The proponents provided much more detailed data to address the ISRP’s questions, and these data were very useful. In particular proponents have responded favorably to our suggestion to develop methods to include adult steelhead abundance estimates in Abernathy and extrapolated to Germany and Mill Creek for an evaluation of supplementation.

One question that was not addressed, and perhaps we failed to emphasize it, was the actual number of individuals that were assigned to single or parent pairs in the parentage analysis, and how many individuals that were genotyped were not assigned to a parent. The numbers (and proportion) of fish not assigned needs to be presented and adequately discussed in any future proposal for completion of this project.

The challenge with this project is not executing the lab work but the logistics of the field work, namely, to meet the sample sizes required to have sufficient data. From the ISRP perspective, the question posed circa 2000, about establishing a broodstock using wild parr and producing smolts and subsequent anadromous adults from them has been answered. The questions for which support is currently being provided are the relative reproductive success of hatchery versus natural origin steelhead and the demographic consequences of supplementation. Since Germany, Mill, and Abernathy Creeks are intended to serve as reference and treatment locations respectively, the near genetic equilibrium among them, with the conclusion they have large amounts of gene flow, complicates any analysis. The challenge is twofold: First, for a demographic analysis you need a reasonable estimate of the adult progeny produced from natural spawning. If the three streams are functionally panmictic, adults attributed to one stream based on redd counts may have originated in one of the other streams. Second, if the implied large proportion of unassigned adults or juveniles is owing to adults that avoided capture at the electric weir, effort is being expended on genotyping individuals for which no useful conclusion can be reached.

Unless all of these logistical challenges can be resolved in future proposals, this project should be designed to complete the RRS and supplementation evaluation tasks over the next few years, and then be concluded. The project should be included in the Columbia River Hatchery Effects Evaluation project as part of consideration of basinwide evaluation. If the data are not suitable for meaningful evaluation the project should be brought to a reasonable conclusion.

If the logistic challenges can be resolved this study will provide an important replicate of the relative reproductive success of hatchery steelhead developed from a local broodstock, adding to the range of locations to help meet BiOp needs.

The ISRP requests a response that provides two primary items. 1. The response should provide a succinct, yet complete, presentation of the accomplishments of all facets of the project. This includes: • the number of parr collected each year to establish broodstocks the smolts released from these initial broodstocks • the estimates of smolts leaving the system from these releases and those residualized in the stream • natural smolt yield before beginning supplementation • adult returns to the stream from natural and hatchery production (by release year) • estimates of steelhead spawning below the hatchery weir site • numbers of hatchery and natural steelhead passed above the weir for natural spawning • estimates of juvenile (parr or smolt) production from natural spawning by natural and hatchery-origin adults, and • estimates of RRS of hatchery and natural-origin adults. The presentation should include the primary data (actual counts of fish), analysis of the primary data, interpretation of the analysis, and use of this interpretation to justify the approach to completing the study design in the 2003 proposal. The submitted proposal and presentation to the ISRP often provide conclusions without transparent supporting data. Portions of the proposal and presentation are contradictory. And within the proposal, conclusions in various places are often contradictory or cannot be easily associated with specific data. As an example, in the proposal in the accomplishments section there is a statement: steelhead smolt production has declined in the last few years in Abernathy Creek, whereas Germany and Mill Creeks (control streams) have been more variable (figure 1). These results suggest that this supplementation strategy may have negative consequences from either HOR smolt release or HOR adults spawning in the wild. Slide 9 in the presentation has bullet points stating that smolt production is equivalent between pre- and post-hatchery production years and that HOR emigration rates, timing, and patterns are similar to NOR fish. The text accompanying the presentation states: “These results suggest that smolt production within Abernathy Creek has not been negatively effected by hatchery production thus far.” A second example: the proposal accomplishments section states that, “Improper synchrony of HOR physiological processes associated with smolt transformation may increase the percent of HOR fish that elect to remain in fresh water or reduce survival. The consistent differences we have observed in HOR and NOR steelhead physiology and morphology may be positively related to the proportion of HOR fish that remain in Abernathy Creek (residualize) annually.” But in the next paragraph: “we evaluated spatial and seasonal overlap in habitat use and behavior between yearling HOR steelhead released from the AFTC and NOR salmonids. During spring, the majority of HOR smolts migrated downstream and left the system soon after each of three releases, whereas NOR smolt migration was more protracted following a normal distribution with one central peak. This suggests that the highest potential for ecological interaction between NOR and HOR at the smolt life states occurs downstream of the release location and within the first few days after each release.” Later in the same paragraph: “Our results suggest that there is a potential for hatchery fish to affect wild steelhead populations due to dietary overlap and salmonid fry predation.” In the adaptive management section the proposal states: “Our results suggest that a small portion (1% - 7%) of HOR released smolts did not emigrate.” For most of the essential production, demographic, and genetic objectives there is similar inconsistency within the proposal. 2. The response should also address the qualifications identified by the ISRP in the 2007 review. The 2007 ISRP review summary stated: “The sponsors made a diligent effort to rapidly respond to the ISRP’s questions. For the most part, however, their answers are only partially satisfactory. One major difficulty with this project lies with the comparison of adult abundance estimates in the reference streams (Germany and Mill Creeks) and the treatment stream (Abernathy Creek). The sponsor’s are apparently unable to verify (with presently collected data) assumptions involved with redd counts, which will be used to assess adult abundance in the reference streams. The response lacks a description of how the error associated with the abundance estimates will be assessed, and there is difficulty in accurately assessing other demographic characteristics such as sex ratio, age structure, and redds per female. The sponsors fail to plainly explain how they will account for confounding effects, such as habitat restoration actions, planned sometime in the future for Germany and Mill Creeks.” The recently submitted proposal continues to emphasize the opportunity to contrast production, demography, and genetic evaluations in reference and treatment streams. The proposal executive summary states: “We have started to compare the reproductive success and demographic changes (to both juvenile steelhead production and adult returns) occurring within Abernathy Creek to two control streams (i.e. Germany and Mill creeks) to determine whether supplementation was successful...” However, the accomplishment section provides no data on adults in Germany and Mill creeks. None of the objectives identify a demographic comparison of adults in reference streams to a treatment stream, and there are no objectives to obtain data on adult steelhead in Germany and Mill creeks. The ISRP raised concerns in the 2007 review about the sufficiency of data to assess and interpret relative reproductive success (for a variety of reasons), and demographic consequences of supplementation (for a variety of reasons) (see 2007 review). These concerns need to be resolved during this response loop.