wild fish. They plan to study residualism, but some information should already be available, and presented.

A review of the harvest-fish release and returns and consequences to the wild population is needed. What are the consequences within the Bonneville Pool and elsewhere when hatchery smolts out-number wild by several fold? Even catch-and-release fishing has an impact, particularly where effort is high, and this wild population can withstand no harvest impact. This form of supplementation may be doing more harm than good to the wild population; likewise for the harvest program.

They should proceed with their watershed rehabilitation plans and hope that these attempts will improve productivity and capability in freshwater to offset the dramatic declines in smolt-to-adult survival. Meanwhile, there is a need to do more work on the latter, including mortality in the downstream migration within the Hood, within the Bonneville Pool, down the Columbia, at the river mouth, and during the coastal migration. Comments above on hatchery harvest and supplementation will apply to several watersheds, thus an overall review may be required.

Recommendation for the set of HRPP proposals: Fundable only if the response adequately addresses the ISRP's concerns.

Issues to address:

1. The proposals contained little specific data presentation.
2. Quantify the juvenile loss through the Powerdale hydro facility.
3. Consider using PIT tags or acoustic tags in the smolt evaluations.
4. Release all smolts below the dam where the goal is to increase the available harvest but consider/address the indirect impacts to wild fish from C&R.
5. The turn-back of hatchery steelhead at the ladder has increased straying, and may have lad to increased angling effort within the lower river (thus further C&R of wild). Alternatives to turnback should be provided (cull?).
6. What are the consequences of increased hatchery smolt presence within the Bonneville Reservoir, the lower Columbia River, and at the mouth, and given the aggregate hatchery releases in the Province and elsewhere?
7. Justify hatchery production levels. In the absence of quantitative stock assessments, the proposals fail to justify technically the need for the projects presented. For example, what is the basis for the numbers of hatchery fish to be released?
8. Develop a monitoring and evaluation plan for the separate tasks of harvest development, supplementation, and habitat rehabilitation.

The Hood River Production Program has many things going for it, including its dedicated staff, high quality facilities (Powerdale collection site and Parkdale), links between the habitat restoration efforts and the production program, etc. Nevertheless, the M&E portion of the program fails to adequately address monitoring and evaluation questions that are critical to the program's success. These include quantifying the juvenile loss through the Powerdale hydro facility, lack of consideration of using PIT tag technology to gather additional juvenile migration and adult return data, and deeper integration of the wild and hatchery production components for winter steelhead goals.

Acclimation as a supplementation strategy, as a means to enhance the survivability of artificially produced smolts released into the watershed, seems not to have been demonstrated, at least by the data presented in the proposals. Reviewers perceive that a better strategy for enhancing winter steelhead fisheries would be to release all smolts below the dam.

Recycling as a fishery-enhancement tactic, returning marked steelhead to the mouth of the tributary to make them available to harvest again, seems to have been responsible for enhanced straying into other watersheds; if so the practice is detrimental to the maintenance of biodiversity in the subbasin and should be curtailed.

Finally, density limits in the Bonneville Pool and lower Columbia River need to be addressed in this Subbasin Summary and others as a potential factor limiting salmon productivity. Without appropriate assessment of stocks including survival in the pool and lower river, and without consideration of density as a potential limiting factor, managers may inappropriately increase smolt releases to the detriment of future cohorts of native salmon. Reviewers note with concern that proposers in the Hood River program contemplate doubling of hatchery production as a method of supplementation; the detrimental effect of this increased density of salmon smolts on the survival of native salmon has apparently not been considered.

Comment:

FY 02 Budget Review Comments: A significant investment has been made in this project. The project is making significant contributions to existing wild population in Hood River. The projects being implemented through this project are identified in the Hood River Fish Habitat Protection, Restoration and Monitoring Plan. The increase in funding for this project is based on the completion of the habitat restoration plan that identified these projects as High Priority projects.

Comment:

Comment:

Many of the ISRP's FY2000 review comments remain pertinent to our present review of this project. This is a complex project involving substantial funding from a large number of sources. It is linked to a number of other projects within the subbasin. The cost share looks attractive; the rationale looks appropriate. The proposal would have benefited from more presentation of biological gains, even at this relatively early juncture in the project's proposed tenure. We recognize that the project is relatively new and that benefits to fish and wildlife from habitat improvement projects take time to accrue and measure. Nevertheless, the project sponsors generally tended to describe past accomplishments in terms of actions completed without discussing the biological benefits gained from the action (some of which could have been measured even at this early stage).

The weakest part of the proposal is the lack of a clear evaluation methodology for assessing long-term success of the alterations. How will success/failure be defined? For example, "spawning ground surveys will be completed annually to assess the upstream passage/spawning benefits." What level of adult returns will be used to define success? How will variability be addressed? Time lags? At this cost, the project sponsors need to assure that the work is providing measurable benefits to fish and wildlife. They need to better document the interaction of this project with 1988-053-03, the monitoring and evaluation component of the HRPP. See General Issues and comments on the need for an integrated approach to M&E in the Province across all subbasins. Given smolt yield as a possible response variable to watershed rehabilitation, is the Hood River a candidate for detailed monitoring or routine monitoring, and compared to what?

Comment:

Comment:

Sponsor comments: See comment at Council's website