The Salmon and Steelhead



Hatchery Fish Controversy, Part VI



Ernest L. Brannon, University of Idaho--February 26, 2005



Hatchery Fish Performance Success
in Natural Streams



It is too bad that our salmon and steelhead resources have become so politicized. Once that occurs, and politicians promote or degrade different recovery strategies, the resources are the losers. The May 12/04 article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer “Salmon recovery efforts must be based on science,” by two King County officials is an example. Apparently they wanted to politicize the National Marine Fisheries Service decision to reconsider hatchery fish in listing determinations under the ESA. The County officials' allegation was that hatchery fish were genetically inferior, more susceptible to disease, and less adaptable than wild fish. Unfortunately, none of their allegations were based on science. They got it wrong, but such allegations are common because political pundits don’t really consider the science. I admit that if good records were kept on hatchery introductions in the Pacific Northwest they would undoubtedly show mixed results, but that is not the fault of the fish. The problem has been fisheries management and how hatchery fish have been used in various applications.



So lets turn to hatchery fish performance in the natural environment and look for genetic inferiority, disease susceptibility and poor adaptation. Most noteworthy among recent hatchery programs is (1) the pink salmon in Prince William Sound (PWS), Alaska. Mean annual adult pink salmon returns to PWS from the 1920s to the 1970s were around 5.2 million fish. Since hatchery production started, the mean adult return has been in excess of 26 million fish annually, and the largest run in the history of PWS occurred in 2003 with 57 million fish. Analysis of otolith marks of hatchery fish in streams relatively close (20 km) to the hatcheries have shown the majority of spawners have been hatchery strays, and there is no evidence of reduced productivity of the wild populations in those streams. Hatchery fish originated from the Sound and are genetically compatible with wild fish.



Other hatchery programs show similar integration. (2) Sooes River just south of Cape Flattery , had fewer than 100 fall Chinook reaching the spawning grounds in some years. Since the Makah National Fish Hatchery program started in 1982, the population has built up to well over 8,000 fish returning to the system. (3) White River with spring chinook salmon dropped to less that 10 adults in the mid-1980s. The hatchery program has been successful in returning over 400 adults annually to the hatchery through the 1990s, and over 2,000 untagged adults returned to their historical spawning grounds in the fall of 2001. (4) The Sacramento River winter-run chinook project is also successful. The program to recover these unique salmon has stabilized and perhaps has even increased the effective population size of the winter-run chinook population previously listed at risk of extinction. (5) And finally, the Oregon coastal hatchery coho have shown no negative impacts on wild coho returns, suggesting no genetic or disease interactions.



Supplementation in the Columbia River Basin has also been noteworthy. (6) Genetic analysis of rainbow trout in the Yakima River and (7) Carson chinook salmon introduced to the Methow River in the mid-Columbia have shown these fish are integrated with the wild populations. (8) Chinook salmon out-planted in Lookingglass Creek in the Salmon River system from the Rapid River hatchery, tributary to the Little Salmon River, have shown spawner-to-spawner return rates similar to wild fish. Successful hatchery fish introductions also include (9) spring chinook in the Methow basin and (10) fall chinook in the Yakima River, (11) chinook in Lake Coeur d’ Alene , and (12) coho in the Yakima River , and (13) coho in the Umatilla. Yakima coho demonstrate increasing survival among second- and third-generation progeny compared to first-generation hatchery fish, which verifies the expectation as hatchery fish adapt to their receiving stream.



There are other successes that add to the record. (14) The self-sustaining chinook salmon populations originating from Sacramento River hatchery transplants to New Zealand streams, and (15) chinook and (16) coho transfers to the Great Lakes provide strong evidence for the potential of hatchery fish to do well and adapt to new circumstances.

And then there is (17) the Hidden Falls hatchery on Baronoff Island , Alaska , propagating coho over the last 15 years. Out-of-basin coho reared under natural conditions in Deer Lake experienced smolt-to-adult survival rates of 5 to 24%. The same coho stock propagated under standard techniques at the Hidden Falls hatchery, have shown smolt-to-adult survival rates from 6 to 29%, every bit as good as the fish raised in the wild.



The above 17 examples of hatchery fish successes are not experimental results, but long-term circumstantial evidence of populations that have become established using hatchery fish. The point is there is positive evidence that artificial propagation can contribute to naturally spawning, self-sustaining salmonid populations over the long-term, even from conventional hatchery programs and transplanted stocks. There is no corroboration of genetic inferiority, greater susceptibility to disease, or less adaptability associated with hatchery fish.



The key to success is making sure that the biological needs of the fish are provided for, and when hatcheries can be reformed to better provide for those needs, even better performance can be expected. The problem is that the hatchery controversy has been exaggerated out of all proportions. It is not just that the arm-chair biologists have misinterpreted the data on hatchery fish, but that there has been the even more insidious strategy to purposefully misrepresent the information in an attempt to benefit some political agenda. There is no question that hatchery fish can fail if they are not adequately provided for in hatchery environments, or are applied in ways inconsistent with their genetic predisposition. Those problems require management reform and can easily be corrected. The problem of using hatchery fish, or spotted owls, or wolves for hidden political agendas, however, will never be resolved, and the public should beware when they see opinions masquerading as science.



Dr. Ernest L. Brannon is a professor at the Center for Salmonid and Freshwater Species at Risk, University of Idaho, Moscow. He is also Chairmen of the Salmon Committee for the Salmonid Foundation.


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