The ISRP’s two recommended Conditions are listed below. The proponents need to assist with development of an M&E Matrix during the response loop (September 24 to November 22, 2021) and to provide information to address the other Condition in future annual reports and work plans:

1. Spawner-recruit relationships. Please present spawner-recruit relationships as a means to evaluate capacity of the habitat to support salmon and steelhead and to help track progress over time. If current data are insufficient to generate these relationships, then please describe efforts to improve data collection.
2. M&E matrix - support. As habitat projects and monitoring projects are not presented as part of an integrated proposal or plan, the need for a crosswalk to identify the linkages between implementation and monitoring is extremely important for basins or geographic areas. The ISRP is requesting a response from the Yakima Basin Habitat Project (199705100) to summarize the linkages between implementation and monitoring projects in the Yakima River basin. During the response loop, as a key M&E project and partner in the basin, we ask your project to assist them in creating the summary and provide information to them about what, where, and when your monitoring occurs and what is being monitored for and shared with implementation projects in the basin. A map or maps of locations of monitoring actions would be helpful in this regard.

The overall Yakima Klickitat Fisheries Project is a very large and comprehensive salmon supplementation and habitat restoration project. This M&E effort reportedly focuses on salmon population dynamics including hatchery supplementation, harvest, and predation effects on salmon but does not specifically describe efforts to monitor fish responses to habitat restoration.

The ISRP is concerned that salmon and steelhead responses to habitat restoration actions in the Yakima Basin are not adequately addressed by the restoration projects and/or this M&E project. Most habitat restoration projects in the Yakima Basin identified this M&E effort as the project that is monitoring salmon and steelhead responses to habitat restoration actions. However, this M&E proposal is clearly focused on supplementation effects, and only occasionally mentions the response of natural-origin salmon to habitat restoration actions. This M&E project should be able to track the basin-wide response of natural-origin salmon and steelhead to habitat restoration actions over the long term while incorporating density dependence and environmental variability into the analyses.

The ISRP encourages the proponents to continue to address comments by the ISRP review of the Yakima Basin Master Plan (2020-3, 2020-9). These comments largely involve supplementation efforts of coho and summer/fall Chinook salmon that have greatly exceeded the EDT and Beverton-Holt capacity estimates. While it is understandable why the proponents target high spawning escapements, it is also important to consider the lower productivity (survival) associated with spawning densities of hatchery salmon that greatly exceed current capacity of the habitat to support the salmon. Higher and higher spawner densities have not produced more progeny. Furthermore, high densities of hatchery origin spawners promote interbreeding with the relatively few natural salmon and will inhibit local adaptation even though the hatchery attempts to use 100% natural broodstock. Recent reviews by Anderson et al. (2020) and the HSRG (2020) indicate that minimizing pHOS is more beneficial to promoting local adaptation than maximizing pNOB. We encourage the proponents to use the collected data to further develop and evaluate spawner recruit relationships for naturally produced spring and summer/fall Chinook salmon, coho salmon, and steelhead. For example, what is the relationship between smolts per spawner (or adults per spawner) and parent spawners, and at what parent spawner densities is smolt production and/or adult maximized? Monitoring of natural-origin salmon spawner-recruit relationships is critical to the evaluation of salmon responses to habitat restoration activities and to inform adaptive management contingencies.

Q1: Clearly defined objectives and outcomes

The goal of the large and comprehensive Yakima Klickitat Fisheries Project (YKFP) is to restore sustainable and harvestable populations of salmon, steelhead and other at-risk species that were historically present in the Yakima subbasin. Abundance objectives by species for the Yakima Basin were developed in collaboration with the Columbia Basin Partnership Task Force of the Marine Fisheries Advisory Committee and presented on pages 212-249 of the task force’s Phase 2 Report, which was released in October 2020. Specific strategies to achieve these objectives include enhance existing stocks; re-introduce extirpated stocks; protect and restore habitat in the Yakima Subbasin; operate using a scientifically rigorous process that will foster application of the knowledge gained about hatchery supplementation and habitat restoration throughout the Columbia River Basin; and use modeling tools to facilitate planning and adaptive management for project activities. The proposal includes a number of M&E questions related to salmon propagation and supplementation, predation on salmonids, harvest and spawning escapement, and monitoring and evaluation methods.

The proposal would have benefited if species-specific objectives for the Yakima Basin were listed in the proposal itself rather than referenced in the Phase 2 Report.

The proposal does not describe monitoring of the salmon and steelhead response to habitat restoration actions even though most habitat projects stated this M&E effort was providing the necessary information.

Q2: Methods

This very large program involves a wide variety of methodologies, which are very briefly noted in the proposal with links to documents that provide more detail. This approach complicates the ISRP review process, but the ISRP recently reviewed the Master Plan that provides more detail. The proposal states that the Yakama Nation is working to update evaluation methods presented in the 1997 and 2006 Yakima Basin supplementation monitoring and evaluation plans. Most methods appear to be based on sound scientific principles. However, on page 18 of the 2020 annual report, it was unclear why the spawner-recruit analysis assumed no production from hatchery origin spawner and the analysis apparently removed hatchery spawners from the analysis.

Q3: Provisions for M&E

This is an M&E proposal for the very large and comprehensive Yakima Klickitat Fisheries Project. In August 2020, the proponents provided a 378-page M&E annual report including appendices. The report provides numerous data tables along with text that can be used for documenting progress over time. The proponents reportedly review their methods and progress and make changes as needed. The project has also produced over 60 peer-reviewed articles. The effort to go through the peer review process helps ensure that results are properly evaluated and that the project adjusts to acceptable scientific standards.

Many projects involving restoration efforts depend on this umbrella project to provide data and information about the success of their efforts. It is not clear how responsive this project is to the needs of some of the sub-projects (e.g., 200739800; 199206200), which refer to this project for providing the biological monitoring efforts needed for feedback to assess the success of their stream restoration efforts.

Q4: Results – benefits to fish and wildlife

The annual report provides many details regarding the benefits to fish and wildlife, including findings for multiple life stages of salmon. Supplementation has led to greater abundances of salmon returning to the watershed; however, abundances remain very small compared with historical levels. The YN recognize the long-term commitment to rebuild populations through supplementation and habitat restoration.

References

Anderson, J. H., K. I. Warheit, B. E. Craig, T. R. Seamons, and A. H. Haukenes. 2020. A review of hatchery reform science in Washington State. Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife; Final report to the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission, January 23, 2020. Available at: https://wdfw.wa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/02121/wdfw02121_0.pdf.

HSRG (Hatchery Scientific Review Group). 2020. Developing recovery objectives and phase triggers for salmonid populations. December 2020.