Nice cheerleading doc. WDFW needs all the help they can get these days.

I'm afraid the rec's wont have much opportunity to "figure it out" when there's an ESA listing of Willapa river chinook and the whole bay is closed to salmon fishing. The current policy seems likely to result in that.

The big problem with the switch from naselle to Willapa is that the habitat does not support the decision. The commercial fishery gauntlet is beside the point. Can't manufacture NOR fish if the habitat isn't up to the task.

BTW, Do you know anyone that's caught a chinook south of the goose/ledbetter point line in the salt?

Anyone?

The Quinault uses wild brood for it's hatchery stock. How do the Steelhead brood programs North of the border fit into this argument? The Vedder for example does not seem to have the dual crash issues referenced here. One would think if a wild brood hatchery program on a given river exists, the wild and hatch. fish both would have the same issues? What other BC brood program examples might exist that would display Wild and Hatchery crash concurrence?

My point about the Quinault is that the "wild brood" they use is heavily hatchery influenced...tons of those hatchery fish spawn in the river, artificially increasing that
"wild run"...and when the hatchery run tanks, there will be less spawners, and less "wild" fish.

The introgression on the Quinault is among the worst on the west coast.

The Vedder, as of now, is dominated by wild fish, and the hatchery run is fed from that component, rather than the other way around. As long as they keep it that way it won't trash the wild run.

The Wilson, on the other hand, is just like the Quinault...overwhelmingly dominated by spawning hatchery fish.

Fish on...

Todd

Todd, you have an official pHOS number for that krik?

ODFW has a wild fish policy of <10%... just never see where it's actually measured.

I do not, Francis...I haven't seen one that I can recall. I'll admit that my thoughts on the Wilson are highly anecdotal, but catch rates while I have been there and from what I have been told by several others is more like 90% or more clipped fish to unclipped fish during the peak of the run, and that there are plenty who are not happy with the few wild fish being caught being tubed up and turned into hatchery fish.

Fish on...

Todd

Question? Do the QIN use full wild brood each year or just add in a % of wild to each years production?

If they use full wild brood then the concept that it is a hatchery fish different from the wild is incorrect other than behavioral changes not genetic. If it is a multi generation hatchery product of natural origin with wild added then that means it is what is normal for a integrated stock. If the point is any hatchery fish of genetic source is not compatible due to simply being reared for a portion of its life is unacceptable then that would be off center bubble also.

I think they use whatever swims into the hatchery, choosing for the larger ones.

Fish on...

Todd

Ok I was correct on the future return years but wrong on the Willapa returns by years. 3 yr are give or take 30% and 4 yr are 43% give or take 5 yr making up the bulk remaining. GH is about even for 4 & 5 yr classes but Willapa with the large hatchery production it is not. Simple fact is hatchery fish numbers change due to the rearing environment.

Here is some Willapa information.

C---

I have worked on the Willapa Bay Chinook baseline analysis but haven’t had time to think hard about the results. Ken Warheit helped with the analyses by running a population mean centered PCA and an assessment of mixture analysis power using a program he wrote that implements a method described by Eric Anderson and others.

Analysis of the data set we generated from the Willapa Bay tributaries Chinook samples that were sent to the Molecular Genetics Laboratory suggests that there is little population structuring among the donor populations. For these analyses we combined the samples from each of the three hatcheries with the samples taken from the adjacent streams.



Pairwise Fst s were all well below 0.01 (table below) and indicate that most of the genetic variance is within populations rather than between them.


FST (theta)

ForksCr Naselle Nemah

-------------------------------------------------

NorthRiv 0.00429 0.00346 0.00521

ForksCr 0.00068 0.00212

Naselle 0.00116

We (Ken Warheit and I) ran exploratory principle component analyses (PCA) to see if there was enough variance structure in the data set to separate samples into more-or-less discrete population clusters. The analysis that I ran was naïve to sampling locations and showed perhaps a weak offset to the North River/Fall River group (red) from the other three groups.

Ken ran a PCA that was aware of population membership and was based on population means, an approach that is similar to Discriminant Analysis of Principle Components (dapc) in the R-package adegenet. Ken’s scatterplot shows significant overlap between the population clusters but the North River and Forks populations show greater dispersion along the first and second axes respectively. The Nemah and Naselle samples form tighter clusters that overlap substantially.

The first plot looks at individuals distributed around a study-wide central value while the second plot looks at individuals distributed around population mean values. Confusing?

We also looked at assignment accuracy in two ways. Ken ran a program he wrote that implements a method developed by Eric Anderson and others to estimate the accuracy of genetic mixture analysis stock assignment the four populations. The plot below shows the results from 100 simulated mixtures. Simulated fish from North River/Fall River misassigned (assigned to one of the other 3 populations) about 20% of the time and the other populations had higher misassignment rates.

None of these analyses address misassignment rates of tule Fall Chinook to any of the Willapa Bay populations – which might be a bigger issue than misassignments within the Willapa Bay population complex.

I will be out of town until August, but we can talk about this when I get back. Maybe I will have additional insight when I get back after letting this bounce around in my head for a bit.



Sewall F. Young
Molecular Genetics Laboratory
Washington Dept. of Fish and Wildlife
600 Capitol Way N.
Olympia, WA 98501-1091

Phone: 360.902.2773
email: sewall.young@dfw.wa.gov

And some more all of it interesting.

Summary of recent genetic analysis performed on Willapa Bay watershed Chinook salmon
Purpose of work:
to extend and update the existing baseline genetic data sets and profiles of Chinook
salmon populations within the Willapa Bay watershed.
Four spawning populations were considered in Willapa Bay tributaries and comprised the North, Willapa,
Nemah, and Naselle rivers.
We sought to answer two questions:
1)
Is there genetic population structuring among the four spawning populations of Willapa Bay
Chinook?
2)
Are the genetic profiles of the four spawning populations distinct enough that we can
reliably accurately identify the spawning population of origin of individual fish?
Samples analyzed included collections from naturally-spawned or -spawning fish and from broodstock
from each of the three hatcheries.
Preliminary results:
1)
Population structuring –
Pairwise
F
ST
values, a measure of population differentiation genetically
comparing each spawning population with all other spawning populations, were all well below 0.01
indicating that the Chinook salmon spawning populations are genetically very similar
.
Principle Component Analysis (PCA), naïve to sampling locations showed substantial genetic overlap
of the four spawning populations. PCA analysis aware of sampling locations still showed significant
overlap among the spawning populations, but the North River and Willapa River populations showed
slightly dispersed clusters and the Nemah and Naselle populations formed even tighter clusters that
almost completely overlapped.
PCA analysis supported the hypothesis that some population
structure may exist in Willapa Bay Chinook, but it is weak.
2)
Identification of spawning population –
Using simulations, we tested the ability of the spawning
population genetic data to genetically assign population of origin to unknown origin individuals.
In
the best case, ~80% of North River simulated fish assigned correctly to the North River spawning
population. In the worst case, only ~50% of Nemah River simulated fish assigned to the Nemah River
spawning population.
The simulations suggested that Chinook spawning populations in Willapa
Bay are too similar to reliably assign individuals to their spawning population of origin.
Preliminary conclusions:
Population structure may exist among spawning populations of Chinook in Willapa Bay tributaries, but it
is weak, and insufficient for reliable and accurate assignment of Chinook with unknown Willapa Bay
population origin.
Please note that this analysis included only Chinook from within Willapa Bay and does not address any
question of genetic assignment of fish originating outside of Willapa Bay tributaries.

Or in laymans terms. They are essentially the same.

Begs the question why we're trying so hard to derive a novel and adapted wild stock.

I'm thoroughly confused? If wild stock brood has always been used in a system, never contaminated w/ an outside stock, the genetics should remain the same whether generations are reared in hatchery pens or not? Is it the time spent in a hatchery pen rearing environment that is the devil that F's thing up? Or, like the Quinault, does the generation after generation used, just turn into to the problem, even though originally from in system wild stock?
Does the Vedder use captured wild sock every year for it's hatchery production? Or, do they have hatchery returns that supply it?
Also, the Quinault Tribe used to live capture all wild it's brood stock from a net strung out in the lake. I new an employee on net watch and hung out there for a day 7-8 yrs ago. They did sort and breed nothing under 15#.

Rearing in the hatchery will select for fish that survive in those conditions. If they use, for example, water that is the same temperatures as the river will be less damaging than if they use water of a different temperature. Fish are cold-blooded and their enzymes have optimal temperatures to funtion. Incubate and raise them in warmer water and you select for that inheritable trait. In the wild, in cold water, it becomes lethal or sub-optimal.

The greater the difference between the hatchery environment and the wild then the greater the impact when those hatchery fish "go native".

Thanks for that explanation Carcassman. I'm no Biologist but it seems if that is known, why not change hatchery practices to benefit the "best conditions" for rearing? Maybe that's already in the works.

The desire, especially with steelhead, is to accelerate incubation and growth to achieve age-1 smolts. Warm water grows them faster. I believe that one of the reasons most hatchery steelhead suck so bad in the wild is that they are generally cultured in water way warmer than what they try in the wild.

"BTW, Do you know anyone that's caught a chinook south of the goose/ledbetter point line in the salt?

Anyone?"

Yeh, that place aint charlie's point- its were locals rule and yuppie insects like everybody else gets off the f'in break.

Follow the white hilaker next season, godwillin.

I'd hardly call it cheerleading, just trying to lay the choices out into a better sense of perspective for those on the outside looking in.

...

A bit of history is in order here.

The habitat doesn't support much in the way of natural chinook production no matter which stream is chosen for the primary. Among the three hatchery rivers, the least suitable for producing natural kings in any significant numbers is Nemah. The other two are pretty much neck and neck. Enough so that in the first attempt at HSRG reform back in 2009, we were considering TWO primary streams.... both Willapa AND Naselle.

When the final decision was made, the commercial fishery gauntlet WAS in fact the point, the whole point, and nothing but the point.

The commercials did NOT want to lose access to 2T and they lobbied hard AGAINST a Willapa primary. They overwhelmingly supported Naselle as primary.... along with meat-market production at Forks Creek to maintain their reign on 2T. That really worked out to their benefit.

While in the past, the entire Bay was managed for 30% exploitation, now only Naselle would be managed to a 30% impact, while the rest of the basin was a free-for-all NET-FEST! They typically took 15-20K kings during the period of Naselle primary @ 30%. Their mean king harvest DOUBLED under that paradigm. By 2014, baywide impact had risen to 57%.... 51% comm and 6% rec, a nearly 90:10 split on wild impacts!

And of course, natural escapement was in the toilet.

We have a Wild Fish Policy in this state.... and despite past blunders, the agency's PRIMARY mission is to preserve protect and perpetuate the resource. Secondary to that mission is the goal of providing/enhancing viable fisheries.... but only to the extent that they DO NOT HARM the resource.

Bottom line, we need to reign in the gross over harvest of wild chinook that can't even meet bare bones escapement goals. It's the only way the wild fish have a chance at recovery. We are also compelled to follow HSRG guidelines in hatchery/harvest reform to reduce the number of hatchery origin spawners (pHOS) on the gravel by optimizing the size of the hatchery programs commensurate with our ability to selectively remove the hatchery product in our fisheries. There's only two mechanisms to reduce pHOS .... we either selectively HARVEST MORE or we judiciously PRODUCE LESS to begin with.

The heavy hitters in the harvest arena REFUSE to come along in the state's quest to transition to a more selective fishery. Their defeatist attitude WILL spell their impending doom. Instead of seeking better ways to selectively leverage limited NOR impacts into many multiples of dead fish in the box, they cling to the anachronism of non-selective gillnetting.... irresponsibly burning that impact at a ridiculous rate that takes them off the water that much sooner.

So like it or not, the newest Policy passed in 2015.... warts and all... is currently our best shot at correcting the hatchery/harvest abuses that have plagued wild chinook in this basin for over a century. (FYI.... Forks Cr hatchery was built in 1899)



Nope.... but mebbe this should be THE year for the ye/eF collaboration to gitter'dun. You in?

My problem with the policy is that it was always all about preserving commercial opportunity while halfheartedly trying to meet conservation goals. The fact is its going to fail on all fronts. No meaningful commercial fishery (no big loss in my book), and a probable ESA listing resulting in no saltwater rec fishery.

We could have done everything the same, but skipped switching primaries and we'd be in so much better shape today, not to mention an additonal 2+ chinook generations towards a more adapted wild stock in the naselle. In hindsight, that it was a mistake is so glaringly obvious now.


As for fishing the south bay, I'm in, but it seems like a windmill to me.

Over the past decade, I've spent decent chunks of 4 tides south of the ledbetter/goose point line with no fish to show for it. That said its a big area, but many areas are unfishable due to high currents and bad weeds though. The weeds can be unreal even by WB standards. Maybe there are good pockets to fish, but I don't think there is anything like the 2T/2U stretch in the south bay.

A lot of good points and all can be 100% right or wrong depending on your perspective. Fact is for whatever reason for the huge hatchery Chinook production in Willapa it is the wrong fish & wrong place if terminal harvest is involved. To many hatchery fish on top of a very small natural production. Harry once told me a story about Chum. Seems he was asked if he could find a way to produce more fish at little cost. He took a look at the hatchery composition and came up with Chum fitting a low volume ( raceway / incubators ) opportunity in Hood Canal, so green light. After a bit of time off to the harvest managers and the question, " shouldn't we figure out how to harvest them first? " Ah nope was the answer we will figure that out later he was told. Now we all know that was a failure with all sorts of issues around the harvest.

So folks get your arms around the issue. The Willapa Chinook production is about feeding the ocean harvest pool. The terminal issues are simply secondary issues that need resolution.

As to fishing the South channel you better figure it out because that is where the fish are going to be. Also your NOS / HOS ratio is about to be the worse you can imagine. New world in Willapa is fast coming and you will need to adapt or stay home. These are the only two options available.

In the past decade, I've spent MANY more than 4 tides in the 2T/2U area WITHOUT a fish to show for it.

I've ventured south only one time since 2005. Pretty certain I wasn't below Leadbetter. Just started trolling south along the east shelf once I found deep water... not sure if I was actually in the main Nahcotta or more likely in the smaller channel leading to the Palix.

All I remember was catching a ton of LARGE dogfish.... and later being surrounded by a pack of 35-40 harbor seals following the ONLY boat in that zone. Couldn't have devoted any more than 2-3 hours to that venture.

...

Look.... there's still gonna be somewhere in the neighborhood of 6-7 million PLUS chinook released into WB. By design, the policy has significantly constrained the comm fleets ability to access chinook. It's not difficult to imagine eventually getting sport gear somewhere in front of the migratory path of all those kings and not have good things happen. They don't just disappear into some black hole. Where there's a will, there's a way.