WRIA 8 Fish in/Fish out Monitoring Summary

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WRIA 8 Fish in/Fish out Monitoring Summary
Presentation to the WRIA 8 Salmon Recovery Council
Hans B. Berge King County Department of Natural
Resources and Parks Water and Land Resources
Division
17 November 2011
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Background

• Chinook listed as threatened under ESA in 1999 in
  Puget Sound ESU
• Science-based conservation plan for WRIA 8
  adopted by NOAA in 2005
• Conservation Plan strongly endorses monitoring
  using VSP parameters to identify goals and
  objectives, and to measure effectiveness of plan
  implementation (this project)

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Viable Salmonid Population(VSP)

• Interdependent parameters for evaluating
  viability

• Abundance
• How many fish are there at various life stages?
• Productivity
• Is the population growing?
• Distribution (spatial structure)
• Don't put all your fish in one stream
• Diversity
• How many life history strategies are present?
  Measures of genetic diversity

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Monitoring Program VSP Parameters VSP Parameters VSP Parameters VSP Parameters
Monitoring Program Abundance Productivity Distribution Diversity
Spawner Surveys Escapement, Redd counts Estimates of total eggs, Prespawning mortality Relative use of streams and rivers in core, satellite and episodic areas Age structure, Hatchery or Natural origin
Fry/Smolt Trapping Juvenile abundance Egg to smolt survival () Relative comparison of Bear vs. Cedar Fry vs. smolt numbers, migration timing
PIT-Tag Monitoring Migration survival estimates Relative use and importance of migration areas Migration timing to ocean
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• 1.4 M people
• Ocean-type, Fall Chinook threatened in 1999
• 2 Chinook hatcheries (2.5 M per year)
• Mass marking began in 1999 (gt95)
• Land use includes urban, ag, rural res, forest

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Methods

• Timing and Abundance
• Biological characteristics
• Productivity
• Diversity

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Timing and Abundance

• Live counts 1x per week in all streams with
  Chinook
• Live and Dead counts

• Carcass sampling
• Redd Identification and location (2-3x per week)
• Analysis
• Area-under-the-curve (AUC)
• Redd counts (2.5 fish/redd) to reduce error
• Redd density (GPS location)

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Live Counts
Redds
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Presence of Hatchery Fish on Spawning Grounds
Photos from NMT website http//www.nmt-inc.com
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Length, Age, and Pre-Spawn Mortality (egg
retention)
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Productivity

• Potential egg deposition (redds x fecundity)
• based on age information
• Migrants (scoop and rotary screw traps at mouth
  of Cedar River and Bear Creek)
• PIT Tagging at screw trap and interrogated at
  Locks
• Returning adults (unmarked component of
  appropriate age)

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Results
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Timing
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Abundance
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Composition
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Pre-Spawning Mortality

• Marked females have a higher incidence of PSM in
  each basin (chi sq Plt.001)
• 7.7 vs. 22.2 of marked females

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CWT Results

• Hatchery strays from
• Kitsap Peninsula (Gorst Ck, Grovers Ck)
• Cowlitz River Hatchery
• Tulalip Bay
• University of Washington
• Issaquah Creek (majority)
• Elliott Bay Net pen releases
• Soos Creek

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Productivity

• What does it mean?
• Survival from life stage to life stage
• Full life cycle survival (redd to redd)
• Population replacement (redd to redd ratio gt1.0)

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Juvenile Survival Cedar River
Jan-April small fry (45mm) migration with later
(May-June) larger parr (60-100mm) migration
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Juvenile Survival Bear Creek
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Cedar River Redd to Redd
Recovery plan goal
Replacement
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Benefits

• Improved knowledge of species
• Monitoring data used to focus actions in the plan
• Auditing of restoration projects
• Rearing capacity limiting in the Cedar River for
  smolt production
• Pooling resources across jurisdictions for shared
  benefits
• In-kind contributions increasing each year for
  projects
• Collaboration and training with the Cedar River
  Naturalists, SalmonWatchers, Water Tenders, and
  Salmon Seeson
• Raising awareness in the public by providing
  accurate information
• Observation of in season problems for salmon
• Blockages/beaver dams, fish kills, etc.
• Interaction and educational opportunities with
  private property owners
• Removing pumps from streams, landscaping, agency
  contact information

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Importance for Stakeholders

• Chinook life history requires consistent
  long-term annual monitoring to understand status
  and trends in population dynamics in order to
  compare to goals for recovery
• Predictive relationships between fish in and fish
  out data will help devise possible future
  management actions
• Understanding how projects relate to productivity
  is essential for de-listing species

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Acknowledgments

• WRIA 8 Technical Committee and Salmon Recovery
  Council
• Spawning ground surveyors mix of State, County,
  and Tribal staff
• Karl Burton, SPU, redd surveys in the Cedar River
• John Sneva et. al, WDFW, for aging scales
• City of Redmond, Boeing, Blockbuster Video for
  help with
• Screw trap access and power

Funding provided by the King Conservation
District