Does anyone here know the story on these net pens? What are the net pens used for?

https://www.votervoice.net/CCAPNW/Campaigns/32871/Respond

Anglers wanted more hatchery fish from the Cowlitz basin than are programmed for Tacoma Power's mitigation hatchery system. CCA and others have advocated the use of net pens to raise additional fish. CCA was one or perhaps the main advocate for these Mayfield Lake net pens for rearing additional fall chinook salmon. I think this was in response to the largest production cuts at TP's hatchery going to fall chinook. However, the reason fall chinook were cut rather than other species, according to the advisory committee that made the recommendation, is because fall chinook return the fewest fish to the terminal recreational fishery in the Cowlitz River. Fall chinook contribute mainly to the ocean and LCR sport and commercial fisheries and very little to the Cowlitz River sport fishery.

The state Legislature has appropriated the money, and Director Anderson said WDFW just got their permits in place for the net pens, and that the eggs were already taken from the 2013 brood, so the programs is set to go this year.

It's not a bad program or a bad idea, but off all the fish that could be raised, most local anglers would prefer a stock that returned more fish to the in-river fishery for harvest. BTW, natural production of fall chinook has been on the increase in the Mayfield-Tilton area since re-introductions began, which only raises additional questions about why fall chinook were chosen.

Sg

Thanks for the information Salmo. I assume the net pens make it easier to transport the fingerlings past the dam as apposed to collecting the free swimmers from the lake. They must have to feed the net pen fish. Is that making them similar to hatchery produced fish?

Net pen fish = hatchery fish.

That's what I thought,thanks.

Danged if you do and danged if you don't

Depends on whether or not she has a fishing pole handy.

are you saying hookers are not native? I would think wives would be the creation of man, and therefore hatchery... and you mark them with a ring even. I believe cave women traded favors for food way back...

As usual, thanks for sharing some interesting information with those of us not as informed or in the know. I for one greatly appreciate it.



Tyler

Why don't they raise these fish in the hatchery vs the net pens in the lake?

Keta,

Hatchery is at its rated capacity. Raising more fish than programed would be inconsistent with TP's settlement agreement and FERC license, as well as its mitigation obligation. TP's mitigation fish are raised at the hatchery. These fish are in addition, so it's on the state's dime.

Sg

More fish is never a bad thing. Hope they can keep those Tiger Muskies out of the net pens....Os

TP is simply trying to do as little as possible. It's all about the greed!

Your insight into the details of these operations is very much appreciated.

Im excited about the program. Maybe now well get a few fish back without adipose fins. Wild fish are great but it is nice to bonk a fish every now and then.

The 2013 legislature approved funding for this project.

At the commission meeting on the 11th, that question was asked. Phil Anderson (the director) said that they had just got the permits & now everything was a go. Can't remember who, but something was mentioned that the eggs had been already taken at the hatchery.

Seems to me that why would this permiting take so long? TP was doing what they do best, stall, stall then more stall & WDFW did not push.

Machinist,

While TP has done an exemplary job of stalling on downstream juvenile fish passage for Mossyrock Dam, they have been pretty much on schedule for every other fish and wildlife obligation in their new FERC license. The Mayfield net pens are not a TP program, so I don't know how they could stall it.

Sg

That's not Tacoma's decision to make. It's the utilities responsibility to provide upstream and downstream passage for all fish arriving at their dams. Period. It's the law. That said, there are practical considerations. Like, why would a fish manager send his 2 million hatchery smolts through a predator-filled reservoir and through a 95% effeiciency fishway, when they could be loaded into a truck and hauled downstream of the dam?

It's cheaper for WDFW to dump the fish out of the pen. Since they are "their" fish they would have to pay for the transport. Really doesn't matter what maximizes survival it is what minimizes cost.

Greetings,

I am against the net pens for the following reasons.

1. Current net pen produced fish at the upstream site of Mayfield lake are notorious for producing damaged and diseased fish. The phrase "Mayfield fuzzy tailed trout" is in response to trout seen or caught that have fins either worn away from the pens and or displaying the fungal growth on the fins and backs of these raised trout.

2. Many of the raised trout are full of intestinal worms. These fish are long in size, but often thin and upon further examination exhibit open bleeding in the digestive track and cavity. Such fish that enter the food chain only exasperate the problem.

3. The location of these net pens will allow the fecal materials from these fish to enter directly into the intake flows of Mayfield Powerhouse, thus ending up at the intake of the Salmon Hatchery. Current use of the Salmon Hatchery is for the brooding of all hatchery species. Any outbreak of disease would directly effect both the Salmon and Trout Hatchery stock, across several species of fish, affecting all Cowlitz Fishery. There is no Ozone plant to treat infected waters that will come in contact with hatchery stock eggs.

4. The Cowlitz River currently has state of the art hatchery facilities for raising fish. If an increase in production is required, then do it there.

5. If for reasons unknown to me, a replacement to the existing hatchery facilities must be utilized there are two much better alternatives.

5a. Raise the fish in the area between Mayfield Dam and Mayfield Powerhouse. This area would at least allow settling of fecal materials and facilitate the natural release of fry through the existing weir system once they are ready to begin the downstream migration. This area is secure from the public, free of any other wild run to prevent cross contamination and readily available and accessible for feeding. Further, due to the natural enclosure of rocks, there is no need for net pens saving both time, money and cutting down on net abrasion sourced diseases.

5b. Develop fish passages past the falls on Winston Creek. Doing this one simple item will open more spawning beds than the whole of the Tilton River system. No feed, net pens or further labor intensive activities required. This one item is the only way to further enhance a "truly wild run" on the Cowlitz.

I believe that the resource can and should be developed further to mediate for the impacts of hydroelectric facilities, but net pens are a poor excuse for developing habitat.

looks like a good place to dump all those steelhead smolts that cant be put in Puget sound rivers

Very informative and thoughtful first post Daddy. Thanks for sharing, and I hope you stick around and share more information.

Sg

Screw salmon. Raise more steelhead!

Well the net pens are going in. Right in front of the intake to Mayfield Powerhouse. Those waisted tens of thousands of dollars should have gone into stream development, not more sick fish.

Well, I called it.

After approximately $600,000 of your tax dollars, between two and three million smolts were placed in the net pens. Then, they started dying by the thousands every day! It seems the smolts had a disease from the supplying hatchery and had to be gathered up in emergency fashion, then dumped down stream of the Cowlitz Salmon Hatchery to either make it to the ocean, or become duck food. The sum total of days in the net pens was less than two weeks. Funny that has not made the papers....
The whole endeavor was a major failure, not to mention it may have introduced a disease into the supply water of the Cowlitz Salmon and Trout Hatcheries.
If the state allows rivers to be damed up, they sure as heck can develop upstream habitat!

Develop Habitat, not Net Pens!

Thanx for posting this Daddy. I'm surprised Reid would have allowed this fiasco to happen .. given the science and all ..... Maybe it's time for you to offer the biological reasoning behind this wasted money Salmo .... Inquiring minds would like to know ...

And a big shout out to all the a$$ kissin' Lewis County Regulars .... from Gary's CCA outfitt. We all know you mean well, ..... but alas ...

More money down a rat hole.

If the fish were of Cowlitz origin and were diseased before being put into the pens then it seems that:

1. The pen concept itself was not the direct cause of the problem and,

2. The disease was already in the salmon hatchery and since that hatchery is upstream of the trout hatchery it had already "contaminated" the water source.

Or did I get one or more facts wrong???? If I did please correct me.

There also is (at least used to be) a WDFW trout hatchery that drained into one of the reservoirs. Need some details as to where the eggs were collected, incubated, and reared .

Kinda funny,clicked on the original link and:

This campaign has been deactivated or has expired.

Nothing funny (as in odd) about that at all. The Voter Voice is a service which is activated for specific issues with each activation having a relatively short life span.

Salmo G. posted early on that eggs had been collected so he should be able to ID the source.

Whatever. I read it as :
This campaign has crashed and burned.

Net pens in a lake... Jay F. C.

Black Bart,

To the best of my knowledge there never was any biological reasoning behind this project. It was all political reasoning by individuals whom I suspect were well meaning and well intentioned, but poorly or uninformed. The money could be better spent on alternatives that would better enhance sport fishing, like recycling hatchery steelhead, for example.

Regarding the knowing release of an infected batch of salmon, that falls in the realm of malfeasance IMO. The release of infected hatchery tule Cowlitz chinook exposes other salmonids in the lower Cowltiz River to that infective agent, whatever it is. And lower Cowlitz salmonids have a rough enough time as it is with C. shasta. They don't need another problem.

Larry B.,

As I recall, the eggs were collected at the Cowlitz salmon hatchery from tule hatchery fall chinook. As losses go, it wasn't an "irretrievable commitment of an irreplaceable resource," so there's no need to lose any sleep over it.

Another word about hatchery programs. Hatchery programs suffer losses of fish. It's a fact of life in the fish hatchery business. Measures can be implemented that reduce the frequency and severity of losses, but losses will occur. Anybody who can't accept hatchery fish losses should not be in the fish hatchery business.

Sg

Well, that's a bummer, to say the least.

I agree with the sentiment that the money could have been better spent on steelhead improvements, but that was never on the table. This project, while it had potential to improve chinook fishing on the Cowlitz, was not about the Cowlitz River. It was about the Columbia; specifically, the Buoy 10 fishery, which, along with Puget Sound, is where the majority of CCA's lobbying is going. I don't have a big problem with that; it IS, after all, the COASTAL Conservation Association, but it has been a bit disappointing coming to that realization.

In-river sport fishing ain't where the money's at, so I think we can all dispense with any notions we might have about habitat projects getting priority over fish production anytime soon. We are hopelessly hooked on the hatchery crack, and that works just fine for WDFW. As long as marine fisheries are marginally successful, their job is done. Additional fish on the gravel are an accident their management paradigm attempts to avoid at all costs.

I'm getting so jaded these days that I have started to think the only reason "wild gene banks" exist is that the hatchery programs in those systems were not productive enough to justify their existence.

Stuff happens. Right now there are much bigger management issues at play. No sleep lost.

My particular concern here was to make sure that the facts were accurately set forth. Whether the whole effort made sense is another issue. Whether a net pen in the lake makes sense is also another question. What is important is to understand that the lost fish were diseased at the Cowlitz salmon hatchery; it was apparently not because of the net pens or that they were in the lake - at least based upon the info provided. And if those fish were contaminated at the salmon hatchery this initiative did not result in the contamination of the water source for the two hatcheries; it was presumably caused by the hatchery water already being contaminated.

Damn it.

The Cowlitz now has more wild fish.

Maybe the Muskies chewed their way through the nets! They've got some big ass teeth! Seriously, you have to think that the Muskies spent time cruising those net pens so when the big escape came there had to be some chomping going on.

No way. According to WDFW the Muskies do not and will not eat salmonids. I've asked.

In the interest of full disclosure, while they deny they eat salmonids, trout were found in some stomachs. Guess they went with model and not the data.

Northern pikeminnows will prey on more of the smolts than the muskies will.

The greater question that remains in play is whether the net pen Chinook program makes sense in the first place. Money spent of fall Chinook that don't recruit to the Cowlitz fishery is money not spent on programs that do recruit fish to the Cowlitz fishery.

But Salmo, the only truly important fisheries are Buoy Zooey, the ocean, and Straits. If we get that, the rest is just gravy.

Pretty sure WDFW would trade almost anything to get "full" fisheries in those three.

How do those fish not recruit the Cow fishery? Honest question, as I don't know much about the net pen fish.

Carcassman, I don't dispute those priorities, and some of those Cowlitz Chinook that aren't caught in BC do recruit to the ocean fishery. B-10, not so much due to tule constraints.

WSU, actual returns to the Cowlitz are very low as a % of smolts released. Investing the $ in fish that actually return to local fisheries would be a more prudent investment. As C-man points out, the ocean fishery is all important, so WDFW probably justifies the expense for the paltry contribution to that fishery of importance.

Lower River Hatchery (LRH) tules (includes Cowlitz) are managed for a 41% exploitation rate, the overwhelming majority of which are taken LONG before they enter the Mother Cow.

Stimulating the economy.

Change you can believe in!!