Hatchery closure part of salmon recovery plan

Changes in salmon management practices will bring much change to Wahkiakum County starting this fall.

The Elochoman Salmon Hatchery will be closed, and the Elochoman and Grays Rivers will become refuges for naturally spawning salmon.

The moves are part of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife's new Conservation and Sustainable Fisheries Plan. WDFW staff came to Cathlamet Tuesday evening to explain the plan and seek support from local residents.

They didn't find a lot; many of the 30 or citizens attending said they felt the plan was a blow against the economy and way of life of lower Columbia communities.

The plan, said Pat Frazier, WDFW regional fish program manager, said the purpose of the plan is to help recovery of naturally spawning fish, the so-called wild fish, protected under the federal Endangered Species Act.

"We're under a lot of pressure from the National Marine Fisheries Service (NOAA Fisheries) to adopt the plan," he said.

Bad management decisions in the past have created a situation in which straying hatchery fish are overwhelming the wild fish, said Frazier and other WDFW staff. The recovery plan calls for managers and harvesters to take a step back to allow the wild fish to recover. As that happens, managers will be able to increase hatchery production and recreational and commercial harvest. If the plan succeeds, the various stocks can be removed from the federal endangered species list. There are 13 endangered salmon stocks in the Columbia River basin, Frazier said, including lower river coho, chum and tule chinook.

Plan management activities will focus on four H's, Frazier said--harvest, hatcheries, habitat and hydropower. The department can act on harvest and hatchery issues. Habitat projects will be sponsored by the Lower Columbia River Fish Recovery Board, which has surveyed tributary basins and developed recommendations funding for habitat improvements.

The hydro portion is upriver and not part of the lower river plan, Frazier said.

Key hatchery management components are restricting the number of hatchery fish in spawning areas, reprogramming hatchery production to minimize risks to wild fish, managing production levels to support sustainable sport and commercial fisheries, and upgrading facilities.

The plan for the Elochoman basin calls for making the system a wild salmon refuge, using a weir on the lower river to capture hatchery fish for eradication, and maintaining current steelhead broodstock and releases. Production of steelhead would be moved to the Beaver Creek Hatchery, which would be reopened on a six-month basis, and the hatchery would raise chinook for the Deep River net pens.

The plan for the Grays River basin calls for making the system a wild salmon refuge, using a weir on the lower river to capture hatchery fish for eradication, maintaining current steelhead releases and a coho conservation program, and maintaining production for net pen release on Deep River.

A third wild salmon refuge would be in the basins of Mill and Abernathy creeks on the eastern edge of Wahkiakum County.

Frazier added that the Elochoman Salmon Hatchery is old and needs much maintenance; upgrading it would cost $15-20 million.

"We had to make a very difficult decision to close it," he said. "The staff who work there will be offered jobs in other hatcheries in the region."

Frazier and the other WDFW staff members urged the audience to lobby federal legislators for expanded funding under the Mitchell Act, which was passed in 1940 to compensate lower river fisheries for fish lost to the construction and operation of Grand Coulee and Bonneville dams. The funding hasn't increased much in the past decade, they said, and that's hampering programs.

Frazier added that representatives from WDFW, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, Columbia River tribes, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and NOAA Fisheries met during the past several months to develop the plan.

Wahkiakum residents and commercial fishermen in the audience were skeptical of the plan.

County Commissioner Dan Cothren recalled that as a youth in the Elochoman Valley he saw salmon in the creeks feeding the river.

Retired hatchery employee Don Witham told of planting fish in all the tributaries with good results.

The fish, the department and the public are paying for that now, responded Andy Appleby, department of fish and wildlife biologist for the hatchery division. With subsequent habitat degradation and the Endangered Species Act, the department is having to take radical steps to restore naturally spawning stocks.

Kent Martin spoke for many in commenting that along the lower Columbia, the hatchery and wild fish have intermingled so much that there are no truly "wild" fish, only naturally spawning fish.

He added that political decisions have driven the department to neglect commercial harvest concerns to the detriment of the commercial industry which has seen great reductions in its harvest over the years.

"We're promised that if we give up a hamburger today, they'll give us two on Tuesday, and Tuesday never comes," he said.

"We have no intention of driving the commercial fishery off the Columbia River," Frazier said. "We're trying to maintain production levels for the commercial fishery."

Steve Gray, a processor living in Seaview, suggested the department raise more desirable fish than the tule fall chinook and that the department lead an effort to reinstate lethal controls on terns, cormorants, seals and sea lions which prey on juvenile and adult salmon.

He also commented that human occupation and activities have surged over the past 30 years so much that restoring habitat in the basin will be impossible.

Jeff Breckel, recently of the fish recovery board and now a WDFW employee, said habitat needs have been identified, but recovery efforts will take 20-30 years.