The Endangered Species Act “compels” the NOAA Fisheries Service to consider hatchery stocks in deciding whether a particular salmon or steelhead species deserves federal protections.
The oft-scrutinized Comparative Survival Study team’s methods and aims received mostly positive reviews in a scientific report released last week by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
The Endangered Species Act “compels” the NOAA Fisheries Service to consider hatchery stocks in deciding whether a particular salmon or steelhead species deserves federal protections.
The Columbia Basin Fish and Wildlife Authority has launched the “Status of the Resource website at http://www.cbfwa.org/sotr
The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife have convened a stakeholder group to develop a future vision for the combined Columbia River fisheries (recreational and commercial), including a workable plan for the future allocation of allowable harvests between the two fisheries.
Many of the details have been worked out, but funding and scope issues remain to be settled before a long-sought study can be launched to determine the best path to the ocean — transportation aboard barges or in-river — for migrating juvenile Snake River fall chinook salmon.
Participants in long-running litigation will meet in federal court Dec. 12 to discuss “issues” arising from the latest federal plan for protecting for Columbia River basin salmon and steelhead that are listed under the Endangered Species Act.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council has had, and will continue to have, a “major” role in efforts to assure that 13 listed Columbia/Snake river salmon stocks aren’t jeopardized by the federal hydro system and are indeed lifted toward recovery, according to the NOAA Fisheries Service’s Northwest regional administrator.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week recommended more than $364,000 in spending for within-year fish and wildlife project budget requests, including $160,000 in startup “coordination” funding for the newly formed Upper Snake River Tribes.
Federal officials this week said that a better scientific understanding of the fish and their needs, and an infusion of resources to meet those needs over the next 10 years, will lift 13 threatened or endangered Columbia River Basin salmon and steelhead stocks toward recovery.
Initial impressions this week of a “draft” federal Columbia River Basin salmon protection strategy ranged from sharp criticisms of the tome, to praise, to “wait and see” attitudes.
Despite scientific and economic rebuffs, Montana’s Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes continue to pin hopes on fishing contests to restore ecological balance in the Flathead Lake/River system.
NOAA Fisheries Service today released two draft biological opinions which determine that federal Columbia/Snake River hydropower and irrigation projects do not jeopardize the survival of 13 salmon and steelhead stocks that are listed under the Endangered Species Act.
Tribes say they will work to improve the draft salmon recovery plan issued today, while industry and river-user interests said the new plan is science-based and a significant improvement over past plans.
Public comments suggested tinkering, expanded analysis and scope and other fine-tuning, but, overall, most judged the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s draft “Carbon Dioxide Footprint of the Northwest Power System” paper as a needed “dose of reality” for the region.
Researchers from Oregon State University and a variety of collaborators have been awarded more than $2.3 million in funding from the Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board to conduct seven separate studies involving Oregon streams and watersheds.
Idaho’s four members of Congress joined forces this week in support of appropriations bill language that would require implementation of measures outlined in the soon-to-be defunct 2005 biological opinion on Bureau of Reclamation irrigation projects on the upper Snake River.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council decided Wednesday to trigger on Nov. 1 the yearlong process to amend its Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program.
A science-policy “exchange” hosted last month by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council produced few sure answers but did serve its intended goal, highlighting key uncertainties in salmon and steelhead restoration efforts.
There is only one way to restore healthy, naturally produced Columbia River basin salmon populations, according to researcher Jack Stanford.
But the region will have to swallow bitter pills to save the chosen ones – knocking back harvest and hatchery production and allowing Mother Nature to provide them a productive environment, he said.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s Independent Scientific Review Panel sought perspective, and feels it got it, in a recently completed review of 16 fish and wildlife projects being carried out in the Umatilla River subbasin in north-central Oregon.
NOAA Fisheries Service on Monday announced the adoption of an Endangered Species Act recovery plan for upper Columbia spring-run chinook salmon and upper Columbia River steelhead.
The rearing of steelhead trout in hatcheries causes a dramatic and unexpectedly fast drop in their ability to reproduce in the wild, a new Oregon State University study shows, and raises serious questions about the wisdom of historic hatchery practices.
A federal court judge on Friday (Oct. 5) ordered that the status of the Oregon coast coho salmon, which has bounced on and off the Endangered Species Act list, be assessed once again.
State managers this week expanded lower Columbia River mainstem commercial fishing options, approving Wednesday and Thursday nighttime outings to enable the harvest of, primarily, fall chinook and sturgeon.
Hatchery steelhead fisheries will open this month on portions of the upper Columbia River and several tributaries, including the first steelhead fishery on the Wenatchee River in 10 years, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife announced this week.
The 2007 fall chinook salmon return to the Columbia River has been puzzling, and in many respects disappointing, with fewer adult fish making their spawning run than expected.
A coalition of farm, building and water user groups this week again pressed their case in federal appellate court that genetically akin naturally born and hatchery produced salmon are equals under the Endangered Species Act.
Columbia River sport and commercial fall chinook salmon fishing continues, in fits and starts, as state fishery managers try wring the maximum allowable harvest from mainstem waters while toeing numerous Endangered Species Act lines.
In a world in which instability, whether driven by people or nature, seems to be increasing, “resilience” is emerging as a key concept – a desirable characteristic of both natural and human systems and communities.
The federal government, state of Oregon and Alsea Valley Alliance all say that a federal magistrates “findings and recommendations” regarding the state of the Oregon Coast coho salmon should be tossed out.
The long-running pursuit of a new federal license to operate three dams in the Snake River’s Hells Canyon entered a new phase this month sans a proposal to provide salmon passage to historic spawning grounds upstream.
A lower than anticipated return of upriver fall chinook salmon has cut short the sport harvest on the Columbia River mainstem, forcing a closure downstream of Bonneville Dam at the end of the day Tuesday (Sept. 18) and from Bonneville upstream to Pasco, Wash., Wednesday (Sept. 19).
A two-pronged attack has been mounted seeking the overturn of a June 13 court order that declared NOAA Fisheries Service’s “hatchery listing policy” contrary to the Endangered Species Act and restored “endangered” species protections for wild Upper Columbia River steelhead stocks.
Lower Columbia River anglers were put on notice Thursday that their pursuit of fall chinook salmon could be ended soon because of a flagging “upriver bright” run.
Federal action agencies Thursday unveiled the “most comprehensive approach ever” to revive protected salmon and steelhead stocks that negotiate the Columbia/Snake river hydro system’s dams and reservoirs.
Efforts to improve the lot of Columbia River salmon and steelhead have increased over the past six years, and so have the costs, according to an “overview” of federal agencies’ newly developed proposal for assuring fish populations aren’t jeopardized by the federal hydro system.
Bonneville Dam passage of upriver bright fall chinook salmon remains sluggish, as does tribal fishing, at a time when the run is normally at its peak.
The Bonneville Power Administration has pegged its 2006 fish and wildlife costs at $851.7 million, a total that is the second highest on record and nearly $300 million more than the previous year’s total, according to a draft annual expenditure report produced by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s Fish and Wildlife Committee this week agreed to recommend to the full Council that a package of five “innovative” project proposals requesting $2.4 million be funded during fiscal years 2008-2009.
Sockeye returns to Idaho’s Sawtooth Valley got off to a strong start, relatively, with three adult spawners finishing their journey July 23 through Aug. 1.
As one fisherman mused Wednesday, “It’s hard to get my mind around the fact that slow fishing is good news.”
Yet it’s true for anglers pursuing chinook and coho salmon in the popular Buoy 10 fishing area at the mouth of the Columbia River. A dip in the catch rate in recent days will allow the Buoy 10 sport season to remain open as planned through Sept. 3 and the long Labor Day weekend.
With broodstock and other management adjustments, Columbia River Gorge national fish hatcheries are “uniquely situated” to aid native salmon restoration and reintroduction and continue to fuel in-river and coastal harvests, according a draft review released earlier this month by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
A federal court order issued Wednesday reaffirms Northwest tribal treaty rights and, potentially, puts the state of Washington on an expensive hook of replacing or fixing hundreds of culverts that impede fish passage.
Widening the divide between hatchery fish and naturally produced salmon can, along with habitat improvements, can achieve Endangered Species Act recovery goals for Lower Columbia River chinook, according to preliminary findings released late last month by the Hatchery Scientific Review Group.
A tiny electronic tag from a steelhead in the Columbia River ecosystem was recently discovered in southern New Zealand, almost two years later and 7,700 miles away.
The PIT (Passive Integrated Transponder) tag was recovered from the stomach of a muttonbird, known locally as the “titi” and formally as the sooty shearwater, harvested by indigenous Rakiura Maori people.
A federal judge whose 2001 decision prompted a re-evaluation of 27 West Coast salmon and steelhead stocks’ protected status on Tuesday ruled that 16 salmon listings satisfy Endangered Species Act requirements.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council on Tuesday approved a $640,844 infusion to keep on track the remodeling of Idaho’s Eagle Fish Hatchery, and expansion of its sockeye salmon captive broodstock program.
A paring down of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s “innovative” fish and wildlife project list stalled this week after a flood of public comment raised red flags about some of the favorites.
CBB SHORTS: Pend Oreille River Cleanup; New ODFW Deputy Director; Climate, Water Forecast Meeting; Ocean Salmon Fishing; Sturgeon Fishing; Tribal Wildlife Grants; Wild Salmon Hall of Fame; Tracking Washington’s Water Use: New WDFW Deputy Director, Operations Chief; New WDFW Commission Member; New IDFG Commission Member
A U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee on Thursday heard testimony pro and con regarding proposed legislation to expedite the process for gaining permission to lethally remove sea lions preying on federally protected salmon in the Columbia River.
Attorneys for farm, builder and water user groups on Thursday appealed a court decision that declared the federal government’s Endangered Species Act listing of Upper Columbia River steelhead, and its policy for determining hatchery stocks’ status in listing decisions, illegal.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Hatchery Review Team has released a final report for the Eagle Creek National Fish Hatchery that includes recommendations aimed at reducing risks to salmon and steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act.
With Lower Columbia chinook and coho climbing to the top of the fish protection list, Washington and Oregon fishery managers have to limit both recreational and commercial late summer/fall harvests that take in, for the most part, upriver fall chinook salmon.
The first three Redfish Lake sockeye salmon in what is expected to be, relatively, a bumper crop have completed their 900-mile trek up the Columbia, Snake and Salmon rivers to their origins in Idaho’s Sawtooth Valley.
A draft environmental impact statement released for public comment this week moves forward Washington’s policy decision to increase emphasis on restoring “wild” steelhead stocks throughout the state.
The Grant County Public Utility District has asked for public comments on its draft plans to build hatchery facilities in the relatively pristine White River drainage in central Washington and rebuild spring chinook salmon populations there and in nearby Nason through hatchery supplementation.
The comings and goings of endangered Upper Columbia steelhead can be monitored more closely by researchers as of July 10 through operations of the Grant County Public Utility District’s new, $4.2 million “Off Ladder Adult Fish Trap” facility at Priest Rapids Dam.
This year’s Columbia River basin fall chinook return is expected to number 347,500, slightly less than last year’s 422,500 actual return to the mouth of the river.
Anglers can receive up to $100 in rewards for providing information about tagged chinook salmon they catch in areas of the upper Columbia River drainage that opened for fishing July 1.
A Friday (July 13) Okanogan County Superior Court decision upholds a Washington state order that has reduced for the second time in five years irrigation withdrawals from the Methow and Twisp rivers.
A decision to withdraw a Oregon coast coho Endangered Species Act listing proposal was based on flawed science and needs to be rethought, according to “Findings and Recommendations” issued late last week by a Portland-based federal judge.
The fishing season sizzled, initially, but the return of upriver summer chinook salmon has fizzled to this point, forcing Oregon and Washington fishery managers to end lower Columbia River mainstem pursuit of the prized “June hogs.”
Upriver “spring” chinook salmon are perhaps the most unpredictable of Columbia/Snake River salmon stocks.
But one positive signal of the relative strength of next year’s adult run comes from near-record counts of “jack” spring chinook this year.
In judging whether salmon stock require protections, the federal government fails to satisfy an Endangered Species Act tenet when it excludes individual populations that “interbreed when mature,” while including others that don’t, according to a legal challenge to 16 West Coast listings.
The state of Montana and Columbia River basin salmon managers are at loggerheads, yet again, with competing plans for tapping Lake Koocanusa this summer.
Novel plans to remove contaminants from Columbia River basin sediments and discourage marine mammal predation on salmon are among the five “innovative,” on-the-ground fish and wildlife projects that are “highly justified” and merit immediate funding, according to the Independent Scientific Review Panel.
Before burning that $3 per gallon gas on a trip to buy fresh-caught salmon, it’s best to check with the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission’s harvest hotline.
Chinook salmon sport fishing on the Columbia River mainstem between Bonneville and Priest Rapids dams will be closed at the end of the day Monday, nearly a month sooner than planned.
The “AutoFish System” is helping Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife staff mark and tag fish faster and more effectively.
Northwest Montana’s Lion Lake has long been a popular and convenient destination for anglers, but judging from history, that’s about to change.
Critics say a budding new federal plan to avoid jeopardizing salmon and steelhead impacted by the Columbia/Snake river hydrosystem represents mostly status quo strategies that have previously been declared legally deficient under the Endangered Species Act.
Has the federal government erred by grouping wild salmon populations under Endangered Species Act listings that, because of their geographical separation, have little chance of kinship?
A marina upgrade project this spring dealt a blow to a multi-million dollar effort to restore kokanee salmon populations on north Idaho’s Lake Pend Oreille, wiping away 15 percent of the wild fry produced this year.
High, turbid flows through much of the 2006 season helped juvenile Snake River spring chinook survive at the highest rate yet during their annual migration through the eight-dam Columbia/Snake hydrosystem toward the ocean.
Columbia/Snake River federal dam operators closely toed the line last year, spilling water for juvenile salmon and steelhead passage as prescribed by a court preliminary injunction 98.3 percent of the time over the spring and summer.
A Federal Columbia River Power System draft proposed “action” and accompanying biological analyses previewed last month represents a “positive step forward” in salmon recovery efforts, according to some.
A Seattle-based federal judge today (Wednesday) ordered “endangered” species protections restored for wild Upper Columbia River steelhead stocks and declared NOAA Fisheries Service’s (NMFS) new hatchery listing policy contrary to the Endangered Species Act.
Agencies responsible for the operation of 13 federal dams in the Willamette River Basin submitted on May 31 a revised set of proposed actions intended to protect winter steelhead, spring chinook, bull trout, Oregon chub and other species listed as threatened or endangered under the federal Endangered Species Act.
Tribes with treaty fishing rights on the mainstem Columbia River want to tap a little deeper this year, and in the future, what has become, virtually, an unlimited resource — American shad.
A steadied flow of chinook salmon over Bonneville Dam has allowed Oregon and Washington fishery managers to expand sport fishing on the Columbia River mainstem from Tongue Point/Rocky Point near the river mouth to McNary Dam nearly 300 miles upstream.
The Bonneville Power Administrations plans to launch on June 7 an online “Report Center” that will contain a set of reports offering details about Columbia River basin fish and wildlife projects.
Oregon and Washington department of fish and wildlife officials on Wednesday extended the lower Columbia River spring chinook salmon sport fishing season through, potentially, June 15, with the goal of maximizing angler opportunity.
With the recent release of a Draft Environmental Impact Statement, another step was taken toward the tribal goal of boosting summer/fall chinook salmon abundance, and reintroducing long-extinct spring chinook, in north-central Washington’s Okanogan River basin.
On the heels of the Federal Drug Administration’s recent announcement that farm fish showed no contamination from recalled fish feed, state hatchery managers are moving forward with their stocking schedules and releasing fingerlings in several lakes and rivers across the state.
The gist of federal “action” agencies’ plan to push Columbia/Snake river basin salmon and steelhead stocks toward recovery, and thus away from extinction, was filed in federal court this week, nearly 20 months after the reigning plan was declared invalid under the Endangered Species Act.
Reserving water behind Libby Dam, and releasing it in “pulses” to prompt Kootenai white sturgeon spawning runs, may not be as vital if a developing plan to sculpture the river’s “braided reach” above Bonners Ferry proves viable.
A pair of fish and wildlife projects, including a long-running terminal fishery program in the lower Columbia River, had their “conditional” funding labels removed Wednesday after clearing scientific and economic hurdles placed by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
A successful pilot program launched last year that used genetics to determine the river origin of chinook salmon caught off Oregon’s central coast will begin its second season this month and expand to the entire coast off Oregon as well as to northern California waters.
Oregon and Washington fishery managers decided Tuesday that the risk of breaching Endangered Species Act impact limits is low enough to allow a reopening of sport fishing for spring chinook on the lower Columbia River mainstem.
Plans to address many of the same Endangered Species Act issues faced in the Columbia/Snake river system, including the threat of lawsuits, are being developed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for its projects in the Willamette River basin.
With 41,372 adult upriver spring chinook salmon having passed Bonneville Dam through Sunday, and an estimated 4,800 of the stock having been harvested in the lower river, fisheries officials feel the 2007 run is well on its way to matching preseason expectations.
The University of Montana’s Flathead Lake Biological Station has been awarded a three-year $4.6 million grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation to continue studying pristine salmon and trout watersheds along the Pacific Rim.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has confirmed the finding of melamine in fish feed at the Marion Forks Hatchery in Idanha, Ore.
The once distant threat of zebra mussels, and their kin, quagga mussels, has leapt closer to the Columbia River basin, a fact that should not be ignored by the public, government officials, or anyone else concerned about the health of the Northwest’s environment and economy.
The Bonneville Dam fish count windows are the focus now for Columbia River mainstem spring chinook fishers hoping for more time on the water to pursue the prized salmon species this year.
The state of Idaho, the Nez Perce Tribe, and the U.S. Department Interior announced on Tuesday they have resolved a number of water rights issues needed to finalize a major water rights agreement for the Snake River and begin implementing its provisions.
A cooperative fish-enhancement and wildlife-viewing project in Chelan County is moving forward with new state funding, as well as volunteer efforts that were recently recognized by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Anglers and netters have been making a dent in part of Lake Pend Oreille’s predator population in 2007, Idaho Fish and Game Regional Fishery Manager Ned Horner says.
The so-called “select area” fisheries project in the lower Columbia River seems to perform as advertised, though additional information is needed to truly gauge its biological and economic impacts and decide whether its expansion is warranted, according to a report prepared for the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
The Columbia River’s 2007 upriver spring chinook salmon return has begun to show some signs of life in recent days, but the jury’s still out on whether it’s a “late-time” run or it’s smaller than anticipated.
Spill began earlier this month at eight Columbia/Snake river mainstem federal hydro projects as a means of easing in-river migrations for juvenile salmon and steelhead moving downstream toward the Pacific Ocean.
The lower Columbia River has been closed to fishing this week as state fishery managers await surer signs of the strength of this year’s upriver spring chinook salmon run.
For the third year in a row, the spring chinook run toward hatcheries and spawning grounds above Bonneville Dam in Idaho, Oregon and Washington appears to be lagging.
Sea lions camped out below Bonneville Dam continue to show a persistent and adaptive nature, perhaps shifting more of their salmon eating to the dark hours to avoid daytime human harassment.
And a trap-and-haul effort appears to be, at least at the start, ineffective in reducing predation.
The status of the Oregon coast coho salmon under the Endangered Species Act started a legal and political firestorm years ago that eventually forced the NOAA Fisheries Service to take another look at 27 West Coast salmon and steelhead listings.
Columbia/Snake River Irrigators Association challenges to U.S. District Court Judge James A. Redden’s decisions on Columbia River basin salmon issues, and complaints about the judge himself, were rejected April 6 via a memorandum issued by a three-judge Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel.
The overall sport and commercial harvest of chinook salmon off the Washington and northern Oregon coasts this spring and summer will be held to slightly more that half what was allowed last year in order to protect what is expected to be a meager lower Columbia River “tule” run.
What are the differences between survival and migration traits of wild and hatchery steelhead smolts?
An Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife research project will attempt to answer that question and others over the next few months.
Scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the University of Washington published a paper Thursday that states habitat deterioration associated with climate change is likely to make salmon recovery in the Pacific Northwest much more difficult, especially in relatively untouched, high-elevation river basins.
For some anglers it’s catch-and-release, but for Idaho Power it’s more a matter of haul-and-release.
Last month company crews moved nearly 500,000 juvenile spring chinook salmon from the company’s Rapid River Hatchery near Riggins, Idaho, to locations on the Snake and Little Salmon rivers where they were released to begin their trip to the Pacific Ocean.
For the third year in a row, upriver spring chinook salmon returning to Columbia and Snake river tributaries and hatcheries appear to be playing a waiting game, with arrivals so far fewer than expected during the beginning of annual spawning run.
A “maximum” non-lethal effort to spook fish-eating sea lions away from the Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam seems to have had early success in at least one regard — nearly eliminating predation on big white sturgeon below the dam.
Lower Columbia River mainstem commercial fishermen scored big, relatively, on Tuesday night and were to venture out again late Thursday on a spring chinook salmon fishery that could push them up against their “impact” limits for the season.
Cool Dworshak reservoir water released in summer to improve conditions for juvenile salmon and steelhead migrating toward the ocean could possibly be doing double duty by providing a haven for subyearling fall chinook that choose to linger in-river, according to a “draft final” research report released earlier this month by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
A spike in mortalities of Spring Creek National Fish Hatchery juvenile fall chinook salmon passing Bonneville Dam last week disappeared as mysteriously as it had appeared.
The discovery of invasive quagga mussels in Lake Mead on January 6, 2007 elevates the
threat these species pose to the Pacific Northwest’s natural resources and economy, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials said this week.
Oregon and Washington managers approved a lower Columbia River mainstem fishery this week in part to answer questions about early season spring chinook “stock composition” in the river.
A 16-year stint with the Northwest Power and Conservation Council ends this week (March 9) for fish and wildlife division director Doug Marker, who resigned recently to pursue other career opportunities.
Caspian terns’ consumption of juvenile salmonids grew last year, as did the sheer numbers of another avian predator — doubled-crested cormorants — in the Columbia River estuary and elsewhere, according to a draft research report released this week.
A request by state salmon managers for specially-timed spill at Bonneville Dam to provide an extra passage route for juvenile Spring Creek National Fish Hatchery fall chinook tules was denied this week in a split — yes, no, or do-not-support-but-do-not-object — vote.
The attorney who won a landmark court case that threatened to undercut the threatened and endangered status of many salmon and steelhead runs on the West Coast died Sunday.
Oregon and Washington fisheries managers opted this week to bide their time, waiting for a more favorable mix of spring chinook salmon to enter the Columbia River before triggering a lower river mainstem commercial fishery.
Prospects for salmon fishing are down this year with fewer chinook and coho expected to return to most rivers in the region, according to preseason forecasts developed by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and treaty tribes.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council on Wednesday decided to seek assurances that long-term fish and wildlife funding agreements hammered out in federal court proceedings adhere to provisions of the Northwest Power Act.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week issued a plea to fish management entities to fuel research that might decide whether Snake River fall chinook salmon that migrate in-river to the ocean survive better to adulthood than those that are collected and barged downstream through the federal hydrosystem.
An evaluation of the survival of in-river Snake River fall chinook salmon migrants vs. that of fish barged downriver through the hydrosystem appears stalled, at least for this year, despite the urgings this week from the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
Technology that has been field tested by tracking Columbia Basin salmon as they migrate north along the Pacific coast will be refined and expanded worldwide thanks to $45 million in grants announced Monday by Canada’s Foundation for Innovation.
NOAA Fisheries Service has begun the process of developing new guidance to assist regional fishery management councils in developing measures to end overfishing in all U.S. commercial and recreational fisheries by 2010.
A “good effort” to clarify policy issues and narrow areas of scientific disagreement is ongoing, but federal agencies can’t promise that all will be happy at the end of the long-running collaboration with Columbia River basin tribes and states on the intricacies of a new hydrosystem salmon protection plan.
The hatchery vs. wild debate continues on several fronts with legal arguments concluded in at least two lawsuits that challenge the NOAA Fisheries Service’s new method for listing salmon and steelhead under the deserve Endangered Species Act.
A new fish trap system now under construction at Lower Granite Dam is expected to ease handling of migrating adult salmon and steelhead.
The capturing process should be easier for both returning salmon and employees at the facility, which is on the Lower Snake River.
The first, and as of Wednesday, only chinook salmon of 2007, crossed Bonneville Dam on the lower Columbia River on January 19.
The outlook for others expected to follow, bound for the Snake River, is for fewer fish than returned in 2006. Last year’s chinook returns were enough to allow limited seasons in Idaho.
A draft review of Oregon’s Eagle Creek National Fish Hatchery concludes the coho program there needs to eventually steer toward native broodstock, and its winter steelhead program may require termination if the out-of-basin products pose significant risk to protected, native Clackamas River stock.
The federal government this week triggered a process that could ultimately provide the states of Idaho, Oregon and Washington authority to lethally remove California sea lions that prey each spring on threatened and endangered salmon in the lower Columbia River.
The Nez Perce Tribe would consider additional gill-net fisheries this year targeting steelhead in the Snake River basin, but the immediate goals for implementing a new Tribal Fisheries Management Plan have been lowered, according to a tribal official.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials on Monday announced a formal proposal to remove legal protections for wolves in the Northern Rockies, a change that will proceed with or without Wyoming.
The federal judge who in 2001 triggered a three-year reassessment of West Coast salmon and steelhead Endangered Species Act listings is once again fielding arguments about how hatchery produced fish should be accounted for in evaluating species status.
Anglers may continue fishing for hatchery spring chinook salmon in the lower Columbia River from the Interstate 5 bridge downstream to Buoy 10 through April 15 under an agreement reached Thursday by Washington and Oregon fishery managers.
Nez Perce tribal officials said this week that they intended to implement their plan to increase their harvest of steelhead in the Snake River basin, beginning with a single gill-net permit Thursday through Saturday in the lower Clearwater.
An Idaho water users group this week cited results from a 2006 study as proof that migrating juvenile salmon do not suffer ill effects from passing down through four lower Snake River federal hydroprojects, and nor does barging the young fish through the hydrosystem hinder their chances of surviving to adulthood.
The federal agency charged with protecting Northwest salmon listed under the Endangered Species Act today approved a far-reaching plan to recover threatened chinook in Puget Sound.
A recent hydrosystem operations/fish and wildlife project funding agreement between the Bonneville Power Administration and five Columbia River tribes was described Wednesday as a step toward a broader agreement on how funding resources should be directed across the basin.
A solicitation for “innovative” fish and wildlife project proposals was approved this week, but its fleshing out awaits a Bonneville Power Administration determination on what it is willing to fund and how much it is able to spend.
A signed agreement filed Tuesday in federal court promises the support of five Columbia River tribes for a specific set of 2007 federal dam operations designed to improve salmon and steelhead survival in exchange for the promise of funding for more than $5 million worth of fish and wildlife projects.
A larger scale evaluation of the survival of transported juvenile Snake River fall chinook salmon compared to those that migrate in-river is in jeopardy due to a lack of available fish this year to launch the experiment.
The Warm Springs National Fish Hatchery experienced a significant loss of spring chinook fry in its incubators Tuesday morning.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, with support from federal fish management agencies, has asked Oregon and Washington for a five-year waiver of the states’ Columbia River water quality standards to accommodate spill at mainstem dams for migrating salmon and steelhead.
The future outlook for kokanee in Lake Pend Oreille is better today than it was a year ago.
However, efforts to reduce predators must be sustained to restore the popular kokanee and rainbow trout fisheries, say Idaho Department of Fish and Game officials.
A new piece has been thrown into the puzzle that is Snake River fall chinook salmon life history.
New research shows that a certain share of juvenile fish not only scatter throughout the Columbia/Snake river hydrosystem to prepare for ocean life, but also settle in freshwater below Bonneville Dam for the winter.
The forecast 2007 return of 78,500 adult upriver spring chinook salmon to the mouth of the Columbia River, if it holds true, would be the lowest since 1999 when only 42,500 made their way back from the ocean.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council last week approved a $657,800 within-year budget request to shore up a Kootenai white sturgeon hatchery water supply system that was overtaxed this year by high flows.
A new study indicates that Snake River spring/summer chinook salmon and steelhead transported downstream in barges as juveniles have more trouble than in-river migrants in finding their natal streams and passing dams when they return as adults to spawn.
Timing, not the stress from barge travel, is the most likely reason that transported juvenile Snake River spring chinook salmon have greater overall post-Bonneville Dam mortality than those migrating in-river to the ocean, according to an article published in the November edition of the American Fisheries Society’s on-line journal “Transactions.”
The number of returning Columbia River fall chinook salmon next year will likely fall below 400,000 adult fish for the second year in a row, according to a preliminary forecast issued this week by the Oregon and Washington departments of fish and wildlife.
A long-running terminal fishing program in the Columbia River estuary costs more than the benefit it generates but does perform better economically than other basin harvest-producing enterprises, according to a recently completed draft report.
An increasingly volatile climate over the past decade provides environmental clues to better predict just when Columbia River basin spring chinook salmon will make their spawning surge upriver, according to a study conducted this year by University of Idaho researchers.
Fish management agencies from Oregon, Washington and Idaho announced this week that they have asked the federal government for permission to use lethal means, as a last resort, to remove individual California sea lions that prey on chinook salmon and steelhead below the Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council on Wednesday put the cap on its 2007-2009 recommendation process with a final decision document that details how and why it made its decisions on specific fish and wildlife project funding and programmatic issues.
The so-called Comparative Survival Study this week earned partial funding for fiscal year 2007, enough to prepare a “retrospective” report describing the 10-year-old project’s methods and results and to outfit some 240,000 juvenile salmon with PIT tags so their survival can be tracked.
A congressionally driven process is building momentum toward its goal of delicately balancing Columbia River Basin hatchery production so it provides desired harvest and, at the same time, protects threatened and endangered salmon and steelhead.
Legal punches and counterpunches have begun in no fewer than five lawsuits challenging NOAA Fisheries’ methods for determining whether West Coast salmon and steelhead stocks should be protected under the Endangered Species Act.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Fisheries Service said this week that it had reached an important agreement with the state of Idaho and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that spells out how the state and the two federal agencies will
cooperate under the Endangered Species Act for the long-term
benefit of both fish and foresters in the state.
The Northwest Power and Conservation on Wednesday completed its fiscal year 2007-2009 fish and wildlife project funding recommendations with but a few, albeit sometimes contentious, changes from a draft list produced a month ago.
The Entiat National Fish Hatchery spring chinook program should be terminated because it provides little harvest benefit and poses “significant straying genetic risk” to naturally produced, listed stocks in the Entiat River subbasin, according to a report released Oct. 13 by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
A pilot study aimed at determining the origins of ocean-caught chinook salmon proved successful this summer, raising hopes for the eventual implementation of in-season management protocols.
A 15-year analysis of spawning steelhead in one Oregon fishery concludes that fish from traditional hatcheries which migrate to the ocean and return to spawn in natural habitat, produce fewer offspring than their wild relatives.
A long, relatively strong “tail” to the upriver fall chinook salmon run enabled Oregon and Washington fishery managers to reopen the lower Columbia River mainstem chinook season to anglers today (Oct. 13).
Issues have “narrowed” but much work still needs to be done before agencies put together a federal Columbia/Snake river hydrosystem “action ” that can be judged as to whether or not it jeopardizes the existence of protected salmon and steelhead, according to a report filed this week in U.S. District Court.
NOAA Fisheries Service on Sept. 29 released a proposed Endangered Species Act recovery plan for upper Columbia spring chinook salmon and steelhead that it says meets requirements under the Endangered Species Act.
A strong pulse of salmon continued passing over Bonneville Dam this week, prompting fishery officials to nudge upwards their estimates of the size of the 2006 upriver fall chinook run.
The No. 1 disease facing the commercial sector of the Idaho trout industry may soon be better controlled by an improved vaccine being developed by a University of Idaho fisheries scientist.
Only three adult sockeye survived the 900-mile trip up the Columbia, Snake and Salmon rivers this year, matching the low since 1999, when hatchery-origin fish used to keep the run alive first began returning.
The level of northern Idaho’s Lake Pend Oreille will be held higher longer, then dropped more rapidly than normal this fall in hopes of leaving newly laid lake trout eggs high and dry and, ultimately, reduce the number of those voracious predators.
Attorneys for the U.S. government and the state of Idaho say a request to have the looming Upper Snake biological opinion remand focused on the augmentation of river flows would undercut federal authorities and go contrary to previous judicial direction.
Even as the Northwest Power and Conservation Council enters its budget-setting stretch run, it is hearing that the nation’s largest fish and wildlife mitigation effort is not large enough.
Anglers will be required to release any chinook salmon they catch during the rest of this season on two major sections of the Columbia River under new rules approved Wednesday by fishery managers from Washington and Oregon.
For most of the summer, a blue catamaran raft has been plying Montana’s Flathead river system, outfitted with an unusual array of high-tech equipment rather than coolers and tackle boxes.
The number of returning summer chinook salmon greatly exceeded the 10-year average, according to the federal agencies responsible for salmon recovery efforts in the federal Columbia River hydropower system.
A federal submittal says agencies will do the work necessary to correct “legal deficiencies” in 2005’s biological opinion on the operation of upper Snake River irrigation projects, and offers a brief outline of progress reporting tasks and schedule.
Hot late August and early September chinook salmon fishing could force closure of that sport fishery on the lower Columbia River mainstem as early as next week, according to Oregon and Washington officials.
A new book of essays from more than 30 salmon scientists, policy analysts and wild salmon advocates suggesting ways to save runs of wild salmon has been published by the American Fisheries Society – and some of the prescriptions are certain to raise a few eyebrows.
U.S. District Court Judge James A. Redden this week gave legal adversaries two weeks to develop a schedule and plan for reworking a biological opinion on federal irrigation projects in the upper Snake River basin that is “coordinated” with an ongoing remand of a BiOp on lower Snake and Columbia river hydro projects.
The Bonneville Power Administration will have the tools to raise power rates in dire times, if need be, to meet Endangered Species Act costs stemming from ongoing litigation in federal court, according to a report filed earlier this month.
Meeting this week in Pendleton, Ore., with some 300 Northwest tribal leaders, officials from EPA’s Region 10 indicated that state water quality standards may not be approved until fish consumption rates are increased to adequately protect Native Americans, who eat a lot more fish than people in the general population.
Bold leadership and political compromise will be necessary if irrigators in the Yakima River Basin expect congressional approval and funding to build Black Rock Reservoir for off-stream storage.
A number of funding decisions remain in limbo as the Northwest Power and Conservation Council enters the stretch run in deciding which of $1 billion in funding requests will fit into a fish and wildlife program budget that holds about half that amount for fiscal years 2007-2009.
If optimal water conditions are provided during warm weather migrations, adult salmon and steelhead will find it and use it to their benefit, according to a new report issued by the Idaho Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit at the University of Idaho.
Changed troll fishery management intended to benefit Canadian fish appear to have the pleasant side effect of reducing the toll on at least one protected Columbia River basin salmon stock, according to a report prepared for the Pacific Salmon Commission.
Oregon State University scientists are teaming with commercial fishermen on a new research effort to rapidly identify the home river basin of chinook salmon found in the Pacific Ocean using genetic testing.
A July 21 letter from the Bonneville Power Administration’s CEO Steve Wright reiterates the agency’s intent to defer funding for new Nez Perce tribal hatchery facilities while the project’s full biological benefits are weighed in an ongoing court-ordered process.
The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife is seeking public comments on a draft scientific report designed to lay the foundation for a new management plan for Washington steelhead.
This year’s spring chinook salmon return to the Columbia River was belated, but eventually provided fair fishing for sport and commercial fishers alike, according to a season summary released this week by the Oregon and Washington departments of fish and wildlife.
A process to rebuild the government’s salmon protection strategy for the Columbia River hydrosystem is on track, aiming for recovery of imperiled salmon and steelhead stocks, federal attorneys told U.S. District Court Judge James A. Redden July 21.
Columbia River mainstem fishers will make a smooth transition next week to “fall” salmon fishing after one of the most successful summer seasons in more than three decades.
The Kootenai Tribe of Idaho, Idaho Department of Fish and Game, and federal agencies have opened a new chapter in efforts to conserve and recover Kootenai River white sturgeon.
The Independent Scientific Advisory Board likes the concept, but says a proposal to make all Columbia River basin fish and wildlife data available through one internet source should start first as a demonstration/pilot project.
Survival of juvenile Snake River spring chinook salmon from Lower Granite Dam to Bonneville Dam was higher in 2006 — 58 percent — than it has been since federal research began in 1993, according to researchers.
The Endangered Species Act is often “used as a tool to drive up costs for our electricity ratepayers,” U.S. Rep. Cathy McMorris said during a July 7 congressional oversight field hearing in Pasco, Wash.
The state of affairs will become clearer in the coming weeks within the federal government’s “collaborative” process to reconstruct its Columbia River hydrosystem salmon protection plan.
A near doubling of the projected Upper Columbia summer chinook return from previous predictions has removed fears that the mainstem sport salmon fishing season would have to be ended prior to the weekend and the looming Fourth of July holiday.
Rapidly rising Snake River water temperatures this week forced an early tapping of Dworshak Reservoir’s cool waters to improve conditions for migrating salmon downstream.
Officials from tribes, fish agencies, the U.S. Forest Service, local government, Grant Public Utility District and interested individuals on Wednesday met in Leavenworth, Wash., to discuss preliminary projects that could help restore populations of Upper Columbia River spring chinook salmon to the White River.
Idaho Power this month has begun trapping spring chinook salmon at both the Hells Canyon Dam and its Rapid River Hatchery with a combined capture goal of 2,700 fish for artificial spawning.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration this week released its annual report to Congress on the status of U.S. marine fisheries for 2005, noting some progress toward reducing the number of stocks that are overfished.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week endorsed expansion of the hatchery captive broodstock program that is the sole barrier between Snake River sockeye salmon and extinction.
A Snake River sockeye salmon captive broodstock hatchery program that continues the genetic line of “Lonesome Larry” earned a groundswell of support this week after receiving a critical scientific review.
The near edge of that “black box” called the Pacific Ocean has been pried open by NOAA Fisheries scientists who say they can gauge how well juvenile salmon and steelhead survive during that crucial time when they move from Columbia River freshwater to saltwater.
A hoped-for June start to construction on a $16.4 million Northeast Oregon Hatchery complex has been deferred as the project’s funding source, the Bonneville Power Administration, awaits assurances that it will bring desired Endangered Species Act “credit.”
New “PIT tag” data analysis developed by NOAA Fisheries should better allow the agency to calculate survival rates of adult salmon and steelhead as they attempt their spawning journey up through the Columbia and Snake rivers’ system of dams and reservoirs.
The Independent Scientific Review Panel last Friday (June 2) issued its preliminary review of projects proposed for inclusion in the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s Columbia River basin fish and wildlife program during the 2007-2009 funding cycle.
Nearly all of the 3.5 million fall chinook salmon smolts scheduled for release from the Ringold Springs Hatchery on the upper Columbia River have died – most likely of botulism poisoning, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) said last Friday (June 2).
The “spring” 2006 non-tribal commercial harvest on the lower Columbia River mainstem officially ended this week as a result of an unexpectedly high catch of unmarked upriver chinook salmon and the downsizing of chinook return estimates.
A 2005 document giving Endangered Species Act clearance to federal dam operations on the upper Snake River is illegal, U.S. District Court Judge James A. Redden said in a Tuesday opinion and order.
Fishery experts now predict the 2006 upriver spring chinook salmon return Columbia River will total 125,000 adult fish, well beyond a preseason forecast of 88,400 and better than last year’s final tally of 106,900.
Nature has played right into the hands of federal agencies this week who began implementation of a “flow pulse” from Montana’s Libby Dam intended to trigger Kootenai River white sturgeon’s spawning movements.
Sport and commercial fisheries resumed this week on the lower Columbia River mainstem, justified by a rising Bonneville Dam spring chinook salmon count that now portends a return of better than 100,000 adult fish.
Idaho anglers will have a spring chinook salmon season this year.
The Idaho Fish and Game Commission Thursday approved a limited spring chinook salmon season, opening Saturday May 20 on the Upper Snake River in Hells Canyon, Lower Salmon River, Clearwater River, including the North and South forks, and the Little Salmon River.
In Lake Pend Oreille in northern Idaho, populations of predatory fish species, particularly rainbow trout and lake trout, are too high to be sustained by the declining kokanee salmon population.
The latest arriving upriver spring chinook salmon run on record has, apparently, arrived, allowing Oregon and Washington officials to reopen the sport fishing season on the Columbia River mainstem above Bonneville Dam and ponder additional non-tribal commercial fisheries in the lower mainstem.
A $16.4 million Nez Perce hatchery construction project was given a conditional green light by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council Tuesday, though state water permitting and Endangered Species Act hurdles remain before the first shovel of dirt is turned.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week recommended more that $6 million in “within-year” fish and wildlife project funding adjustments with the vast majority coming its capital expense account.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released this week the assessments and recommendations report for the Warm Springs National Fish Hatchery (Warm Springs NFH) review.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Fisheries Service last week announced it has approved sharp reductions in sport and commercial fishing opportunity up and down the West Coast in large part to protect depleted Klamath River fall chinook salmon to the south of Oregon’s Cape Falcon and north of Humbug Mountain to protect Lower Columbia coho salmon and other depleted stocks.
An upriver spring chinook salmon has shown some signs of life in recent days but counts at the Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam remain at historic lows for this point in the season.
White sturgeon harvest management on the Columbia River is tightening to better protect a species besieged by sea lion predation in the waters below Bonneville Dam and plagued by relatively poor natural production in upstream pools.
Despite legal battles raging in the background about responsibility and costs, the Environmental Protection Agency continues to push ahead with its evaluation of whether pollution in the upper Columbia River and Lake Roosevelt in Washington poses enough risk to warrant designation of the area as a Superfund site.
The Army Corps of Engineers began collecting and barging migrating juvenile salmonids at the Snake River’s Lower Granite Dam this week, but will hold off smolt transportation at two downstream dams until next week.
A favorable vote next month by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council would trigger a summertime start to construction on the Northeast Oregon Hatchery, part of a vision first adopted into the Council’s Fish and Wildlife program nearly 20 years ago.
Oregon and Washington fishery officials expressed optimism that this year’s upriver spring chinook salmon will eventually make a surge towards their home hatcheries and spawning areas in reasonably high numbers.
Fishing and conservation groups in a complaint have asked a federal court to restore “endangered” species protections for naturally produced upper Columbia steelhead and declare invalid a “hatchery listing policy” that tallies both hatchery and wild stocks in assessments of species’ vitality.
The Pacific Fisheries Management Council voted this to allow what would be the lowest combined sport and commercial salmon harvest ever off the Oregon and California coasts, and sharply reduced harvests north of Oregon’s Cape Falcon to the Canadian border.
Documents filed in federal court this week detail how Federal Columbia River Power System agencies plan to implement court-ordered spill for fish passage this spring and summer and how a “collaborative” effort to rework the hydrosystem salmon protection plan is progressing.
A Canadian-based effort to track salmon and other sea-going creatures up the North Pacific coast’s continental shelf will fully flower this spring and summer with the goal of detailing fish movements and survival that have to this point mostly mystified fish managers.
The Oregon and Washington fish and wildlife departments beginning April 1 will expand on federal efforts to keep sea lions and other pinnipeds ill at ease in the waters below Bonneville Dam.
A plan to relocate much of the world’s largest Caspian tern colony from their Columbia River estuary nesting site will not jeopardize the survival of protected salmon and steelhead in areas where biologists envision the birds will make new homes.
Relatively low numbers of spring chinook salmon in test fisheries and at dam counting windows have made Oregon and Washington fishery managers wary of the future and forced non-tribal commercial fishers to remain docked for the second week in a row.
Montana state officials say a developing long-term plan to carry out spill operations at Libby Dam for the benefit of the endangered white sturgeon faces a major legal obstacle that could plug up the dam’s spillways for years to come.
An independent scientific review agrees with criticisms on numerous technical points but says the Fish Passage Center’s ongoing Comparative Survival Study is generally heading in the right direction and doing well with the tools at hand.
Sport and commercial salmon fishing opportunities off the Oregon and Washington coasts will limited this summer as compared to recent years with one alternative under consideration that would close all fisheries from the north Oregon coast to Cape Sur just south of San Francisco.
The swelling presence of upriver spring chinook salmon and protected wild winter steelhead in the lower Columbia River has forced non-tribal commercial fishers off the mainstem until at least late next week.
Idaho Power Company late last month awarded Starr Corporation of Twin Falls a contract worth approximately $10 million to build a new salmon/steelhead hatchery complex on the site of the company’s upper Pahsimeroi Fish Hatchery in central Idaho.
Grant County PUD moved one step closer in the relicensing process for the Priest Rapids Project when commissioners adopted a resolution that establishes a Habitat Conservation Account and a No Net Impact Fund (NNI).
Some 7.5 million juvenile “tule” fall chinook salmon released from Spring Creek National Fish Hatchery Thursday (March 2) will have intricate juvenile bypass systems, the turbines and the relatively new “corner collector” for passage routes as they head downriver through Bonneville Dam.
Even though the Klickitat Subbasin Anadromous Fishery master plan’s hatchery scheme is still a work in progress, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s Fish and Wildlife Committee has recommended that $474,000 be spent this fiscal year for an environmental review of related passage improvement proposals.
Among the 4H’s of salmon recovery, harvest won the headlines Tuesday (Feb. 21) when three Northwest Congressmen conducted their third public meeting to gather information on the survival of returning adult salmon and steelhead populations.
Tribal fishers are being asked for information that will help guide the management and operation of an 800 square foot commercial fish processing facility being built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers at East White Salmon in Washington.
Columbia River basin federal, state and tribal salmon managers have asked hydro operators to spill at least 50,000 cubic feet per second of water at Bonneville Dam to pass about 7.5 million tule fall chinook being released March 2 from the Spring Creek hatchery located alongside the Bonneville pool.
The federal agency responsible for protecting salmon in the Pacific Northwest last week hired Jim Waldo, a regionally respected attorney, facilitator and hatchery expert, to oversee a strategy leading to hatchery reform, said federal agencies in a joint press release.
A federal judge has dismissed three Idaho irrigation districts’ cross claims asking for an order to end harvest of salmon in the Columbia/Snake river basin and flow augmentation from Upper Snake River reservoirs.
Nearly $4.2 million in within-year fish and wildlife project funding budget expansions got the endorsement Wednesday of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
An Earthwise Knowledge Initiative Publication
