FY 2003 Request for Studies proposal 200304900

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:

Does the study address the following RFS questions:

Are there statistically significant differences in reproductive success between natural-origin and hatchery-origin fish when measured at the second generation (F2)? Do F1 progeny with HxW parents differ from F1 progeny with HxH parents in the production of F2 progeny?

The evaluation is designed to test for significant differences in reproductive success between natural-origin and hatchery-origin steelhead. The evaluation does not include a design to extend to the F2 adult returns, but could be easily modified to include F2 adult returns.

What are possible hypotheses to explain this difference? For example, can the difference be attributed to reduced genetic fitness of hatchery-origin compared to natural-origin fish? Are differences more significant during any specific life history stages?

Two life-stages, egg-to-smolt and smolt-to-adult, will be evaluated along with contrasts of life-history characters between adjacent treatment and reference streams. The sponsors indicate they will estimate the heritability of life-history characters. This will be less informative than establishing phenotypic and genetic correlation's between "traits" and "fitness".

What is the likely effect of any difference, in terms of population growth, population recovery, and genetic diversity/fitness in subsequent generations according to the Viable Salmonid Population (VSP) criteria?

The study would contribute data important to parameterizing the extinction risk models used by NOAA-Fisheries.

Does the proposal address the additional criteria for selecting among well-designed and responsive proposals include:

The degree to which studies are directly applicable to one or more of the following listed ESUs (for which there are currently no reproductive success studies underway): Upper Columbia steelhead, Mid-Columbia steelhead; Snake River fall chinook; and Columbia River chum. Studies not occurring in those ESUs, but with clear applicability to those ESUs will also be considered;

The study involves Mid-Columbia steelhead.

The degree to which the study is designed (or is capable of being extended) to address whether and to what extent any difference in reproductive success of hatchery spawners persists in subsequent generations (beyond F2);

This is not included in the proposal but could be addressed.

The degree to which proposals may provide information more broadly applicable to multiple species/ESUs identified above;

Good for steelhead above Bonneville.

Potential to commit to a long-term study (beyond F2);

Good.

Overall cost effectiveness.

Maybe a little on the expensive side, but there are more startup costs in this one. $400K the first year and $300 each year after does not seem to be too much out of line with the other proposals.

General comments and evaluation.

This well-written proposal addresses the potentially important problem of effects of hatchery straying on naturally spawning steelhead in the Deschutes subbasin. However, the primary weakness of this study is unknown implementation conditions in the two creeks. The applicants should first document the incidence of straying in each stream and the degree of genetic difference between naturally spawning adults and hatchery strays. Both streams appear to have had an extensive history of stray hatchery fish spawning with “wild” steelhead. If genetic introgression has been extensive the genetic makeup of “hatchery” strays and “wild” spawners may be similar, reducing the ability of the researchers to detect genetic differences between progeny of strays and “wild” fish. Also, the abundance of adults and juveniles should be evaluated because parentage assignments will be made on a sample of juveniles, and all adults once they start returning. It is not clear whether the abundance of juveniles will be sufficient to sample contributions from the spawning adults. Future funding should be contingent upon the results of the preliminary work.

The project evaluates "stray" hatchery-origin adults spawning in the wild rather than individuals from "state of the art" hatchery programs and for this reason does not seem to directly respond to the requirements of the RFS. It does respond to RPA #182. The focus of the proposal is on assessing the effect of stray hatchery fish, period. It seems that the study plan should also somehow incorporate the local Round Butte or Warm Springs hatchery fish. As it stands, this study may do a great job of evaluating the consequences of hatchery strays, but ignores some of the large issues that need to be addressed.

This would be a fascinating study to see what would happen to fitness of later generations when you cut the hatchery strays off from the control stream.

The experimental approach does not permit evaluating the "same stock in the same stream", since the strays are not necessarily from the same Mid-Columbia ESU and could change from year to year.

Use of a “control” stream is a MAJOR plus for the study. Most of the proposals do not have adequate control streams in the study design. Bakeoven and Buck Hollow creeks are probably good choices because they are relative warm on the east side of the Deschutes and may represent extreme environmental conditions to which wild steelhead are adapted.

The principal investigator proposes to consider inter breeding with resident rainbows. The proposal does not carefully describe how the principal investigator would evaluate differences in reproductive success if they find large effects of resident fish (no testable hypotheses) but other proposals did not do that, either.

Comment:

Comment:

Comment:

In the initial ISRP review, this proposal had good support and was evaluated as having scientific merit. The responses are adequate to most questions. The research should continue through the F2 generation even though the timeframe for the project will be extended substantially.

Less convincing is the sponsor’s response to the question of whether there are genetic differences between natural origin adults and hatchery strays. The sponsors state that this question will be answered during the first two years of the study, but they do not discuss in any substantive way how the research will be modified if there is little genetic divergence. In fact, if there is little divergence another research design may be warranted and the value of the project may be reduced.

In answer to the comment about the potential difficulty of differentiating between progeny of strays and “wild” fish, the response provides an example of two extremes (no introgression vs. high levels of introgression), then describes how each will be tested for. But isn’t the real question how tests will be able to determine the “middle ground” cases in between the extremes? The potential inability to assess the influence of strays seems to continue to be a weakness of this proposal, so the same recommendation to fund in phases still applies.

The response to the sampling question was not complete. That question concerned whether the abundance of juveniles will be sufficient to sample contributions from the spawning adults. Two issues remain: the sample size necessary and how to determine that, and what value the juveniles have compared to the monitoring of adults only. The juvenile sample size issue seems more important than they recognized. Other proposals refer to large samples sizes (a couple of thousand) in order to have confidence in the parentage of the progeny. Given the concerns about genetic background and the unknown number adults in the treatment stream, this remains an issue for them to consider. However, if the real issue is source of returning adults, maybe the juvenile sampling is unnecessary in this study especially if the numbers of wild fish are limited. These seem to be important questions that the ISRP asked, and that remain now.

The location proposed may not be suitable to do this study. The potential for spawning with resident rainbows is high (e.g., studies by Zimmerman and colleagues). The proposers recognize the problem. If this ends up just a parentage analysis, it won’t move things along as the initial proposal promises. Their existing database is a plus for this proposal.

The ISRP recommends that BPA fund a preliminary study to first document the incidence of straying in each stream and the degree of genetic difference between naturally spawning adults and hatchery strays. Funding of Phase 2 should be contingent on ability to document straying in phase 1. The results of this study should be reviewed by the ISRP prior to final approval of the project.

The ISRP was mystified by the comments from the H/H group. The issue of strays is an issue throughout the Basin. Strays are probably a larger problem basinwide than intentional supplementation with hatchery fish. It makes sense to opportunistically use the strays that are “naturally” provided by returning fish to these well-controlled streams. They should give as good information as intentionally supplemented fish. The ISRP supports the proposers’ response to the H/H questions. The issue of whether hatchery strays meet the intent of the RFS request should be resolved by the RFS team.