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15
Conclusions and Recommendations:
Toward a Sustainable Future for Salmon
Anadromous salmon in the Pacific Northwest and their habitats have been
adversely affected by the region's development, including such factors as for-
estry; agriculture; grazing; industrial activities; dams; commercial, residential,
and recreational development; and fishing. Development and its associated pres-
sures and changes will continue. Considerable action would be needed merely to
arrest the decline of salmon and maintain even the current degraded status. Im-
proving the prospects for sustainability of anadromous salmon is complicated
and contentious, and it has no simple or single solution. But the Committee on
Protection and Management of Pacific Northwest Anadromous Salmonids
reached consensus on several important conclusions and recommendations. If
the committee's recommendations are adopted, a considerable reallocation of
financial and natural resources will follow.
Life-history and migration patterns of salmon complicate their management
because, for example, fish hatched in the Columbia River are caught as far away
as southeastern Alaska and northern British Columbia. Solutions to the salmon
problem must recognize the influence of fishing in Alaska and British Columbia,
in addition to that in the Pacific Northwest. Indeed, unless Alaska, British Co-
lumbia, and the Pacific Northwest cooperate, solutions to the salmon problem
might be impossible. In the absence of such cooperation, any success would
entail greater expense for the Pacific Northwest.
In most respects, the salmon problem is a problem of how to match scales of
management, governance, fishing, research, and understanding with scales of
biology, hydrology, and environmental change in space and time. The salmon
traverse a great variety of environments throughout their life cycle, including
358
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CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
359
thousands of miles at sea and up to 1,500 km in rivers. Salmon cross interna-
tional and state boundaries, and they are important components of several ocean
and inland aquatic ecosystems. Salmon catches are governed by local, state,
federal, tribal, and international treaties, conventions, agreements, organizations,
commissions, and agencies; salmon environments are used for commerce, agri-
culture, industry, recreation, public safety, and hydropower. Climates that affect
salmon fluctuate from year to year and over decades and vary between regions.
Human cultures that depend on salmon and the economic factors that affect
salmon values have spheres of influence that range from a few to thousands of
kilometers and a few to thousands of years. Many of the committee's conclu-
sions and recommendations reflect an attempt to reconcile some of those diverse
scales. The committee has developed the conclusions and recommendations that
follow within the framework of rehabilitation, rather than degradation, restora-
tion, or substitution.
We present an approach to solving the salmon problem, then a general con-
clusion, and finally a set of more-specific conclusions and recommendations
regarding environmental changes, including habitat changes, both natural and
anthropogenic; genetic structure of salmon populations and species and appropri-
ate units to be managed for conservation; fishing and fishery management; hatch-
eries and other techniques for increasing the number of fish spawned naturally;
dams; goals and values; information needs; and institutional and management
considerations, including international, federal, state, local, and other jurisdic-
tions.
GENERAL CONCLUSION
Economic development and human population growth without sufficient
attention to salmon and their environment have created widespread declines in
anadromous salmon abundances in the Pacific Northwest. Although some salmon
populations are stable or increasing, the overall pattern is one of decline. Many
factors have contributed to salmon declines; it is therefore unlikely that reducing
or compensating for only one type of adverse impact will be enough to reverse
the decline in any watershed. To rehabilitate salmon populations and their eco-
systems, changes in fishing, dam and hatchery operations, and land uses would be
required. The degree of change needed in each of these factors will be related to
their contribution to the problem in each watershed and to the degree of rehabili
tation desired.
Until very recently, the importance and benefits of rehabilitating salmon and
their ecosystems have been overridden by the motivation to sustain catch, a
reliance on technology, and economic considerations. Weighing the direct and
collateral benefits of rehabilitating salmon populations against the dislocations
that are sure to occur raises profound questions that should be discussed in ways
that allow opportunities for citizens to participate.
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UPSTREAM: SALMON AND SOCIETY IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST
The salmon problem took many years to develop, and its solution will re-
quire the commitment of time, money, and effort. There is no simple answer to
this complex social and biological problem. To achieve long-term protection for
a diverse and abundant salmon resource in the Pacific Northwest, two conditions
must be met:
· Management must recognize and protect the genetic diversity of salmon.
It is not enough to focus only on the abundance of salmon: their long-term
survival depends on genetic diversity within and between local breeding popula-
tions. This diversity and the protection and rehabilitation of salmon habitat are
the bases of sustained production of anadromous salmon and of the species'
evolutionary futures. Because of their homing behavior and the distribution of
their populations and their riverine habitats, salmon populations are dependent on
diversity in their genetic makeup and population structure and thus are unusually
susceptible to local extinctions (Chapter 61. Attempts to control mortality by
fishing and improving environmental conditions and to compensate for mortality
with hatchery-produced fish must keep genetic diversity as the highest priority.
· Any solution to the salmon problem must take the effects of growth in
human population and economic activity into account. If economic and popula-
tion growth in the region continue, many of the forces that have reduced salmon
runs will continue to make it harder and more expensive to rehabilitate salmon in
the Pacific Northwest successfully. The social structures and institutions that
have been operating in the Pacific Northwest have proved incapable of ensuring
a long-term future for salmon, in large part because they do not operate at the
right time and space scales. As described in Chapter 13, differences among
watersheds mean that different approaches are likely to be appropriate and effec-
tive in different watersheds, even where the goals are the same. This means that
institutions must be able to operate at the scale of watersheds; in addition, a
coordinating function is needed to make sure that larger perspectives are also
considered. Substantial institutional changes would be needed to achieve those
goals.
The specific recommendations that follow were made in the context of those
two goals. A crucial aspect of the recommendations is the overriding need to
focus management goals primarily on genetic diversity rather than on biomass
production.
ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGES
Large changes have occurred in salmon habitats, including the ocean. Some
changes are natural, others are due to human impacts; some appear to fluctuate,
others are more trendlike; some can be directly influenced by human activities,
others at present cannot. Rehabilitation must now operate within that context and
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CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
361
must acknowledge the inherent uncertainty associated with environmental
changes and variability.
Oceanic Conditions
Conclusion. Variations in ocean conditions powerfully influence salmon
abundance. Ocean conditions-especially water temperature and currents and
associated biological communities have common effects over wide geographic
areas and have become less favorable for salmon in the Pacific Northwest since
the late 1970s. Because ocean conditions vary, fish deaths caused by numerous
human activities such as fishing could be more damaging just when fish popula-
tions are most likely to be depleted by natural conditions.
Recommendation. Fishery management must take the variability in ocean
conditions into account. Some might be tempted to attribute all changes in
salmon abundance to changes in ocean conditions and to conclude that manage-
ment related to rivers is therefore unimportant. However, because all human
effects on salmon are reductions in the total production that the environment
allows, management interventions are more important when the ocean environ-
ment reduces natural production than when ocean conditions are more favorable.
In a situation of such uncontrollable external variation, it would make sense for
fishing to take a f xed and sustainable proportion of the returning spawners rather
than a fixed number, as has been common practice, whether ocean conditions are
favorable or unfavorable as long as the number of returning spawners exceeds
a minimal safe threshold based on demographic and genetic considerations. Be-
low that threshold, no fishing should be allowed. Management should attempt to
reduce human-caused deaths of fish in rivers and at sea especially when ocean
conditions are unfavorable (as measured by estimates of survival rates at sea).
Any favorable changes in ocean conditions which could occur and could in-
crease the productivity of some salmon populations for a time should be re-
garded as opportunities for improving management techniques. They should not
be regarded as reasons to abandon or reduce rehabilitation efforts, because condi-
tions will change again.
Regional Variation
Conclusion. There is considerable regional variation in the physical, biologi-
cal, social, cultural, and economic environments of salmon. No unified solu-
tion to the salmon problem, management strategy, research strategy, institutional
arrangement, or governance structure can be expected to apply to the entire
Pacific Northwest.
Recommendation. Any approach to improving the status of salmon popula
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UPSTREAM: SALMON AND SOCIETY IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST
tions must have regional components that, when possible, reflect the bio-
regions relevant to salmon biology and conservation. Preemptive recovery
plans should include management and research strategies, institutional arrange-
ments, and governance structures that are flexible and can be adjusted to fit
. . .
regions variations.
VALUES AND INSTITUTIONS
Conclusion. Extractive interests have structured regional practices and in-
stitutions for the management of natural resources and for the modification
of environments for human benefit. Society in the Pacific Northwest is in the
midst of assessing values with respect to natural resources and their use. Histori-
cally, the region has been governed by an extractive value system. The values
were ingrained into the social and political institutions that developed to manage
and control resources.
Recommendation. Institutional changes that better reflect societal interests
in maintaining biodiversity and the functioning of ecosystems should be
sought in light of the conflicts among those interests during a period of
change. A broad range of techniques should be used in estimating societal
interests, including opinion surveys, focus groups, public participation, and con-
tent analysis of written commentary. Because institutional arrangements reflect
the commitments of earlier times, continued conflict focused on institutional
rules and procedures is to be expected as part of the process of change.
Recommendation. Goals and values should emerge in significant part
through cooperative management, so that those most directly involved play
an instrumental role in determining how the rehabilitation of salmon takes
shape in the places they regard as their own. Efforts to rehabilitate salmon
should be accompanied by efforts to communicate with stakeholders and the
general public in ways that allow for their evaluation of goals and values of the
rehabilitation projects and their participation, where appropriate, in cooperative
management.
Recommendation. Interdisciplinary approaches to the salmon problems
should be strengthened and should incorporate the expertise required to
deal with nonbiological and nonmonetary aspects. Greater effort should be
made to use interdisciplinary working groups to evaluate projects, to work on
methodologies needed to incorporate monetary and nonmonetary criteria into
those evaluations, and to accurately depict and (where appropriate) quantify the
value of salmon to the region.
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CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
GENETICS AND CONSERVATION
Genetic Resources
363
Conclusion. Sustained productivity of anadromous salmon in the Pacific
Northwest is possible only if the genetic resources that are the basis of such
productivity are maintained. We have already lost a substantial portion of the
genetic diversity that existed in these salmon species 150 years ago. The possible
genetic effects of any actions must be considered when any management deci-
sions are made. The local reproductive population, or deme, is the fundamental
biological unit of salmon demography and genetics. An adequate number of
returning adults for every local breeding population is needed to ensure persis-
tence of all the reproductive units. The result of regulating fishing on a meta-
population basis and ignoring the reproductive units that make up a metapopula-
tion is the disappearance or extirpation of some of the local breeding populations
and the eventual collapse of the metapopulation's production.
Recommendation. Salmon management should be based on the premise
that local reproductive populations are genetically different from each other
and valuable to the long-term production of salmon. Managing from that
perspective will protect habitat and also protect resources for the long term.
Efforts should be made to identify and protect remaining native wild populations
and their habitats. Minimum sustainable escapements should be established for
as many populations as possible. Populations that have unusual genetic adapta-
tions or occupy atypical habitats are of special importance and should be identi-
fied and protected. The genetic diversity within existing spawning populations is
not replaceable and must be conserved to protect present and future opportuni-
ties, including the evolutionary process in salmon. This principle seems self-
evident, but risks continue to be imposed on such populations.
Regional Population Structure
Conclusion. The metapopulation model of geographical structure is impor-
tant for salmon because of the geographical arrangement of salmon into
discrete spawning populations (domes) adapted to the environmental condi-
tions in which they reproduce. Local demes of salmon are small enough and
exist in variable-enough environments for it to be likely that they will have
relatively short persistence times on an evolutionary scale. Although the deme is
the functional unit of salmon genetics and demography, the cluster of local popu-
lations (the metapopulation) connected by genetic exchange via natural straying
is the fundamental unit on an evolutionary time scale. This conclusion is crucial
because it leads to many other conclusions and recommendations about salmon
management. For example, most of this report's conclusions and reco~nmenda
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UPSTREAM: SALMON AND SOCIETY IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST
lions about hatcheries, fishing, and habitat rehabilitation are founded on the
importance of maintaining appropriate diversity in salmon gene pools and popu-
lation structure, which has not been adequately recognized by many.
Recommendation. It is important to maintain geographical clusters of demes
or metapopulations. The loss of genetic material in small populations is domi-
nated by random events (genetic, demographic, and environmental), so the loss
of genetic material in one deme should be largely independent of that in another.
In a cluster of demes, a large proportion of the original genetic variation should
remain. Thus, small populations might not be viable for long periods in isolation
but are important in maintaining genetic variation as parts of a metapopulation.
HABITAT LOSS AND REHABILITATION
Conclusion. Freshwater habitats are critically important to salmon because
they constitute the spawning grounds and nurseries in which the genetic
makeup of a population is determined. Many human activities- notably
forestry, agriculture and grazing, hydropower, and commercial, residential,
and recreational development-have contributed to degradation of the riv-
erine and adjacent riparian and near-river habitat and caused loss of habitat
of spawning adults and young salmon, and loss of associated components of
the ecosystem. So few intact basins or subbasins are in good condition that those
few should be viewed as critical salmon refuges and as sources of plants and
animals necessary for ecosystem recovery as other watersheds are improved.
Part of this source of recovery is provided through the occasional straying of
salmon to adjacent streams. Thus, especially if the refuges harbor large popula-
tions, this potential for colonizing other suitable habitats is important (Chapter 71.
In addition, programs that have relied on artificial habitat and hatchery-produc-
tion techniques have usually not lived up to expectations and in some cases have
actually hastened the decline of wild salmon populations, as described in chapters
7 and 12. Most of the traditional habitat research and current performance stan-
dards (e.g., forest-practice rules) have emphasized protecting habitats in headwa-
ter stream networks with secondary consideration to lowland systems. In the
decline of salmon and their future, more attention needs to be given to rehabilita-
tion of streams subject to county and city planning and land-use authorities.
Although rehabilitating habitat will be more difficult in a region experiencing
rapid population growth, it is not prudent or appropriate to abandon streams that
are degraded, and rehabilitation can be worth the effort. Chapter 7 outlines
examples of projects to rehabilitate streams in the Seattle area. All streams
providing spawning or rearing habitat can contribute to the long-term survival of
salmon populations in river basins.
Recommendation. Riverine-riparian ecosystems and biophysical watershed
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CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
365
processes that support aquatic productivity should have increased protec-
tion. Riparian zones are important for the maintenance of aquatic productivity,
but insufficient protection has been given to these critical areas in the past. The
width of riparian zones requiring protection from harmful human disturbances is
usually not known with certainty, but all possible ecological functions should be
considered when attempting to define riverine-riparian boundaries. Within the
domain of interactions between aquatic and terrestrial environments that charac-
terize the riparian zone, some human activities might occur without major disrup-
tion; however, it is critical that the full range of ecological functions be explicitly
protected, including all biotic and physical processes that mediate the exchange
of energy, water, nutrients, and organic matter between watersheds and their
streams. In many cases, the riparian zone in which these exchanges occur may be
substantially wider than the narrow border of vegetation often specified in current
regulatory language (e.g., state forest-practices acts) for nonfederal forest lands.
Riparian zones associated with streams draining rangeland or agricultural or
urban areas often lack any regulatory prescription.
Beyond the edge of the riparian zone, it is important that hydrologic pro-
cesses within watersheds not be altered by human activities to such an extent that
patterns of water, sediment, and organic matter inputs to streams degrade aquatic
habitat or rip arian functions. Human activities resulting in habitat degradation
include activities that prevent some important ecological processes (e.g., flood-
ing and groundwater recharge) and activities that alter the rates of other processes
(e.g., accelerated erosion). Although land and water will continue to be used in
most Pacific Northwest watersheds, recovery of productive salmon habitat will
necessitate a concerted effort to rehabilitate the full range of natural conditions in
aquatic and riparian ecosystems. To facilitate that recovery, the following six
recommendations are offered:
1. Forestry, agricultural, and grazing practices should allow riparian zones
to maintain a full range of natural vegetative characteristics, i.e., characteristics
occurring in watersheds with natural disturbance regimes. Riparian zones should
ideally be wide enough to fulfill all functions necessary for maintaining aquatic
productivity.
2. Sediment from all land uses should be reduced to magnitudes appropriate
to the geological setting of a river basin. In practical terms, the goal is that human
activities should cause no net increase in sediment over natural inputs. Likewise,
water temperatures should reflect as closely as possible the normal regime of
temperatures throughout the basin.
3. Patterns of water runoff, including surface and subsurface drainage, should
match to the greatest extent possible the natural hydrologic pattern for the region
in both quantity and quality. Effects of consumptive water uses on both the
timing and the quantity of flow should be minimized. Water-management tech-
nologies that promote the restoration of natural runoff patterns and water quality
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UPSTREAM: SALMON AND SOCIETY IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST
should be strongly encouraged. That will mean implementation of methods to
reduce the volumes of water used for irrigation, industrial, and urban uses.
4. Toxic waste products from industrial, mining, agricultural, and urban
activities should receive the appropriate treatment before being discharged into
any body of water.
5. Habitat reclamation or enhancement activities should emphasize rehabili-
tation of ecological processes and functions, not artificial creation of habitat.
Placement of permanent or semipermanent habitat structures in streams should
be discouraged unless it can be clearly demonstrated that no other alternative is
available. Existing artificial structures that appear to be impeding natural recov-
ery should be removed.
6. Beneficial long-term effects of natural disturbances, such as flooding,
should be preserved or restored whenever possible. Lowland slough and estua-
rine habitat rehabilitation should receive high priority in coastal regions.
Rehabilitation of riverine-riparian ecosystems will take time. Recovery of im-
portant ecological processes, even with appropriate human intervention, may
take decades to centuries and will require patience and long-term commitment.
Restoration efforts should be coordinated across large areas of the landscape, be
accompanied by adaptive management agreements, monitoring and evaluation,
and be guided by the results of thorough watershed analyses.
DAMS
Conclusion. Although as many as 90% of young salmon might survive
passage over, around, and through any individual major hydropower project
on the Columbia-Snake river mainstem, the cumulative reduction in sur
vival caused by passing many projects has adversely affected salmon popu-
lations. Partly because salmon do not have rights to water, allocation of water
rights usually has not included considerations of their long-term survival. (Of
course, the current concern over their survival has included considerations of
water availability for them.)
Recommendation. Improve salmon survival rates associated with passing
hydropower projects in the Columbia and Snake rivers. The following ap-
proaches are recommended:
.
Determine existing reach survivals (survival rate of fishes as they pass
through a reach or a specified stretch of the river), e.g., by project and project
components. On completion of such studies, initiate measures to improve sur-
vival, prioritized by the greatest gains obtainable.
· Secure water as need is demonstrated-for example, where changes in
annual patterns or total amounts of streamflow are shown to decrease survival
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CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
367
from water-consumers by subsidizing water conservation by buyout of water
rights (which might require legislative changes in transfer of water rights to point
of use) and by improved reservoir-system operation, e.g., through improved ac-
curacy of seasonal streamflow forecasts through telemetering, satellite assess-
ments of snow coverage and water content, and other technological means. As
long as other rights to public water are considered sacrosanct in any river basin,
it will be difficult to respond to demonstrated needs of salmon in a timely man-
ner. All options should be open to consideration, after appropriate evaluation of
costs and benefits. For example, flood-control-rule curves should be considered
open to change, because in some cases increased seasonal streamflows might
need to be balanced against increased risk of downriver flooding.
· Continue downriver transportation of smelts by barge in the Columbia
and Snake rivers as long as data indicate that survival in transport exceeds that of
inriver migration. It is critical that barging (and any other treatments be done
with experimental controls so that information can continue to accumulate, i.e.,
enough smolts should continue innver migration to assess the effectiveness of
transportation. And it is essential not to treat all the fish in a river in such a way
that failure of a treatment can have catastrophic consequences for the entire
population. Careful scientific monitoring is essential for addressing controver-
sies about transportation and other interventions.
· Improve information on the migratory characteristics of salmon in the
Columbia-Snake river system. PIT-tag applications should be expanded to
enough wild fish and as many hatchery fish as possible to conduct convincing
scientific analysis and to separate hatchery from wild fish. The utility of genetic
markers that can be safely and quickly detected from fish scales or slivers of fin
tissue should be explored. Interrogation facilities (facilities that detect tags)
should be set up at all bypasses so that adult returns can be evaluated to compare
survival of fish that migrate via bypass, transport, and turbine and spill, and so
that reach-specific information can be obtained on tagged smelts. Spawning-
ground surveys should be greatly expanded to evaluate homing efficacy in trans-
ported and nontransported fish.
Conclusion. The many dams on the Columbia River and its tributaries
cumulatively have had large effects on salmon survival. Therefore, the addi-
tion of any new major dams in undammed reaches of large rivers in the region
(e.g., the Hanford Reach of the Columbia River) would make the situation worse;
existing dams should have adequate fish-passage facilities where feasible and
appropriate before being relicensed.
Conclusion. Because there has not been a major seasonal shift in the annual
Snake River hydrograph, it is doubtful, a priori, that the declines in Snake
River salmon populations have resulted from or are reversible by seasonal
changes in flow regime alone. Even if flow changes could be helpful in a
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UPSTREAM: SALMON AND SOCIETY IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST
rehabilitation effort, they are likely to be insufficient without changes in other
human interventions in the salmon life cycle and habitat.
Conclusion. Because the Snake River system stores and then diverts sub-
stantial quantities of water for consumptive uses, and the volume of water
flowing through the system has therefore decreased, beneficial changes in
flow regime for salmon can in principle be obtained in a controlled fashion
by reallocating human uses of water, including agricultural uses. Whether
those changes can be made at lower total social cost than large-scale engineering
changes, such as drawdown, would need to be analyzed on a case-by-case basis.
Conclusion. Transportation of smelts to bypass middle Columbia dams
might prove better than Driver migration as more data become available on
bypass and collection in that region. Because of the stress, injury, post-bypass
losses, and delayed arrival of smelts at the ocean resulting from decreased water
velocities in reservoirs, the most appropriate use of bypass facilities at most dams
might be to collect fish for transportation. Avoidance of mortality at downstream
hydropower dams and in reservoirs is an attractive concept. The concept might
become even more attractive as means develop to improve survival through
release point protocols. Any experiments with transportation should follow the
guidelines discussed earlier.
Recommendation. Transport of middle Columbia summer migrants should
be investigated. At McNary Dam, upstream from three hydropower projects,
transportation of subyearling migrants yielded transport:benefit ratios (observed
survivals to adulthood of transported smells to observed survivals of inriver
migrants) of over 3.0:1 in tests in the 1980s.
FISHING AND FISHERY MANAGEMENT
For rehabilitation of salmon populations, the aim of fishery management-
as for other management efforts should be to achieve long-term sustainability
based on maintaining genetic diversity. In the recommendations below, the
overall goal is to reduce total fishing mortalities (or to increase escapements) to
be consistent with the present productivity of salmon and to develop and imple-
ment catching technology that ensures minimal mortality in depleted demes.
Too Few Spawners
Conclusion. Not enough fish are being allowed to return to spawn. It is
essential to keep in mind that unless enough fish are able to spawn, there will not
be enough fish produced to compensate for all the sources of mortality imposed
by human activities and to provide sustainable runs of wild salmon. Therefore, a
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Strong and Depleted Populations
Conclusion. Past practices of salmon management have not treated strong
and depleted populations differently enough, and more important salmon
management has not been sufficiently based on recognition of the impor-
tance of demes. The anadromy of salmon and their tendency to return to their
natal streams to spawn results in a population structure in which metapopula-
tions clusters of demes are important. Conservation of salmon must take that
structure into account to achieve long-term survival of diverse salmon popula-
tions.
Recommendation. Management of salmon should be based on the genetic
structure of their populations and should allow for separate management
regimes for strong and depleted demes and metapopulations whenever pos-
sible. In general, the aim is to assure adequate escapements for depleted popula-
tions. To achieve this aim, fishing should take place only where the demic
identity of the salmon is known and where catching technology can reduce mor-
tality rates in depleted demes. In many cases, that would require fishing to take
place in the home-stream estuary or in the river upstream. Inriver gear should be
changed to live-catch systems to the greatest possible extent, permitting release
of fish of depleted populations or species. Implementing this recommendation
initially will require low fishing effort in many areas, especially in the ocean, and
will require the cooperation of British Columbia and Alaska, because many
salmon that originate in the Pacific Northwest are caught at sea in southeastern
Alaska and in British Columbia. Ideally, those fish would be allowed to be
caught in terminal fisheries in the Pacific Northwest. If only the ocean fisheries
in the Pacific Northwest are closed, more northerly ocean fisheries will still
impose a large mortality on a mixture of depleted and strong populations. Be-
cause of the diversity of interests and agreements, conventions, and treaties among
various parties and nations in the region, and because there are various costs and
benefits associated with all methods for rehabilitating salmon populations in the
Pacific Northwest, a serious political effort will be needed to achieve the com-
mon goal of protecting depleted populations in an acceptable way. Typically,
negotiations within the Pacific Salmon Commission (PSC) have been character-
ized by conflict and stalemate resulting from winner-loser negotiations and the
desire of users to avoid disrupting fisheries. The committee notes, however, that
management actions have already disrupted some fisheries, especially those in
the more terminal areas. Disruption is inevitable during the rehabilitation of
Pacific Northwest salmon. An effective Pacific Salmon Treaty is needed, how-
ever, to balance changed allocations among fisheries and to balance short-term
losses against the long-term gains that will be derived by conserving and rehabili-
tating the Pacific Northwest salmon. To assist in establishing greater cooperation
in the Pacific Salmon Commission, new approaches are encouraged. For ex
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CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
371
ample, re-establishing reciprocal fishing agreements would allow each country
greater access to its salmon production and might allow financial agreements to
aid in fishing-effort reductions through vessel buybacks or the buying out of
portions of catch ceilings and vessels to reduce ocean interceptions permanently,
or to aid in rehabilitation costs.
HATCHERIES
Role of Hatcheries
Conclusion. The management of hatcheries has had adverse effects on Nate;
rat salmon populations. Hatcheries can be useful as part of an integrated,
comprehensive approach to restoring sustainable runs of salmon, but by
themselves they are not an effective technical solution to the salmon problem.
Hatcheries are not a proven technology for achieving sustained increases in adult
production. Indeed, their use often has contributed to damage of wild runs. The
current approach to hatchery use the enhancement of catchable salmon runs-
entails a large and continuing input of human energy and money. In addition,
such use of hatchery production often results in reduction of already depleted
wild runs by further reducing natural populations of salmon (see Chapter 12~. In
many areas, there is reason to question whether hatcheries can sustain long-term
yield, because they can lead to loss of population and genetic diversity and
adversely affect natural populations, as discussed in Chapter 12. Therefore, it is
unlikely that hatcheries can make up for declines in abundance caused by fishing,
habitat loss (including that resulting from dams), etc., over the long term. Hatch-
eries might be useful as short-term aids to a population in immediate trouble
while long-term, sustainable solutions are being developed. Indeed, such a new
mission for hatcheries-as a temporary aid in rehabilitating natural populations
could be important in reversing past damage from hatcheries as well as from
other causes.
Recommendation. The intent of hatchery operations should be changed
from that of making up for losses of juvenile fish production and for increas-
ing catches of adults. They should be viewed instead as part of a bioregional
plan for protecting or rebuilding salmon populations and should be used
only when they will not cause harm to natural populations. Hatcheries should
be considered an experimental treatment in an integrated, regional rebuilding
program and they should be evaluated accordingly. Whenever hatcheries are
used, great care should be taken to minimize their known and potential adverse
effects on genetic structure of metapopulations and on the ecological capacities
of streams and the ocean. Special care needs to be taken to avoid transplanting
hatchery fish to regions in which naturally spawning fish are genetically differ-
ent. The aim of hatcheries should be to assist recovery and opportunity for
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genetic expression of wild populations, not to maximize catch in the near term.
Only when it is clear that hatchery production does not harm wild fish should the
use of hatcheries be considered for augmenting catches. Hatcheries should be
audited rigorously. Any hatchery that "mines" broodstock from mixed wild and
natural escapements to meet its normal operating targets should be a candidate
for immediate closure or conversion to research. Diseased broodstocks should be
rigorously culled to minimize disease in progeny. It is useful for all hatchery fish
to be identifiable. Visible marks, such as finclips, have some advantages, but
other methods, such as passive integrated transponder (PIT) tags, coded-wire
tags, and genetic markers are also useful. Marking hatchery fish externally is
particularly important when fishers and managers need to distinguish between
hatchery and wild fish.
Regional Variation in Use of Hatcheries
Conclusion. Current hatchery practices do not operate within a coherent
strategy based on the genetic structure of salmon populations. A number of
hatcheries operate without appropriate genetic guidance from an explicit conser-
vation policy, although this is beginning to change. Consistency and coordina-
tion of practices across hatcheries that affect the same or interacting demes and
metapopulations is generally lacking.
Recommendation. Hatcheries should be dismantled, revised, or repro-
grammed if they interfere with a comprehensive rehabilitation strategy de-
signed to rebuild natural populations of anadromous salmon sustainably.
Hatcheries should be tested for their ability to rehabilitate populations whose
natural regenerative potential is constrained severely by both short- and long-
term limitations on rehabilitation of freshwater habitats. Hatcheries should be
excluded or phased out from regions where the prognosis for freshwater-habitat
rehabilitation is much higher, as is the case for many watersheds of the Oregon
coast. This recommendation, for example, would allow continuation of the hatch-
ery-supported fishery on chinook at Willamette Falls because it is disrupting
neither wild populations nor rehabilitation efforts.
Recommendation. Decision-making about uses of hatcheries should occur
within the larger context of the region where the watersheds are located and
should include a focus on the whole watershed, rather than only on the fish.
Coordination should be improved among all hatcheries release timing, scale of
releases, operating practices, and monitoring and evaluation of individual and
cumulative hatchery effects, including a coastwide database on hatchery and wild
fish proportions and numbers. Hatcheries should be part of an experimental
treatment within an adaptively managed program in some regions but not in
others.
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373
Recommendation. All hatchery programs should adopt a genetic-conserva-
tion goal of maintaining genetic diversity among and within both hatchery
and naturally spawning populations. Agencies involved in management of
anadromous salmon should recognize that achievement of population-rebuilding
goals will be jeopardized without concurrent adoption of a genetic-conservation
goal. Hatchery practices that affect straying genetic interaction between local
wild fish and hatchery-produced fish should be closely examined for consis-
tency with regional efforts.
INFORMATION NEEDS
Funding Adequacy
Conclusion. Research has been adequately funded but inadequately guided.
Recommendation. An independent, standing scientific advisory board
should be established to ensure that the available research dollars are spent
most productively to answer the most critical questions as soon as possible.
The advisory board would encourage cooperation from other organizations and
individuals in the region to help to design and evaluate research and would serve
as a conduit for information. It should be composed of experts in relevant
disciplines, including natural and social sciences and engineering. The primary
funding agencies for salmon research in the region (at least the Bonneville Power
Administration, the Army Corps of Engineers, the National Marine Fisheries
Service, the Department of the Interior, and the Department of Agriculture) should
carefully consider the advice of the advisory board with respect to identification
of critical questions, research funding, monitoring, and other science-based deci-
sions concerning salmon. When they do not follow the board's advice, they
should provide written justification. The committee's reports should be publicly
available.
Adaptive Management
Conclusion. Much of the current uncertainty over the benefits of habitat-
improvement projects, hatcheries, and other management and restoration
approaches results from lack of scientific monitoring and evaluation. Many
habitat programs involving millions of dollars have been undertaken over the last
20 years with little or no monitoring. Even when monitoring has been under-
taken, lack of replicates and controls, uneven measurement consistency, and lack
of commitment to long-term study have constrained the opportunities to learn
from these programs.
Recommendation. Watershed analysis, adaptive management, a careful in
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ventory, and strong regional monitoring programs are needed to provide the
context within which management decisions can be made. A systematic
evaluation of the condition of Pacific Northwest watersheds and the status of
salmon populations must be undertaken. Some states and federal agencies are
initiating such efforts. Watershed analysis should encompass multiple land uses
throughout river basins. A regional network of reference sites should be estab-
lished for adaptive-management experimentation similar to the trials now being
implemented on federal forest land. Integrative measures of watershed produc-
tivity (such as smolt production) must be monitored at many more locations than
is the case today. Finally, a clearer picture of the status of salmon populations
throughout the region is needed to increase confidence in decisions about how to
allocate financial and human resources to solve the salmon problem.
INSTITUTIONS
Conclusion. Continued human population and economic growth threatens
the existence of salmon in the Pacific Northwest. In the absence of explicit
choices to do otherwise, salmon will continue to decline.
Conclusion. The current set of institutional arrangements contributes to the
decline of salmon and cannot halt that decline. Institutional arrangements
have a long reach in time, space, and function and are formed and designed on
political bases. For the most part, human institutions that affect salmon have
taken only incidental account of salmon biology. Because of the character of the
social processes by which institutional arrangements emerge and change, rational
analysis is necessary but not sufficient for constructive change.
Conclusion. The current set of institutional arrangements is not appropriate
to the bioregional requirements of salmon and their ecosystems. A critical
institutional need is to link a bioregional (ecosystem) perspective to cooperative
management (i.e., joint management by a government agency and a community
of stakeholders) as a governing concept. Meeting this need is primarily a politi-
cal task, not a scientific one.
Conclusion. Political turbulence has thwarted attempts to take a long-term
perspective, even though salmon management requires time scales of de-
cades to determine whether a given approach is successful.
Conclusion. Attempts to halt the decline of salmon over the last 30 years
have led to institutional reforms in fishing management, funding, habitat
conservation, dam operations, and protection of endangered populations.
They have not halted the decline but have raised expectations that the decline
would be ameliorated.
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375
Recommendation. Because the problems facing salmon are multidimen-
sional, an interdisciplinary approach to solving them is essential. Market
mechanisms should be used to help people know the costs of choices, and subsi-
dies that prevent markets from operating effectively should be removed. In
addition to the biological and environmental benefits of a sustainable salmon
population, effective solutions should improve the operation of market forces and
thus reduce some economic factors that now lead people to undervalue salmon
and their ecosystems.
Recommendation. Bioregional cooperative management that incorporates
stakeholders in governance should make use of local knowledge, provide
incentives for long-term learning, and balance local interests against the
problems that arise at the edges of bioregions and the requirements to deal
with stem effects. Such an approach would reorient and diversify human man-
agement in ways that improve the possibilities of sustainability. Bioregional
cooperative management is inherently diverse in goals and enables a region to
respond to changing conditions with greater resilience. It also provides resilience
against political and economic turbulence.
Recommendation. Our limited understanding of salmon and the ecosystems
they inhabit requires adaptive management if rehabilitation is to have a
chance. Systematic, experimental learning is faster and less expensive than trial-
and-error learning, which has proved ineffective within the current institutional
arrangements.
Recommendation. All institutional changes should take into account the
long time scales of and likelihood of surprise in attempts to rehabilitate
salmon and their ecosystems.
Recommendation. Hydropower prices, which internalize the full costs of
growth, should be used to provide funding for rehabilitation of salmon and
their ecosystems, especially in areas that are affected by hydropower
projects.
Recommendation. The institutional framework for fishery management
should be unified and streamlined. The committee is reluctant to recommend a
detailed model of institutional structure that is most likely to be successful. One
reason is that no institutional solution to a similar problem stands out above all
others, most have advantages and disadvantages. Another reason is that any
institutional structure's success will depend in large degree on having been cre-
ated by all groups of stakeholders and not imposed from outside. However, three
major principles must be adhered to.
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1. The institutional structure must allow for a sharing of decision making
among all legitimate interests.
2. It must consist of local units small enough to ensure local legitimacy and
to respond to local variations in environmental and socioeconomic factors, and it
must make use of local knowledge.
3. There must be a mechanism to ensure that the larger-scale environmental
and anthropogenic forces behind and consequences of local actions are taken into
account, i.e., the interests of the greater region should not be submerged by or
sacrificed to local interests.
Our incomplete understanding of salmon, their ecosystems, and the social sys-
tems that affect them requires adaptive management, and adaptive management
requires a long-term point of view. The following suggestions are made with the
three principles in mind.
· Organize a commission for management of each river basin, combining
smaller basins into single groups.
· Include American Indian tribes in the process of rehabilitation. Strong
populations and terminal fisheries-among the goals of rehabilitation will ben-
efit everyone in the long run.
· Organize cooperative-management groups to develop more selective fish-
eries and techniques, such as converting gill-net to live-catch systems and devel-
oping techniques appropriate to terminal fisheries.
· The activities of river-basin commissions and preemptive recovery plans
must be coordinated with the Northwest Power Planning Council, the Pacific
Salmon Commission, the Pacific Marine Fisheries Commission, the National
Marine Fisheries Service, and other institutions that have a multibasin focus.
Recommendation. The committee proposes that the relevant agencies in the
Pacific Northwest, including the National Marine Fisheries Service, agree on
a process to permit the formulation of salmon recovery plans in advance of
listings under the Endangered Species Act and that the Pacific Northwest
states, acting individually and through the Northwest Power Planning Coun-
cil, provide technical and financial assistance to watershed-level organiza-
tions to prepare and implement these preemptive recovery plans. The U.S.
Department of Agriculture, Department of the Interior, Department of Com-
merce, and Department of State, and Bonneville Power Administration should
also provide technical and financial assistance to those efforts. In describing the
biological, social, and practical reasons for a constructive course of action, the
committee has emphasized three components.
First, because of the unusual biology of salmon populations, action to protect
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CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
377
a given population must be organized within the biologically relevant drainage
and along its migration route in freshwater and at sea.
Second, although much of the habitat modification carried out by humans
over the past 150 years has been detrimental to salmon, research and practice
over the past several decades have taught much about habitat needs and improve-
ment. However, science cannot ensure the recovery of any specific salmon
population. A long-term adaptive, experimental approach is both logically com-
pelling and pragmatically indispensable for the large collection of demes that
constitute Northwest salmon.
Third, acting at the bioregional scale requires cooperation among diverse
landowners and water-rights holders. No body of law or practical way to consoli-
date governing powers is sufficient to put each bioregion under the supervision of
a single managing entity today. From that practical reality grows the need to rely
on cooperative management as a way to act in the face of fragmented control.
Because of the groundwork carried out by generations of fisheries biologists,
and most recently summarized in the Federal Ecosystem Management Assess-
ment Team's (FEMAT) report and the subbasin planning process of the North-
west Power Planning Council, it is possible to identify some of the geographic
outlines of salmon bioregions. One way to harness the Endangered Species Act's
potential for disrupting human activities in a biologically constructive fashion is
to foster the development of preemptive recovery plans which incorporate bind-
ing contractual commitments from funding sources-for adaptive management
to rehabilitate specific salmon populations within their bioregions and migration
routes. The plans would include a set of experimental actions and monitoring
methods that ensure that lessons important for salmon management would be
learned within several salmon lifetimes (up to 20 years, perhaps even longer) and
that lead to a scientifically grounded expectation that the salmon population
would increase during that time while preserving its genetic integrity. The recov-
ery plans would need to reflect the commitments undertaken by all the parties
that control the various elements of their execution; therefore, cooperative man-
agement would probably characterize the plans' development and implementa-
tion. The plans would be preemptive in the sense that the National Marine
Fisheries Service would agree that, while an adopted recovery plan is in opera-
tion, the salmon population it covers is protected as much as is possible under the
Endangered Species Act. In sum, the formulation and adoption of a plan would
forestall a petition under the Endangered Species Act to protect the population
covered by the plan. No filing on a population would be acted upon by the
National Marine Fisheries Service for two years after a state certifies that a
recovery plan is being developed unless the petitioner demonstrates that a decline
warranting emergency protection preceded the state's certification; this policy
would allow time for a plan to be developed but set a time limit within which the
National Marine Fisheries Service would have to adopt or reject a proposed plan.
The Northwest Power Planning Council, the agency with the most highly
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developed base of knowledge relevant to protection and enhancement of salmon
on the bioregional scale, must be centrally involved in recovery plans for the
Columbia River basin. Under current law, the council can also direct funding to
support recovery-plan implementation within the Columbia River basin. Outside
the Columbia basin, the states should facilitate cooperative management and
planning on the bioregional scale. Funds to support those activities can learn
from the model of the Timber, Fish, and Wildlife Agreement in Washington state,
which combined private, tribal, and state resources. The activities of the states
should be augmented by the Bonneville Power Administration, the Forest Ser-
vice, and the Bureau of Land Management these agencies are developing adap-
tive management areas and watershed-level plans under FEMAT. Assistance
will also be needed from the Pacific Fisheries Management Council and the
International Pacific Salmon Commission to target fishing restrictions to protect
specific populations, as well as other relevant agencies that operate beyond state
boundaries.
The prospect of constructive action to conserve and rehabilitate at least some
salmon populations without the conflict and delays encountered under the present
Endangered Species Act regime leads the committee to advance the idea of
preemptive plans. This approach requires no new legislation (although a way
would need to be found to allow the government to delay action on a petition to
list a species), and it calls into play resources that are already available in the
region. Although the proposed shifts in incentives are incremental, the bioregion-
scale learning that the adaptive plans would produce is likely to lead to more
substantial change over the next several decades. The strategy that the committee
proposes becomes more compelling as salmon abundances decline, in that bio-
regions that fail to act are more likely to face petitions under circumstances not of
their own choosing. By increasing the incentive to act on behalf of salmon
populations, institutional mechanisms can play a role that is more constructive
than the protective but conflicted stance of those institutions today.
AN APPROACH TO SOLVING THE SALMON PROBLEM
As described in previous chapters, the salmon problem took many years to
develop, and its solution will require the commitment of time, money, and effort.
The committee's analyses of the problems and potential solutions lead to the
conclusion that there is no "magic bullet." Therefore, like the problem itself,
solutions will be complex and often hard to agree on; to be successful, they will
need to be based on scientific information, including information provided by
social and economic sciences. In addition, to be successful, consensus will be
needed about the size of the investments to be made in solving the problem and
how the costs should be allocated. This means that solutions will have to be
regionally based, just as the salmon problem has regional variations (see Chapter
133.
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CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
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The committee recommends the following general approach. For each major
watershed or river basin, the following should be assessed.
· All the causes of salmon mortality, including their estimated magnitude
and the uncertainties associated with the estimates. Factors known to decrease
natural production should also be listed.
· Ways of reducing those sources of mortality or compensating for them,
their probable effectiveness, and their drawbacks.
· The probable costs of each method of reducing mortality; to be most
useful, the estimates should include both market and nonmarket costs. To the
degree possible, it is important to identify what groups would bear the major
portion of the costs of each method and significant uncertainties in the estimates.
(For example, reductions in catch rates would primarily affect fishers and tour-
ists; changes in water use could affect agricultural interests or ratepayers; changes
in riparian management could affect forest-products industries or private land-
owners.)
All the estimates would include substantial uncertainties, due both to lack of
knowledge and to fundamental environmental, socioeconomic, and biological
uncertainties. Nonetheless, such a process of assessment and evaluation is essen-
tial for rational decision making. They will provide a basis for evaluating op-
tions for weighing benefits and costs and for identifying areas where research
is critical. All the committee's recommendations should be viewed in this con-
text: they need to be considered on a regional basis (i.e., major watersheds and
in a comprehensive framework that includes an analysis of their costs, probable
electiveness, and the ability and willingness of various sectors to bear the costs.
This will be challenging for several reasons. First, in many cases, the desired
information has not been collated or does not exist. Second, considerable time
and resources will be needed to perform such analyses even for one watershed.
But the most important reason is that estimates of costs and how they might be
distributed will require intimate knowledge of each watershed and of people's
preferences and habits. These essential estimates should be made with input from
the people involved. Nonetheless, the committee believes this approach will lead
to improved effectiveness and if not reduced costs-at least increased cost-
effectiveness and reduced controversy.
THE FUTURE
The best approach to establishing a sustainable future for salmon in the
Pacific Northwest is to use currently available information to develop workable,
comprehensive programs rather than reacting to crises. This report has analyzed
many parts of the salmon problem and assessed many options for intervention.
However, the effects of more people, more resource consumption, changing eco
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nomic demands and technologies, and changing societal values are hard to pre-
dict. Because the success of programs to improve the long-term prospects for
salmon in the Pacific Northwest will depend on the societal and environmental
contexts, it is important to develop ways for improving our ability to identify
changing contexts and to respond to them. As long as human populations and
economic activities continue to increase, so will the challenge of successfully
solving the salmon problem.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
genetic diversity
