"(19) The term “take” means to harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture, or collect, or to attempt to engage in any such conduct."
Can anyone tell me how early winter steelhead programs harass, pursue, hunt, shoot, trap, capture or collect listed steelhead?
Therefore, and as I said in a previous post, the only form of take that can apply to these programs is through harm. Harm as defined by the ESA must involve mortality of an individual of the listed stock.
Title 50: Wildlife and Fisheries
Part 17 Subpart A
17.3 DEFINITIONS
"Harm in the definition of 'take' in the Act means an act which actually kills or injures wildlife. Such act may include significant habitat modification or degradation where it actually kills or injures wildlife by significantly impairing essential behavioral patterns, including breeding, feeding or sheltering."
It's pretty easy. Hatchery programs need to collect broodstock, if one wild fish swims into the hatchery while they are collecting hatchery broodstock then you have 'trapped, captured, or collected' an ESA listed animal. Don't see how you couldn't see this as a 'take' under your own definitions, and that this action would then require an ESA permit for the hatchery program to operate. Albeit, this is just during broodstock collection, not across the entire operation of the hatchery program. A reasonable person should understand that there is a lot of potential interaction between a hatchery steelhead program and wild steelhead living in the same watershed. These interactions are what require the permitting process, given the definitions you yourself have provided here. Pretty simple really when you think about it.
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