SALMON HATCHERIES

Hatcheries have operated in Washington state for more than a century, beginning with one hatchery on the Kalama River in 1895. Originally built to compensate for land use decisions that permanently altered large areas of fish-producing habitat, state hatcheries have since become an important part of the state's economy, releasing millions of fish annually for harvest by recreational and commercial fisheries. Tagging studies indicate that more than 75% of all coho and chinook salmon caught in state fisheries begin life in a hatchery facility, as do 88% of all steelhead.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) now operates 91 hatchery facilities, of which 69 are dedicated to producing salmon and/or steelhead while the other 22 rear trout and other gamefish exclusively. Thirty-five tribal hatcheries and 12 federal hatcheries also contribute to the statewide salmon harvest, which contributed more than $1 billion to the state's economy in 2000 according to estimates by the U. S. Department of Commerce.

The Cowlitz Hatchery in southwest Washington is one of 91 hatchery facilities operated by WDFW. Together, these facilities represent a public investment of more than $1 billion.

In recent years, state hatcheries also have taken on a new, equally important role in helping to recover and conserve the state's naturally spawning salmon populations. Nearly a third of all state salmon hatcheries were involved in some aspect of wild salmon recovery during the 1999-01 Biennium, whether by rearing juveniles prior to release or holding fish through their lifespan to ensure the survival of depressed stocks. This renewed focus on wild stock recovery represents a major realignment in hatchery operations, as WDFW, the tribes, federal government and independent scientists worked to develop a comprehensive operations strategy for hatcheries in Washington.

One major milestone reached during the biennium was the mass-marking of virtually all hatchery coho salmon and nearly half of all hatchery chinook salmon released from state hatcheries. Using new, automatic fin-clipping machines, state hatchery crews marked more than 60 million fish in each year for release from state and tribal hatcheries, allowing for easy identification of hatchery salmon on the fishing grounds. As discussed in the Salmon Harvest section of this report, mass-marking laid the foundation for a new era in selective fisheries in which fishers are required to release wild, unmarked fish.

Like all activities that can affect wild stocks, state hatcheries have come under intense review since the listing of additional salmon population groupings under the ESA. In addition to initiating its own review process, WDFW worked with federal natural resource agencies and a newly appointed regional science panel to identify ways to minimize adverse impacts of hatchery operations on depressed wild stocks. These ongoing efforts, including the Deparments's new Benefit/ Risk Assessment Procedure (BRAP) and the development of Hatchery and Genetic Management Plans (HGMPs) for more than one hundred state hatchery programs, are discussed in the Applied Salmon Research section of this report.

The Hatcheries Division is the largest single component of WDFW's Fish Program, with 340 FTE employees and a total operating budget of $56.26 million during the 1999-01 Biennium, including $17.3 million from the State General Fund. Working out of the Department's headquarters in Olympia and 17 regional complexes throughout the state, hatchery staff were responsible for fish culture, fish health, facility maintenance, hatcheries support (including activities ranging from tagging fish to securing permits) and administration.

Total Salmon Production by State Hatcheries (All Species)

Hatchery Production

Click here for map of hatchery complexes in Washington State

Hatchery production figures for 1999 and 2000 show a continuing decline in the number of juvenile salmon released from WDFW hatcheries in recent years. The decline in poundage is less pronounced, however, because fish have generally been held longer in recent years to improve their chance of survival once they are released. Returns of adult salmon should be maintained over time under this approach.

In either case, ESA-related permitting requirements have made it necessary to decrease production of specific stocks or species at certain locations. In other cases, poor ocean survival conditions reduced the number of adults returning to some hatcheries, reducing the availability of eggs. Finally, WDFW's hatchery budget has not kept pace with increasing operating costs (especially utilities and labor costs), forcing cutbacks in some programs.

Returns of salmon to WDFW hatcheries during the 1999-01 Biennium showed typical annual variations by species and region. While hatchery return numbers offer some indication of the health of salmon stocks, it should be noted that hatchery returns can be strongly influenced by harvest rates and other factors. (Numbers have been rounded to the nearest 1,000 fish in the regional summaries that follow.)

Puget Sound Some chinook stocks in Puget Sound showed important increases during 1999 and 2000, rebounding from their lowest return rates on record during the mid to late 1990s. Spring chinook, especially, showed increases of up to 50% in the number of adult salmon returning to key facilities, compared to 1997 and 1998. These higher returns provided enough eggs to sustain recovery efforts at such hatchery facilities as Kendal Creek, Marblemount and Minter Creek, which rear chinook stocks listed under the ESA.

Salmon Releases and Returns, 1999/ 2000
Adult returns, egg takes and subsequent releases from WDFW hatcheries

Adult Return Adults Upstream Hatchery Egg Take Egg Take Goal Juvenile Fish Released ** CHINOOK 1999 Puget Sound 80,306 9,629 46,751,443 50,715,000 42,497,830 Coast 5,917 175 5,634,500 14,665,000 6,969,816 Col. River 46,501 2,659 51,790,950 53,710,000 41,264,527 2000 Puget Sound 56,273 10,357 47,846,515 52,365,000 36,924,619 Coast 10,466 27 10,102,400 13,165,000 4,978,489 Col. River 42,242 6,889 50,706,572 55,677,400 38,563,285 COHO 1999 Puget Sound 58,183 22,015 15,743,210 22,072,000 11,134,926 Coast 69,262 2,685 11,590,100 10,059,000 7,882,909 Col. River 125,019 57,990 27,462,278 18,205,000 22,466,539 2000 Puget Sound 200,796 38,512 15,426,930 22,068,800 9,470,907 Coast 78,141 4,185 8,690,500 9,100,000 6,482,384 Col. River 211,223 90,449 22,698,168 23,415,000 16,751,542 CHUM 1999 Puget Sound 60,286 10,782 40,365,500 43,675,000 40,571,247 Coast 646 351 271,000 285,000 284,000 Col. River 581 433 212,681 195,000 108,711 2000 Puget Sound 49,899 18,722 22,871,121 43,675,000 32,130,674 Coast 251 97 152,200 200,000 152,750 Col. River 272 18 190,000 190,000 197,481 SOCKEYE 1999 Puget Sound 6,251 745 3,090,000 20,380,000 11,024,495 Coast None -- -- -- -- Col. River 216 70 191,700 176,000 121,344 2000 Puget Sound 37,446 20,844 17,171,000 20,380,000 5,051,417 Coast 3 1 None None -- Col. River 1,623 1,429 195,500 260,000 167,955 PINK 1999 Puget Sound 9,281 1,491 1,810,500 1,500,000 None Coast None -- -- -- -- Col. River 2 2 None None -- 2000 Puget Sound -- -- -- -- 1,632,390 Coast ( Pink salmon return only in odd-numbered years) Col. River -- -- -- -- -- ** Tables include coop and Regional Fisheries Enhancement Projects, but do not include federal or tribal programs.

Fall chinook returns stayed consistent throughout the region during this time frame, averaging about 65,000 fish for all facilities. Hatcheries with large (and expected) fall chinook returns included Soos Creek, Samish and Minter Creek, all of which had average returns of 9,000-10,000 fish in 1999 and 5,000-7,000 fish in 2000.

Coho salmon returns displayed large annual variations in 1999 and 2000. Returns to the hatchery rack in 1997 and 1998 averaged 117,000 fish, then dropped sharply in 1999 to 58,000 adults before increasing to over 200,000 in 2000. Very strong returns were seen in 2000 at Soos Creek (43,000 fish), Voights Creek (41,000 fish) and Wallace River (23,000 fish).

Pacific Coast

Hatchery returns of fall chinook to coastal facilities remained consistent during the 1999-2000 time frame, averaging about 6,000 fish per year. Coho, however, showed significant increases after returns of 23,000 fish in 1997 and 40,000 in 1998. In both 1999 and 2000, the number of returning adults rose to approximately 65,000 fish.

Columbia River

As in Puget Sound, returns of spring chinook to Columbia River hatcheries were up somewhat from a very poor showing in the late 1990s. Returns in 1999 were about 12,000 fish and 10,000 in 2000, compared to just 7,000 fish in 1998. While low by historical standards, this increase was good news, because all of these stocks are listed under ESA.

Fall chinook returns were stronger than those for spring chinook, but still showed the decreasing trend of the late 1990s. In 1997, 31,000 fish returned to Columbia River hatcheries, followed by 34,000 in 1998. In 1999, returns increased to 41,000 fish before dropping to 22,000 fish in 2000. The Priest Rapids Hatchery continues to have the strongest returns of fall chinook on the Columbia River, with returns of 15,000 fish in 1998, 23,000 in 1999 and 7,000 in 2000.

WDFW hatchery workers harvest chinook salmon eggs at the Issaquah Hatchery.

Coho salmon returns to Columbia River hatcheries increased from 47,000 fish in 1997 to 58,000 fish in 1998, then to 102,000 fish in 1999 and 184,000 fish in 2000. The largest returns in the last two years were seen at Cowlitz Salmon Hatchery (34,000 fish in 1999 and 41,000 in 2000) and Lewis River Hatchery (32,000 fish in 1999 and 61,000 in 2000).

Wild Stock Restoration

During the past two decades, the number of state hatcheries involved in some aspect of wild salmon recovery has increased from two to 21. Hatcheries are now viewed by fishery scientists and policy makers as integral tools for the restoration of wild runs that have dwindled because of habitat degradation or other factors. Fifteen of the 18 stocks included in recovery actions during the 1999-01 Biennium were listed under the ESA.

Hatcheries play several different roles in sustaining wild stocks. For stocks such as Methow River summer chinook and dungeness River pink salmon (fall run), adults are captured and spawned each year and the resulting progeny are reared and released as juveniles. The purpose of these efforts, called "supple-mentation," is to maximize egg fertilization and fry survival and thereby increase the number of outmigrating smolts.

For other stocks, such as Dungeness spring chinook and White River spring chinook that are at dangerously low population levels, juveniles were maintained in a hatchery for their entire life to ensure the stock's survival – a practice known as "captive brood." While this process can often take years to show results, efforts by WDFW to bolster depleted runs paid off at a number of facilities during the 1999-01 Biennium.

The captive brood program for Dungeness spring chinook is a prime example. Starting in 1992, approximately 2,000 wild juvenile salmon were captured each year for five years and held at three facilities: the Hurd Creek and Dungeness hatcheries and the South Sound Net Pens. Since then, the number of outmigrating smolts was increased from an estimated 20,000 to 30,000 naturally produced smolts per year to more than 1,000,000 in 1997-2000.

Wild Stock Restoration Projects
Currently, restoration efforts are taking place on the following stocks.
(* = Type of restoration efforts; Both = captive brood and supplementation.)

The resulting adult returns from the project increased from an average of 167 fish from 1986 to 1999 to 218 in 2000 and 453 in 2001 – the highest number since surveys began in 1986. WDFW's partners in the project included the Jamestown S'Klallam Tribe, the Olympic National Park, NMFS, the U. S. Forest Service and volunteers from Olympic Outdoor Sportsmen's Association, Wild Olympic Salmon and the North Olympic Salmon Coalition.

The White River chinook salmon restoration project on the Puyallup River system is the oldest recovery effort involving hatchery facilities in Washington, setting the standard for similar efforts up and down the West Coast. Begun in the late 1970s by the former Washington Department of Fisheries and still continuing, this project has used supplementation, captive brood, habitat restoration and harvest restrictions – as well as dam relicensing and water withdrawal agreements – to bring this unique stock back from the brink of extinction.

Working in cooperation with the Puyallup Tribe, the Muckleshoot Tribe, the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service and NMFS, WDFW has helped to build the White River chinook salmon population – listed as "threatened" under the ESA in 1999 – from fewer than 20 returning adults in the early 1980s to 553 adult returns in 1999 and an estimated 2,000 fish in 2001. Prospects for recovery of this stock are now considered good and the project has become a model for successful stock restoration.

Hatchery facilities involved include Hupp Springs, Minter Creek, South Sound Net Pens, the Muckleshoot Tribal Hatchery on the White River and a number of rearing ponds provided by the Puyallup Tribe.

In addition to supplementation and captive brood recovery projects, WDFW used its hatchery facilities to protect and nurture wild salmon runs in other ways during the 1999-01 Biennium:

• Mass Marking: Perhaps the single biggest change in salmon fishing during the last biennium was the expansion of selective coho fisheries to include the Washington coast and many inland waters. To make it possible for fishers to distinguish between hatchery and wild coho, WDFW crews started clipping the adipose fins of hatchery coho in 1996, including nearly all of those produced in the 1999-01 Biennium. It also allowed fisheries managers to better assess hatchery/wild stock composition in various fisheries as well as stray rates into natural spawning areas. Significant selective fisheries were allowed in 1999 and again in 2000 (from juveniles clipped in 1997 and 1998), protecting wild stocks, while providing for the harvest of healthy hatchery runs.
  
  
• Nutrient Enhancement: Research over the past decade in Washington, British Columbia and Alaska has demonstrated the critical role salmon play in transporting nutrients from the Pacific Ocean to aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems of the Pacific Northwest. The Hatcheries Division worked aggressively with Regional Fishery Enhancement Groups and other local organizations, primarily volunteers, to distribute the carcasses of adult salmonids used for broodstock at WDFW hatcheries back into watersheds. Beginning in 1996 with 14 projects and 4,747 carcasses, the program grew to include 123 projects that distributed more than 160,000 carcasses into streams across the state in 2000. These projects range in size from 20 carcasses for Barnaby Slough (Skagit watershed) to10,000 carcasses into the Kalama River. Additional projects were approved for 2001, when more than 200,000 carcasses were expected to be distributed. Because the movement of fresh carcasses between watersheds has limitations due to the risk of spreading fish pathogens, WDFW has taken a leadership role in international conferences dealing with the development of approved alternatives such as processed carcasses (pasturized briquettes) or fertilizers to replace the lack of nutrients in streams with poor adult returns.

Mass-Marked Salmon Releases by WDFW Hatcheries

Hatchery Infrastructure

New legislation: Salmon carcasses and aquaculture The Washington State Legislature approved two pieces of legislation during the 1999-01 Biennium that have a direct bearing on hatchery operations. Salmon Eggs (ESHB 1286): The bill, titled "An Act Relating To the Use of Viable Salmon Eggs," prohibits WDFW from destroying salmon that originated from a hatchery for the purpose of destroying viable salmon eggs that would otherwise be useful for replenishing fish runs as determined by the department and Indian tribes with treaty fishing rights. The new law also specifies a prioritized order for distribution of salmon eggs, and directs the Department to allow more hatchery-produced salmon to spawn naturally in areas where progeny of hatchery fish have spawned before. The Department is drafting rules consistent with this legislation and will produce annual reports on the disposition of salmon eggs and carcasses. Aquaculture (SSHB 1499): Titled "An Act Relating to the Regulation of Marine Fin Fish Aquaculture," the bill returns regulatory authority to the Department over marine fin fish aquaculture. The Department, with the Hatcheries Division acting as lead, is in the process of drafting rules as directed by the bill covering areas of escape prevention, rapid recapture protocols and approval procedures for the species, stock and race of marine fish to be reared. It is also establishing an Atlantic Salmon Watch Program similar to that currently existing in British Columbia. Draft rules were prepared for the 2002 Legislature.

With the listing of large numbers of naturally produced salmon populations under the ESA, all the factors believed to play a role in the decline of a stock became subject to review, including state hatcheries. While hatcheries have become an increasingly important tool in the restoration of wild stocks, they can also present obstacles to recovery.

Some facilities, particularly those built decades ago, can present physical barriers to naturally produced outmigrating juveniles or adult fish returning to streams to spawn. Scientists also have concerns about interbreeding between wild and hatchery fish, and about predation and competition for food in streams, estuaries and the open ocean. As discussed in the Applied Salmon Research section of this report, WDFW worked to address these issues in a variety of ways during the 1999-01 Biennium, filing 128 Hatchery and Genetic Management Plans (HGMPs) with NMFS and developing a Benefit/ Risk Assessment Procedure (BRAP) to help analyze the compatibility of each state hatchery with the goal of recovering wild salmon stocks.

For all these efforts, the need for additional investments in the state's aging hatchery infrastructure was identified long before the announcement of the latest round of ESA listings in 1999. In 1991, a study by the consulting firm of Dan Adkins and Associates found that most state salmon hatcheries had entered the last quarter of their expected design life and would require major renovations and repair. Based on a review of just 35% of the facilities operated by the former Department of Fisheries, the study indicated that at least $25.3 million would be needed to meet immediate needs at those facilities alone.

Since then, funding for hatchery facilities has fallen significantly short of the amount needed to meet those basic operational needs, let alone address all the new issues raised by the ESA. From 1993 through 1997, state capital funding averaged $5.2 million per biennium, then rose to $7.2 million in the 1999-01 Biennium and dropped to $2.2 million proposed for 2001- 03. WDFW also allocated $2.4 million in operating funds for hatchery maintenance and repairs in the 1997-99 Biennium, but was forced to reduce that amount to $1.3 million in 1999-01 and to $770,000 proposed for 2001-03 to meet other priorities.

Faced with difficult choices, WDFW prioritized its capital funding to focus on projects that reduce hatchery impacts on wild fish. The final phase of a major renovation project at Issaquah Hatchery was begun with provisoed funds, but needed screening and fish-passage work was delayed at the Minter Creek Hatchery and a number of other facilities. To fund renovation of incubation facilities at the Marblemount Hatchery, the Department secured $285,000 from the Seattle Public Utility District in 2001.

WDFW regularly monitors the discharge from all hatcheries to comply with federal water quality standards. However, a number of state facilities did not comply with these standards during the biennium, due to insufficient funding for needed renovations.

The state's hatchery system represents a public investment of approximately $1 billion. Built as compensation for lost natural habitat, state hatcheries produce millions of fish for harvest every year, supporting fisheries and local economies from northern Puget Sound to the Columbia River. For an increasing number of depressed wild stocks, hatchery programs offer the best chance of survival. During the 1999-01 Biennium, WDFW worked to protect the public's investment in state hatcheries and make the changes necessary to ensure they will continue to provide these benefits in the 21^st century.