Evaluation of the Tucannon River Summer Steelhead Endemic Stock Hatchery Supplementation Program

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Evaluation of the Tucannon River Summer Steelhead Endemic Stock Hatchery Supplementation Program EVALUATION OF THE TUCANNON RIVER SUMMER STEELHEAD ENDEMIC STOCK HATCHERY SUPPLEMENTATION PROGRAM 2011 ANNUAL REPORT Prepared by: Joseph D. Bumgarner Jerry T. Dedloff Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife Fish Program, Science Division Hatchery / Wild Interactions Unit Snake River Lab Dayton, WA 99403 Prepared For U.S. Department of Energy Bonneville Power Administration Environment, Fish and Wildlife Portland, OR 97208 BPA Project Number 2010-050-00 Intergovernmental Contract No. 00053444 and No. 0057970 Budget and Performance Period of 6/01/11 through 12/31/12 March 25, 2013 Acknowledgements We thank the Bonneville Power Administration for funding this project and extend our appreciation to the employees of Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife’s Snake River Lab, the Wenatchee Field Office, and District 1 Fish Management staff for their help in building and deployment of three additional PIT Tag Arrays in the Tucannon River. Lyons Ferry and Tucannon Fish hatchery staff were responsible for the rearing and release of the hatchery steelhead, we thank them in their efforts for rearing a high quality steelhead smolt for this program. Tucannon River Summer Steelhead Endemic Supplementation Program – FY 2011 Annual Report i Abstract The 2008 Biological Opinion by NOAA Fisheries, RPA 40.2 states that the Tucannon River endemic steelhead hatchery supplementation program should be implemented, and in 2010 WDFW and the co-managers adopted that recommendation. A primary goal of this hatchery supplementation program will be to increase the total abundance of spawning steelhead (of the appropriate stock) and for the long-term conservation of natural origin summer steelhead in the Tucannon River. A second goal of the program is to provide harvest as part of the LSRCP mitigation program in the Tucannon River once the hatchery program is expanded to full production (150,000 smolts annually). To determine if the supplementation program goals are being achieved some level of monitoring and evaluation must occur, hence this project was initiated. Results from this monitoring and evaluation will provide managers with the necessary data to make future program changes (i.e., numbers of fish, release locations, harvest rules, etc.). Therefore, the primary goal of this project is to monitor and evaluate the status and trends of both natural and hatchery origin summer steelhead in the Tucannon River. Project objectives covered during the contract period included 1) Install three full-stream PIT Tag Antenna Arrays in the Tucannon River, 2) Contract the PIT Tagging of 15,000 Tucannon River endemic hatchery steelhead, and 3) Administer the BPA contract. A total of 18 PIT tag antennas were constructed and deployed at three separate sites on the Tucannon River. All three sites generally had continuous operation during the contract period. Power supple the tag reader (MUX) was lost on a few occasions, but quickly rectified with minimal data lost. High stream flows and debris during the spring of 2012 damaged or broke loose some of the antennas, yet due to site configuration (multiple rows of antennas), individual array efficiencies were high (90% at MTR, 96% at UTR, and 77% at TFH). Adult and juvenile salmonids with PIT tags were detected at all three arrays, though the degree of detections varied within the watershed, with most of the adults detected at MTR, and most of the juveniles (spring Chinook and steelhead) detected at TFH. Escapement estimates and gross distributions of summer steelhead within the Tucannon River by origin (natural origin, Tucannon River hatchery endemic stock, and Lyons Ferry stock released into the Tucannon River) were estimated. Total steelhead escapement for 2012 is incomplete as other stocks of steelhead (hatchery and wild origin) were detected at the array sites. Project staff coordinated the PIT tagging of Tucannon River endemic hatchery steelhead at Lyons Ferry Hatchery. Release information was documented and detection of PIT tags to juvenile collections sites in the Snake and Columbia rivers were documented. Project staff worked with BPA staff to ensure environmental compliance needs, quarterly status reports, and a statement of work for 2013 activities, were completed on time or as needed by BPA. Tucannon River Summer Steelhead Endemic Supplementation Program – FY 2011 Annual Report ii Table of Contents Acknowledgements.......................................................................................................................... i Abstract........................................................................................................................................... ii List of Figures................................................................................................................................ iii List of Tables................................................................................................................................. iv List of Photos................................................................................................................................. iv Introduction..................................................................................................................................... 1 Description of Project Area............................................................................................................ 3 Objective 1.......................................................................................................................... 4 Middle Tucannon River (MTR)……………………………………..…………… 5 Upper Tucannon River (UTR)…………………………………………………… 7 Tucannon Fish Hatchery (TFH)…………………………………….…..……… 10 PIT Tag Detection Summary………………………………………………..….. 12 Objective 2........................................................................................................................ 14 Objective 3........................................................................................................................ 16 References .................................................................................................................................... 17 List of Figures Figure 1. Location of the Tucannon River, and Lyons Ferry and Tucannon Hatcheries within the Snake River Basin........................................................................................... 4 Figure 2. Site configuration of PIT Tag antennas at the MTR site in the Tucannon River, 2011……………………………………………………………..…… 6 Figure 3. Site configuration of PIT Tag antennas at the UTR site in the Tucannon River, 2011……………………………………………………..……….. 9 Figure 4. Site configuration of PIT Tag antennas at the TFH site in the Tucannon River, 2012………………………………………………...………….. 12 Figure 5. Length frequency distribution of hatchery origin Tucannon River summer steelhead tagged at the WDFW Lyons Ferry Hatchery, January 2012…...… 14 List of Tables Table 1. Detections of PIT tagged salmonids (adult or juvenile) during the project period at the Middle Tucannon River (MTR) array site……………...………. 7 Tucannon River Summer Steelhead Endemic Supplementation Program – FY 2011 Annual Report iii Table 2. Detections of PIT tagged salmonids (adult or juvenile) during the project period at the Upper Tucannon River (UTR) array site…………………….….. 9 Table 3. Detections of PIT tagged salmonids (adult or juvenile) during the project period at the Tucannon Fish Hatchery (TFH) array site…………………….. 12 Table 4. Estimated mean detection efficiencies of summer steelhead for four Tucannon River PIT Arrays, fall 2011 and spring 2012………………..…………… 13 Table 5. Number (% of group) of adult summer steelhead by stock within each defined zone of the Tucannon River based on PIT Arrays and detections during the 2011 run year…………………………………….…………… 13 Table 6. Summer steelhead smolt releases into the Tucannon River from Lyons Ferry Complex, 2012…………………………………………….…………… 15 Table 7. Mean fork length, weight, condition factor (K), co-efficient of variation (CV), fish per pound (FPP), and the percent of visually apparent precocious mature males for steelhead released into the Tucannon River, 2012………………………………………….…………… 15 Table 8. The number, percent of release, and mean detection date of PIT tagged Tucanon River endemic stock summer detected while migrating downstream to the ocean from the 2012 release…………………………….………. 15 List of Photos Photo 1. Preliminary design/construction of a PIT Tag Antenna………………………….......... 5 Photo 2. Deployment of finished antenna to Tucannon River bottom at the Middle Tucannon River (MTR) site………………………………………..……….… 5 Photo 3. Middle Tucannon River Site (MTR)…………………………………………………... 6 Photo 4. Upper Tucannon River PIT Array (UTR)…………………..………………..………... 8 Photo 5. Tucannon Fish Hatchery PIT Array (TFH)………………………...………....……… 10 Photo 6. Tucannon Fish Hatchery PIT Array (TFH) MUX storage box……………....………. 11 Tucannon River Summer Steelhead Endemic Supplementation Program – FY 2011 Annual Report iv Introduction The 2008 Biological Opinion by NOAA Fisheries, RPA 40.2 states that the Tucannon River endemic steelhead hatchery supplementation program should be implemented. Following a 10- year evaluation of the endemic stock test program in the Tucannon River, WDFW, Lower Snake River Compensation Program (LSRCP), and the Nez Perce and Umatilla tribal co-managers agreed to implement the endemic steelhead supplementation program in 2010. Concurrent with that decision, releases of Lyons Ferry stock steelhead (harvest mitigation for the LSRCP) into the Tucannon River were stopped. These actions were consistent
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