Comments on the Scope of the Environmental Impact Statement for Two Joint State and Tribal Resource Management Plans for Puget Sound Region Hatchery Programs;

per FR 04–10788 (5–11–04)

 

Submitted by

Washington Trout

PO Box 402 Duvall, WA 98019; 425/788-1167; wildfish@washingtontrout.org

 

July 12, 2004

 

 

Introduction

Please accept these comments and references submitted in response to NOAA’s request for public input published in the Federal Register as identified above.  Please also acknowledge these comments as a request to be included on the mailing list of persons/organizations interested in the EIS on the two Resource Management Plans for Puget Sound Region Hatchery Programs.

 

The Scoping Notice published in the Federal Register (FR 04–10788; 5–11–04) explains that the EIS will attempt to evaluate a “full range of reasonable alternatives” to the proposed action, identified as “implementation of the co-managers’ Resource Management Plans.” By the time of the FR Notice, NOAA does not appear to have identified a specific list of potential alternatives for analysis, beside the proposed action, no action, and two roughly described “additional alternatives:” (1) a decrease in artificial production in selected programs that have a primary goal of augmenting fisheries, and (2) an increase in artificial production in selected programs that have a primary goal of augmenting fisheries.

 

The FR Notice requests input from the interested public regarding: “other possible alternatives; the direct, indirect, and cumulative impacts that implementation of the proposed Resource Management Plans could have on endangered and threatened species and their communities and habitats; potential adaptive management and/or monitoring provisions; funding issues; baseline environmental conditions; other plans or projects that might be relevant to this proposed project; and potential methods to minimize and mitigate for impacts.” Washington Trout respectfully offers its input on several of these parameters.

 

Proposed Action

In August 2003, Washington Trout submitted to the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife a review of all of the chinook Hatchery and Genetic Management Plans and all of the coho and steelhead Hatchery and Genetic Management Plans prepared by WDFW for inclusion in the Joint Resource Management Plan for Puget Sound Chinook Salmon Hatcheries, and the Joint Resource Management Plan for Puget Sound Steelhead, and Coho, Pink, Chum, and Sockeye Salmon Hatcheries. The review identified some general concerns that run throughout all or many of the chinook, coho, and steelhead HGMPs.  These include our assessment that:

·        In general, the HGMPs fail to adequately describe clear program goals, justifications, performance standards and indicators, or adequately detailed monitoring and evaluation protocols or timetables;

·        A number of erroneous and/or unsupported assumptions run throughout the HGMPs;

·        Many of the HGMPs contain critical deficiencies and omissions;

·        There is a consistent failure to quantify, as required, the estimated take of listed Puget Sound chinook;

·        The overall size of the chinook hatchery program in Puget Sound is far too large with respect to any reasonable “acceptable levels” of competition, predation, and related genetic and ecological impacts upon indigenous wild chinook;

·        The overall size of the coho and steelhead hatchery programs in Puget Sound are far too large with respect to any reasonable “acceptable levels” of competition, predation, and ecological impacts upon indigenous wild chinook;

·        The HGMPs are often in direct conflict with critical elements of WDFW’s own Wild Salmonid Policy.

 

The HGMPs generally provided no reason to believe that unacceptable levels of take of listed species will not occur as a result of hatchery operations proposed and described in each. The HGMPs committed to no readily identifiable, measurable performance standards or indicators. Nor did they identify alternative management actions that will or might be undertaken in light of the evaluation of the results of a clear quantitative monitoring program. The responses provided to individual queries in the HGMP Template were often cursory, lacking in sufficient detail, and sometimes inappropriate.

 

Many of the HGMPs contained essentially the same answers to critical sections of the HGMP Template that deal with program justifications, performance standards, alternatives to the proposed actions, and the monitoring and evaluation of the proposed action, often utilizing the same vague language, consistently failing to adequately address these particular queries. These and other redundant failures run throughout the chinook, coho, and steelhead HGMPs.

 

In general, Washington Trout is skeptical about the size and scope of individual programs and the PS hatchery program in aggregate, about rearing and release strategies and techniques employed by WDFW, and about many of the fundamental assumptions underlying WDFW hatchery practices. WDFW’s Puget Sound hatchery program is simply too large to responsibly accommodate the level of uncertainty presented in the HGMPs.

 

 

The WDFW HGMPs by and large share a central flaw, a general unwillingness or inability to adequately quantify estimates of the harm the individual programs may be doing to natural chinook populations in Puget Sound, or estimates of the benefits the HGMPs claim derive from the programs. Levels of take are consistently characterized as unknown. Levels of benefit are described in cursory, vague language, generally as “fish for harvest,” without providing sufficient detail about how many fish, caught where, by whom, and at what total value. Few adequate standards, targets, or thresholds are offered for either harm or benefit. Efforts to determine and/or monitor levels of harm and benefit, standards for each, or any measures or timetables to meet those standards are not adequately described.

 

Washington Trout’s review found the WDFW HGMPs inadequate to justify take authorization under the criteria enumerated in the 4d Rule. We suggested that WDFW withdraw many of the applications for redraft, if it can provide the necessary information. If the necessary information is unavailable at this time, we suggest that WDFW reconsider some of the particular programs, either discontinuing or significantly scaling them back until it can provide pertinent information adequate to warrant take authorization.

 

The Washington Trout review of the WDFW HGMPs is attached to the RMPs as part of the take-authorization application submitted to NOAA Fisheries for ESA review, along with other public comments submitted to WDFW, and WDFW’s published responses to public input. We request that NOAA specifically reference the full text of WT review as an integral component of these comments, in considering the scope of issues to be analyzed regarding the direct, indirect, and cumulative impacts that implementation of the proposed Resource Management Plans could have on endangered and threatened species and their communities and habitats; potential adaptive management and/or monitoring provisions; other plans or projects that might be relevant to this proposed project; and potential methods to minimize and mitigate for impacts.

 

In October 2003, WDFW published responses to 24 sets of comments it received regarding the HGMPs, including the WT review. Washington Trout explicitly characterized many of its specific comments as “requests to supply more detailed information to meet the requirements of the HGMP Template and the 4d Rule,” and WDFW appears to commit to providing some of that information. Most significantly, to developing and identifying measurable performance standards and indicators adequate to evaluate harmful impacts, and to developing monitoring programs adequate to measuring hatchery performance relative to the standards and indicators.

 

However, the responses offer little detail, promising information during the development of the EIS at issue here. WDFW asserts that the ESA does not require numeric performance standards, but they offer to provide them.   In some other cases, WDFW appears to concur and/or admit that requested information or recommended approaches would be “useful” in evaluating the HGMPs.  Again, it defers providing any specific information until completion of the EIS. WDFW summarizes many comments, and some individual responses appear to be attempts to answer several comments at once. Many of WDFW’s summaries are extremely brief, and the responses lack significant detail, so some clarification is necessary.

 

For instance, WDFW summarizes WT’s comments regarding the HGMP’s failure to adequately describe monitoring plans:

Detailed description of the monitoring plans and methods related to the performance indicators is not provided.

WDFW concurs, and promises “additional details” as it participates in the “iterative, ongoing review leading to the distribution of the Final Environmental Impact Statement.”

 

However, our comments included many specific suggestions and requests, including a list of contingent management responses to monitoring findings. We recommended criteria for performance indicators. The response doesn’t make it clear if WDFW concurs with all, some, or any of the details of our relevant comments, or what types of “additional details” it will eventually provide.

 

WDFW challenges the merits of some specific comments. They claim that the ESA does not require them to provide numerical estimates of potential take from hatchery operations. They disagree that predation is a concern. However, some other responses appear to have misinterpreted a comment or fail to address important specific examples, citations, and requests. WDFW’s summary of a WT comment reads:

WDFW incorrectly assumes that there is a “unique narrow period of time during which an overwhelming majority of wild juveniles migrate downstream and out of the river basin.”

The response indicates that WDFW did provide information (in “many” HGMPS) regarding out-migration timing of wild juveniles that should address our concern. But the explicitly clear point of the comments from which the quotation is taken was that WDFW’s assertion in the HGMPs that hatchery and wild juveniles are being effectively segregated temporally is not supported by the available information, not simply that the information was not presented. This much more relevant issue is not addressed by the response, except to note that all “available” information on “natural-origin” out-migration will eventually be provided.

 

While WDFW does commit to providing information in the future, very little information is actually provided in the published responses. Concerns about competition, many critical omissions, the overall scale of the program, and the failure of the HGMPs to comply with the Wild Salmonid Policy or align with other recovery initiatives go unanswered. Specific requests and recommendations are ignored. Most significantly, the responses do not address the concern identified repeatedly in the WT review that the HGMPs do not attempt to support or even elaborate the critical assertion that hatchery juveniles are effectively segregated from wild juveniles during rearing. WDFW does not respond to recommendations to provide proposals with estimated timelines for filling current data-gaps.

 

NOAA Fisheries will apparently be considering all the public comments submitted to WDFW regarding its HGMPs, as well as the substance of WDFW’s responses, during its ESA evaluations of the HGMPs and the RMPs. WDFW has committed to providing NOAA additional information during the preparation of the EIS being scoped here; presumably NOAA will utilize that information in its NEPA review. It would seem appropriate to analyze as well information pertinent to outstanding issues that may not be provided by WDFW, either in its original responses, or in supplements provided during the NEPA review process.

 

In addition to information provided by WDFW during the NEPA review, NOAA should include the full text of the WT review, the pertinent WDFW responses, and its own analyses of outstanding issues raised in public comments that have not been adequately addressed by WDFW’s responses, in considering the scope of issues to be analyzed regarding the direct, indirect, and cumulative impacts that implementation of the proposed Resource Management Plans could have on endangered and threatened species and their communities and habitats; potential adaptive management and/or monitoring provisions; other plans or projects that might be relevant to this proposed project; and potential methods to minimize and mitigate for impacts. NOAA should particularly include in its NEPA review information necessary to supplement or clarify WDFW commitments to provide particular information. We request that NOAA specifically reference the full text of WT review of WDFW HGMPs as an integral component of these comments.

 

Range of Possible Alternatives

Replace or Supplement Hatchery Programs with Habitat Preservation/Restoration to Increase Wild-Salmonid Productivity: Related to the alternatives of program reduction or elimination would be a consideration of how and whether habitat-management efforts could replace or supplement hatchery production to meet some program goals at a lower level of biological risk.  Efforts on the Skagit River provide an example for consideration. In 1980 and again in 1990, Seattle City Light (SCL) radically changed the operation of the Upper Skagit dams with increased commitments of flow to better accommodate salmon spawning and rearing. It is apparent there has been a shift of wild Skagit chinook production increasingly into that section upstream of Rockport.

 

Between 1974-1984 the percentage of the overall wild Skagit chinook population that spawned upstream  of Rockport was 62%, between 1985-1993 it was 73%, and between 1094-2001 it was 78% (Connor and Pflug 2003). This sub-stock of chinook is the only one in the watershed that has remained in stable numbers in the period of spawning survey record between 1974-2001.  For comparison, these same data indicate that the percentage of change in mean escapement between the 1974-1984 time period and the 1985-2001 time period was +3% for the Upper Skagit while it was -41% for the Lower Skagit and -52% for the Lower Sauk River, the major wild chinook spawning tributary to the Skagit.  While the Upper Skagit wild chinook have remained stable, or increased slightly, the remaining basin has been in significant downward decline.  From 1974-2001, the overall average wild Skagit chinook population escapement remained relatively stable:  1974-84 - 12,112; 1985-93 - 10,279; 1994-2001 - 11,526.  Wild-chinook productivity for the population is being increasingly carried by the Upper Skagit.

 

Since 1980, SCL mitigation investments became increasingly focused on habitat acquisitions with related habitat protection, habitat restoration, or habitat re-creation projects (personal communication Dave Pflug 2000, 2001, 2002, per Bill McMillan, 2003).  This contrasts with hydro electric dam mitigation for fish losses more commonly realized in the form of hatchery programs elsewhere. While Upper Skagit wild chinook have remained stable, the rest of the Skagit basin has remained in wild chinook decline at the same levels as other Puget Sound areas where habitat investments have most often been lower and hatchery domination commonly higher in those other river basins.

 

The Skagit system is the only place in the Puget Sound region where wild fish have a clear production advantage.  Seiler et al. (2002a) show that the 12-year (1989-2000) annual production of wild fry and fingerlings averaged 2.8 million fish.  This compares favorably with a relatively modest hatchery program planned for 672,000 fingerlings and 150,000 yearlings. 

 

Evidence suggests that on the Skagit, where emphasis has been on moderation of hatchery chinook production, the result has been comparatively high wild fry and fingerling production.  This credible alternative, with others, should be discussed and contrasted with the proposed alternative in this section, with a rationale for rejecting any.

 

Full Implementation of Hatchery Scientific Review Group Recommendations: The Hatchery Scientific Review Group was mandated and funded by the US Congress to develop an independently reviewed scientific framework for evaluating and reforming hatchery practices in Washington, including the Puget Sound chinook ESU. The HSRG has issued several reports, detailing specific recommendations for changing hatchery operations throughout Puget Sound and Hood Canal. The co-managers have worked closely with the HSRG and publicly declared support for the goals and specific recommendations of the HSRG. The NEPA review should discuss and describe the alignment of the RMPs to the HSRG recommendations, and analyze the environmental impacts of the reasonable alternative of Puget Sound hatchery programs being operated in full compliance with all HSRG recommendations.

 

Full Implementation of WDFW’s Wild Salmonid Policy: WDFW’s own Wild Salmonid Policy, adopted in 1997, provides clear performance standards and policy guidance for hatchery operations and practices throughout Washington State, including the whole of the Puget Sound chinook ESU. Since the listing of Puget Sound chinook in 1999, WDFW has repeatedly cited the WSP as a guiding document in its ESA-related recovery management. Yet no mention is made of the relationship or alignment of the hatchery program described in the individual HGMPs with any particular performance standard or policy guidance in the WSP. Ample evidence suggests that current hatchery practices and operations, including practices and operations described in this and other HGMPs, are inconsistent with the WSP, as cited in Washington Trout’s review of WDFW HGMPs.  The NEPA review should describe and evaluate the WSP standards and guidance, discuss the relationship between the RMPs and the WSP, and analyze the environmental impacts of the reasonable alternative of Puget Sound hatchery programs being operated in full compliance with the Wild Salmonid Policy.

 

 

A Decrease in Artificial Production in Selected Programs that have a Primary Goal of Augmenting Fisheries: Washington Trout supports this possible alternative, proposed in the FR Notice. WT is particularly interested in a review that evaluates the full range of environmental impacts, particularly direct and indirect impacts on listed PS chinook salmon, HC summer chum salmon, and bull trout, of hatchery programs that meet only the minimum requirements of the identified purpose and need, if at a significantly lower level than the proposed RMPs. The interested public deserves to understand clearly the relative environmental costs of meeting any identified purpose and need through the proposed action, in order to adequately evaluate both the action, and the public’s (and even the proponents’) own commitment to meeting the purpose and need.

 

WT would include several other suggestions for such a “minimal” program that might better satisfy the goal of minimizing potential adverse impacts on listed fish, including:

·        reducing the proposed number of juveniles released until stray rates within the pertinent basin are reduced to within the Wild Salmonid Policy guidelines (as described in the Table in subsection 1.10);

·        changing rearing practices so as to produce juveniles that are similar in size and condition to wild conspecifics likely to be rearing in and migrating from the basin during the time of release;

·        within the limits of the facility, releasing juveniles over a more protracted period of time to more closely approximate the temporal distribution of wild juvenile migration, in order to avoid overwhelming wild juveniles with one large pulse of hatchery juveniles;

·        release out-of-basin yearling chinook only in Puget Sound river basins lacking indigenous, listed Chinook populations.

 

WT would also make recommendations concerning alternative adaptive management and/or monitoring provisions, and potential methods to minimize and mitigate for impacts relative to the proposed RMPs. Details concerning those recommendations are available in the WT review of WDFW HGMPs.

 

Miscellaneous Issues

Evaluate the Potential of Establishing Non-Hatchery Watersheds as References for Analyzing Impacts of Hatchery Production: The Independent Science Advisory Board recommended establishing reference basins for evaluating hatchery supplementation programs in the Columbia Basin. It seems reasonable in this context to explore, either through alternatives-analysis or other mechanisms, the effect of monitoring hatchery impacts in Puget Sound by identifying and utilizing several appropriate reference basins. The HSRG endorsed a similar approach in its recommendation for “wild steelhead management zones.” A further benefit would be the opportunity to develop an appropriate method for determining and monitoring baseline environmental conditions relative to evaluating impacts from hatchery operations, which will likely otherwise be difficult and controversial.

 

The DEIS Should Include a Clear Explanation on if/why Reduced Production Would be Precluded by US v. WA: NOAA Fisheries identifies potential conflicts that may arise from its various responsibilities under different statutes, policies, and court orders, including treaty trust responsibilities to the PS Treaty Tribes and compliance with various court orders under US v. WA. The co-managers rely to a similar degree on these concepts in justifying the RMPs. If  NOAA’s attempt to balance its responsibilities forces an accommodation of higher environmental impacts than would otherwise be desirable, the NEPA review should contain a thorough, transparent description of the minimum hatchery program necessary to meet NOAA’s  responsibilities regarding tribal treaty rights, and the relationship of the two RMPs to that minimal standard.

 

Examine the impacts of implementing the proposed RMPs in consideration of acknowledged uncertainties and data gaps, including but not limited to ecological interactions between hatchery and wild juvenile salmonids, particularly in estuaries and other near shore habitats: The WDFW HGMPs attempt to imply that existing smolt-release strategies effectively segregate hatchery juveniles from emigrating wild chinook smolts, minimizing potential adverse interactions. However, the assertion relies on grossly over-simplifying the temporal distribution of the migration of wild listed juveniles from freshwater to saltwater habitats. Recent data on the timing of wild juvenile chinook outmigration in mid-Puget Sound rivers gathered by the Department's own Wild Salmon Production Evaluation Unit (WSPE) (Seiler et al. 2001(a), 2001(b), 2001(c), 2002, and 2003) provides substantial evidence that wild juvenile chinook downstream migration generally occurs over a protracted period of time ranging from February to July. The majority of this data is noteworthy in displaying no pronounced mode in the timing of wild chinook outmigration. Rather, outmigration appears to be more or less continuous with several small modes scattered from mid-March to mid-June. This makes it extremely unlikely that hatchery smolt releases can be scheduled to occur after wild emigration unless hatchery releases occur after late July.

 

The assertion also fails to acknowledge current work that strongly suggests hatchery and wild juvenile chinook are commingling in near-shore habitats in Puget Sound for significant periods of time before migrating to the open ocean, any attempt at temporal segregation during emigration from upstream, freshwater habitats notwithstanding. Early data from beach-seine and surface-trawl sampling in Skagit Bay in 2002 demonstrate that wild chinook juveniles of various age and size classes are present together in significant ratios throughout the spring, summer, and fall, in several types of estuarine and near shore habitats. Sampled hatchery-marked juveniles are mixed with unmarked juveniles in mean percentages ranging from 10% to nearly 60%  from May through November (personal comm., Casey Rice, NMFS; 2003). During the periods that wild juveniles are present in these near shore environments, any commingled hatchery juveniles may enjoy several competitive advantages over their wild counterparts, including most significantly size, which may contribute to create a significant risk of adverse interactions and impacts to listed chinook, including competition, displacement, and predation. NOAA should be aware of these preliminary findings and should understand their implications.  These data, while still inconclusive and not directly related to wild-hatchery interactions in nearshore habitats, should warrant some discussion and analysis in this context, insofar as the co-managers are asserting that they can successfully minimize adverse impacts to listed Puget Sound chinook by effectively segregating listed chinook juveniles from hatchery juveniles of all species during freshwater out-migration and rearing life stages.

 

Explore the impacts of making take-authorization contingent on meeting specific goals within specified timelines, or alternatives that set different target dates for meeting specific standards.

 

References

·        Beamer, E.M., R.E. McClure, and B.A. Hayman. 2000. Fiscal Year 1999 Skagit River Chinook Restoration Research/ Project Performance Report. Skagit System Cooperative. La Conner, WA.

·        Conner, E. and D. Pflug. 2003 Changes in the Distribution and Density of Pink, Chum and Chinook Salmon Spawning in the Upper Skagit River in Response to Flow Management Measures; North American Journal of Fish Management. (Accepted for publication, in press)

·        Pearsons, Todd N. and Anthony L. Fritts. 1999. Maximum Size of Chinook Salmon Consumed by Juvenile Coho Salmon. North American Journal of Fisheries Management 19: 165-170.

·        Seiler, D., G. Volkhardt, L. Kishimoto, and P. Topping.  2002a.  2000 Green River juvenile salmonid production evaluation.  Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.  Olympia, WA.

·        Seiler, D., S. Neuhauser, and L. Kishimoto.  2002b.  2001 Skagit River wild 0+ chinook production evaluation.  Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.  Olympia, WA.

·        Seiler, D., G. Volkhardt, and L. Kishimoto.  2003.  Evaluation of downstream migrant salmon production in 1999 and 2000 from three Lake Washington tributaries:  Cedar River, Bear Creek, and Issaquah Creek.  Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.  Olympia, WA.

·        Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW).  1997.  Final environmental impact statement for the Wild Salmonid Policy.  Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, Olympia, WA.

·        Wright, S., M. Fraidenburg, and R. Brix.  1973.  Observation and marking of juvenile chinook salmon in the Humptulips River, Washington.  The Progressive Fish-Culturist 35(3):154-156.

·        Wright, S.  1993.  Fishery management of wild Pacific salmon stocks to prevent extinctions.  Fisheries 18(5):3-4.