NOTE TO CONTRACT OFFICER:  Please send contract documents to Jannice Richardson, Administrative Contact and Matt Boyer, Contract Manager.

Subbasin:  Flathead.  This project conducts mitigation actions in the Flathead River headwaters downstream to Flathead Lake, including lakes within the subbasin boundary.

Project Background:
In 1991, Montana Fish Wildlife & Parks (MFWP) and the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes (CSKT) published the Fisheries Mitigation Plan for Losses Attributable to the Construction and Operation of Hungry Horse Dam (MFWP and CSKT 1991). This Mitigation Plan presented fisheries losses, mitigation options, and recommendations to protect, mitigate, and enhance resident fish and aquatic habitat impacted by the construction and operation of Hungry Horse Dam. The Northwest Power and Conservation Council (Council; formerly the Northwest Power Planning Council) approved the loss statement: including annual losses of 250,000 juvenile bull trout (Salvelinus confluentus) and 65,000 juvenile westslope cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarkii lewisi), plus 124 km of critical, low gradient spawning and rearing habitat that was inundated and lost subsequent to the filling of Hungry Horse Reservoir. The Council then directed MFWP and CSKT to immediately develop an Implementation Plan, which was adopted for Hungry Horse Dam (MFWP and CSKT 1993). On-the-ground mitigation activities began in 1992. This project is one of a few federally funded, Columbia River mitigation projects carrying out a plan to offset a Council-adopted loss statement. Fisheries losses were to be offset by modifying dam operations, restoring or reconnecting habitat, reducing negative non-native species interactions, and implementing hatchery (native fish conservation) technology and offsite mitigation.  

The Council adopted the Flathead Subbasin Plan in 2004 (CSKT and MFWP 2004). The federal action agency's 4-H plan is designed to recover Columbia River fish species listed as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act (Federal Caucus 2000). Our mitigation program is directed by a similar scientific framework to offset fisheries losses at various spatial scales, descending from basin-wide mitigation requirements to site-specific actions. Mitigation projects are selected and prioritized based on decision pathways described in the Flathead Subbasin Plan (2004), and specific objectives and tasks are described in detail in the contract and statement of work. This project will focus on improving conditions for native fish survival and recovery in the upper Flathead River and Lake system.  

From July 2023 through June 2024 our work will focus on assessing population level effects of dam operations on native fishes (bull trout, westslope cutthroat trout, and mountain whitefish), implementing habitat improvement and fish passage projects, and quantifying and mitigating deleterious effects of non-native aquatic species on native fishes. Specific actions are detailed in the current Statement of Work and include genetic and demographic trend assessments of focal fish species, improvements and maintenance of culvert passage projects, land stewardship at Fisheries Conservation Areas and conservation easement properties, fish barrier site surveys to inform future isolation management strategies for westslope cutthroat trout, and suppression and eradication of threats posed by introduced rainbow trout.