[env-trinity] Fwd: CBB: Study Analyzes Benefits Of 'Mark-Selective' Fishing For Wild Salmon Populations

[Kier Associates]

'Takes me back..

 

It's been nearly 20 years, but the late Nat Bingham and I spent nearly a
year - fruitlessly - trying to promote mark-selective salmon fishing for CA
by seeking a federal appropriations earmark to provide CA Fish & Game with
funds for undertaking universal marking of hatchery salmon

 

We successfully approached then-North Coast Congressman Dan Hamburg and had
the earmark in gear before meeting with the DFG oppostion at the old NMFS
Tiburon Lab. 

 

The DFGers brought in Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission personnel
to beef up their opposition, which, if memory serves, turned on two main
concerns : 1- that hooking mortality, particularly for coho, was
unacceptably high; and 2- that there were too many management programs that
relied on longtime series of fractional marking data to simply chuck it all
for a new mark-selective fishing regime

 

As these things go, critical junctures in the federal appropriation process
were missed, Nat and I had trouble figuring out what was going on with the
Hamburgers, and, when we did, we found they had quietly shelved our
initiative because of the DFG opposition.

 

Such is the stuff conservation leadership is too often made of

 

To be fair, not all the opposition came from the fish bureaucrats. Earl
Carpenter of Bodega Bay was still regarded as 'the Captain' of CA's
commercial salmon fishing fleet and he growled 'you're going to be sorry as
hell if you succed - you're going to find there's a hell of a lot more
naturals out there then you think.   'Would that it were so!

 

In those days Jim Martin (cc-ed here), then ODF&W's fisheries chief was
pushing hard - and successfully - for what is now the NW's universal
hatchery marking/mark-selective salmon fishing regime

 

Fishing with Jim on the Willamette last year for spring salmon (the mainstem
Columbia was closed) I tied into a beauty which took me several minutes to
crank up close enough to the boat to see the ad fin. It was an absolutely
huge, gorgeous fish and my heart filled, frankly, for the opportunity to
turn it loose, hopefully to produce more lunkers like him/her

 

I'm still wrapped around one of the assignments that the visionary Nat
Bingham - who's been gone 14 years now - gave me, and that's boosting,
however I can, genetic stock identification (see, e.g.,
http://www.pacificfishtrax.org/media/2pagers/Genetics%20CROOS%20Summary%201J
an10.pdf 

 

Hopefully, between the two technologies - mark-selective fishing and GSI -
we can pass salmon on to the next seven generations 

 

Bill Kier

Kier Associates, Fisheries and Watershed Professionals 
P.O Box 915 
Blue Lake, CA 95525 
(707) 668-1822 
Mobile: 707.498.7847   
 <http://www.kierassociates.net/> www.kierassociates.net 
GSA Contractor GS10F0124U

From: env-trinity-bounces at velocipede.dcn.davis.ca.us
[mailto:env-trinity-bounces at velocipede.dcn.davis.ca.us] On Behalf Of Tom
Stokely
Sent: Friday, July 27, 2012 8:22 PM
To: env-trinity at velocipede.dcn.davis.ca.us
Subject: [env-trinity] Fwd: CBB: Study Analyzes Benefits Of 'Mark-Selective'
Fishing For Wild Salmon Populations

 

From: "Sari Sommarstrom" <sari at sisqtel.net>

Date: July 27, 2012 6:16:01 PM PDT

To: "Trinity River e-news" <env-trinity at velocipede.dcn.davis.ca.us>

Cc: "Tom_Stokely" <tstokely at att.net>

Subject: CBB: Study Analyzes Benefits Of 'Mark-Selective' Fishing For Wild
Salmon Populations





THE COLUMBIA BASIN BULLETIN:

Weekly Fish and Wildlife News

www.cbbulletin.com

July 27, 2012

Issue No. 630

 

Study Analyzes Benefits Of 'Mark-Selective' Fishing For Wild Salmon
Populations

 

A fish marking practice commonly used in Washington and Oregon could
significantly increase wild salmon populations in California, while allowing
continued harvest of abundant hatchery populations, according to a recent
study published in Marine and Coastal Fisheries.

 

The article, first published June 18, is authored by Brian J. Pyper of
Cramer Fish Sciences and Fish Metrics, Steven P. Cramer of Cramer Fish
Sciences and Randoph P. Ericksen of Cramer Fish Sciences and the Wild Salmon
Center.

 

California wild chinook salmon populations, including several populations
that are protected under the Endangered Species Act, have declined over the
past decades. This has led to increased management restrictions on
commercial and recreational fisheries, as well as increased reliance on
hatchery-raised fish to support those fisheries.

 

In Oregon and Washington, nearly all hatchery salmon produced for harvest
receive a visible mark, while wild salmon remain unmarked and are therefore
easily identified in ocean and river fisheries. When adult salmon are
caught, marked hatchery salmon are kept, while unmarked wild salmon in most
cases must be released back to the ocean or river.

 

This practice of "mark-selective fishing" has enabled many salmon fisheries
in Oregon and Washington to continue despite serious concerns for the
abundance of wild salmon, according to the recently published study. As an
example naturally produced fish from a total of 13 salmon and steelhead
stocks originating in the Columbia River basin are protected from non-tribal
harvest.

 

Although California has not adopted this practice, the new study suggests
that mark-selective fishing could result in substantial increases in wild
salmon populations while maintaining important harvest opportunities, the
research paper says.

 

"A harvest strategy that targets hatchery salmon over wild salmon makes
sense when hatchery salmon are plentiful but are mixed with depleted wild
populations" said Steve Cramer, founding scientist of the consulting firm
Cramer Fish Sciences, and co-author of the publication. "If wild salmon
populations in California continue to struggle and we do not find a solution
that enables targeted capture of hatchery fish while allowing wild fish to
escape, then it is likely that salmon fishing in California will be
increasingly constrained to low levels."

 

The study used data on the actual abundance and harvest of chinook salmon in
northern California's Central Valley and the ocean off California over two
decades (1988-2007) to examine how mark-selective fishing regulations would
have affected harvest and spawner abundance.

 

The study showed that selective fishing could have, if applied to past
fishing seasons, doubled the number of wild salmon in California rivers. At
the same time, it would have allowed substantial harvests of hatchery fish,
depending on the proportion of salmon that were of hatchery origin.

 

The key results of the study applied to recent years (2001-2007) in which
ocean fisheries were constrained to protect weak wild populations.

 

"We examined a range of plausible scenarios of fishing effort and hatchery
salmon abundance," Cramer explained. "When 60 percent or more of the salmon
are from hatcheries, the mark-selective scenarios generally allowed for
higher total harvests of salmon and modest increases in wild populations
compared to the traditional regulations that were in place to constrain
harvest and protect wild fish."

 

The study cited other research that estimated hatchery fish have composed as
high as 90 percent of chinook off California in recent years.

 

About 35 million juvenile chinook are released each year from Central Valley
hatcheries, but most of these fish are unmarked.

 

"The high cost of marking all hatchery fish, and the challenge of working
out new methods to estimate catch-and-release mortality of wild salmon has
hindered fisheries agencies in California from implementing mark-selective
fisheries," Cramer said. "Despite these challenges, the results of our study
suggest that serious consideration and evaluation of mark-selective
fisheries for California salmon are warranted."

 

The full study, "Implications of Mark-Selective Fishing for Ocean Harvests
and Escapements of Sacramento River Fall Chinook Salmon Populations," can be
found here:http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/19425120.2012.679575

 

 

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