Cowlitz Steelhead

[Stonedfish]

Revenant Steelhead: Resurrecting The Cowlitz Early Winter Fishery -

Remember the good ol’ days of late fall and early winter steelheading on Southwest Washington’s Cowlitz? They’re a lot closer to coming back than you may realize. State and utility managers are “working to shift” the lower river’s stock “to produce earlier-returning fish,” a resurrection and...

nwsportsmanmag.com

SF

 

[DerekWhipple]

Sounds good! Now let's increase cutthroat plants!

 

[DKL]

Revenant Steelhead: Resurrecting The Cowlitz Early Winter Fishery -

Remember the good ol’ days of late fall and early winter steelheading on Southwest Washington’s Cowlitz? They’re a lot closer to coming back than you may realize. State and utility managers are “working to shift” the lower river’s stock “to produce earlier-returning fish,” a resurrection and...

nwsportsmanmag.com

SF

Is this just spreading the late winter run out over more months or is this an expected increase in fish numbers too?

 

[Dennis Mitchell]

City of Tacoma has destroyed the winter run of steelhead. What they have done is nothing short of criminal....

 

[JodyRay]

I wasn't aware there are hatcheries on the Tilton and Cispus. Unless I misunderstood what they mean by "Cowlitz’s four hatchery stocks – Tilton integrated winters, Cispus and upper Cowlitz integrated winters, lower Cowlitz segregated winters, and lower Cowlitz segregated summers." But they only way for steelhead to return to the Tilton or Cispus is by truck, isn't it? Are the fish wire-coded so they can be separated at the Salmon Hatchery and then trucked respectively to the Tilton or Cispus?

 

[Stonedfish]

Is this just spreading the late winter run out over more months or is this an expected increase in fish numbers too?

My understanding is the same number of fish, just an effort to get some to return earlier than the March / April timeframe that is now the norm after the elimination of the Chambers stockings.
SF

 

[Cabezon]

Hi folks,
If I remember correctly, the argument for shifting to a late winter steelhead run from the traditional Thanksgiving to New Years return window was to separate the run timing of the hatchery fish from the run timing of the remnant wild steelhead in the Cowlitz system. Those native fish (which are ESA listed as threatened) tend to spawn earlier in the spring and there was substantial overlap with the hatchery returns. And yes, the genetic analyses showed that there were still "wild" Cowlitz genetics even after decades of intense hatchery stocking with steelhead of Chambers Creek origin. Many of the native fish were found to be spawning in lower Cowlitz tributaries. It is an open question whether they used to also spawn in the rivers above the dams but could not because of the lack of fish passage and now that segment of the population is extinct. Or if they never did much spawning in the upper tribs (unlikely). Therefore, the hatchery shifted toward brood stock that returned later in the spring. But from a fishery aspect, this also puts those returning fish in a window when the water flows are often high due to runoff and rain.
So, to resurrect this early run, albeit after filtering out Chambers Creek genetics, is a change in policy. It does raise the specter of wild fish mating with straying hatchery fish. Even if both fish have similar genetics, these matings can still impact (reduce) the success of the wild fish. There are epigenetic impacts where suites of genes are turned off (or on) by different habitats and being raised in a hatchery appears to be one of those triggers. This wild x hatchery mating may produce offspring that have lower survival / success than a wild x wild mating because the epigenetic effects can carry over for a generation or two even when the offspring are raised totally in the wild. I presume that WDFW has received approval from the USFWS for this change in run timing. Does anyone have a link to documentation of this approval?
Steve

 

[Salmo_g]

I wasn't aware there are hatcheries on the Tilton and Cispus. Unless I misunderstood what they mean by "Cowlitz’s four hatchery stocks – Tilton integrated winters, Cispus and upper Cowlitz integrated winters, lower Cowlitz segregated winters, and lower Cowlitz segregated summers." But they only way for steelhead to return to the Tilton or Cispus is by truck, isn't it? Are the fish wire-coded so they can be separated at the Salmon Hatchery and then trucked respectively to the Tilton or Cispus?

There are not hatcheries on the Tilton and Cispus. Last I knew, Tilton natural fish get a mark or tag as the smolts pass downstream at the Mayfield fish counting house, so some of those subsequent adult returns can be diverted into an integrated hatchery program to supplement and kickstart a restored natural production population in the Mayfield sub-basin (Tilton and Wilson). Natural smolts coming downstream from the upper Cowlitz and Cispus pass through the Cowlitz Falls Dam smolt collection structure. I think they remain unmarked. So some of the unmarked returning adults can be diverted to hatchery production to supplement and kickstart restoration of the natural runs to the upper Cowlitz basin.

To supplement Cabezon's post above, the Cowlitz Fish Technical Committee decided about 10 years ago to discontinue stocking Chambers Creek winter steelhead for ESA and genetic reasons. The Cowlitz "late winter" hatchery steelhead are most likely a remnant of the historical upper Cowlitz native winter steelhead. The public relations nightmare is that anglers had grown accustomed to a massive early winter return of Chambers fish. (Two to three times as many Chambers fish were reared and released as late winters.) WDFW committed to selecting for earlier return timing from among the late winter fish to try to restore some of the early winter steelhead fishing opportunity that has been missing for some years now.

Of course all of this has coincided with the generally poor ocean survival and low smolt to adult return rates affecting all of our steelhead rivers. So this effort at the Cowlitz may result in some improvement in adult steelhead returns as the restoration program achieves whatever success it can, but I have no realistic expectation that the massive returns of hatchery steelhead to the Cowlitz will occur again unless and until ocean survival rates improve across the board for all steelhead rivers in the region.

 

[Dennis Mitchell]

There is no Mayfield fish counting house...and if you look at the actual numbers they are not the same for 2022 and 2023...Why even concern themselves with fish above Mayfield dam as they would have to go through the turbines to get down stream, doubt they would survive that, then the cormrants and the seals downriver. Tacoma City Light should have been required to put fish ladders around the Mayfield dam that would open the Tilton fish could either use ladder at barrier or open it above....and ladders around Mossyrock dam and Cowlitz falls dam......

 

[DanielOcean]

I would really like this for my area.

 

[Salmo_g]

There is no Mayfield fish counting house...and if you look at the actual numbers they are not the same for 2022 and 2023...Why even concern themselves with fish above Mayfield dam as they would have to go through the turbines to get down stream, doubt they would survive that, then the cormrants and the seals downriver. Tacoma City Light should have been required to put fish ladders around the Mayfield dam that would open the Tilton fish could either use ladder at barrier or open it above....and ladders around Mossyrock dam and Cowlitz falls dam......

That's odd; there was a fish counting house for smolt monitoring when I was last working with that project. But that has been a while. There is no reason why the numbers would be the same in two different years. River productivity varies naturally, and smolt production can vary more. If you're referring to the number of hatchery fish produced, it's pretty reasonable that production would vary from year to year in an integrated hatchery program. About 85% of the smolts migrating out of Mayfield use the louvered fish bypass, and smolt survival through Mayfield's Kaplan turbines is pretty high, although I don't remember the average during the years I checked it. As for commorants and seals downriver, that predation applies to all hatchery and natural production fish. It seems like you're looking for reasons to not restore fish production to the upper Cowlitz. However that decision was made by fishery agencies, tribes, and NGOs in the 1990s.

Tacoma Power (TP) could have installed a fish ladder at Mayfield, but for some reason a tram was chosen and installed instead. So that gets fish into Mayfield pool (reservoir). The nice thing about that is that it allows self separation by Tilton and upper Cowlitz fish. A fish ladder around Mossyrock dam isn't feasible because it's a storage reservoir with around 80 feet of pool elevation fluctuation. Fish ladders only work with up to about 10 feet of reservoir fluctuation. A fish ladder could be feasible at Cowlitz Falls dam, but is unnecessary since fish bound for above Mossyrock are also bound for above Cowlitz Falls (CF). Once the fish are in the truck at Barrier Dam, managers can direct them wherever they are wanted. I was going to say that Cowlitz Falls Dam should never have been built, however its construction facilitated Friends of the Cowlitz and others to sue BPA (which bought the first 30 years of energy production from CF) and force initiation of the Cowlitz anadromous fish restoration program even before the ESA listings.

 

[DanielOcean]

That's odd; there was a fish counting house for smolt monitoring when I was last working with that project. But that has been a while. There is no reason why the numbers would be the same in two different years. River productivity varies naturally, and smolt production can vary more. If you're referring to the number of hatchery fish produced, it's pretty reasonable that production would vary from year to year in an integrated hatchery program. About 85% of the smolts migrating out of Mayfield use the louvered fish bypass, and smolt survival through Mayfield's Kaplan turbines is pretty high, although I don't remember the average during the years I checked it. As for commorants and seals downriver, that predation applies to all hatchery and natural production fish. It seems like you're looking for reasons to not restore fish production to the upper Cowlitz. However that decision was made by fishery agencies, tribes, and NGOs in the 1990s.

Tacoma Power (TP) could have installed a fish ladder at Mayfield, but for some reason a tram was chosen and installed instead. So that gets fish into Mayfield pool (reservoir). The nice thing about that is that it allows self separation by Tilton and upper Cowlitz fish. A fish ladder around Mossyrock dam isn't feasible because it's a storage reservoir with around 80 feet of pool elevation fluctuation. Fish ladders only work with up to about 10 feet of reservoir fluctuation. A fish ladder could be feasible at Cowlitz Falls dam, but is unnecessary since fish bound for above Mossyrock are also bound for above Cowlitz Falls (CF). Once the fish are in the truck at Barrier Dam, managers can direct them wherever they are wanted. I was going to say that Cowlitz Falls Dam should never have been built, however its construction facilitated Friends of the Cowlitz and others to sue BPA (which bought the first 30 years of energy production from CF) and force initiation of the Cowlitz anadromous fish restoration program even before the ESA listings.

Has anyone told you that you're a smart dude? Cause ya are.

 

[Dennis Mitchell]

I was just remembering what it was like to stand knee deep at the mouth of the Tilton and be knocked down by fish coming up that river at this time of year....or 18" searuns in September where Bear Creek runs into the Tilton....I believe there were 3 winter runs and 5 summer runs counted last week and trucked up river, I grew up on these rivers remember swimming in Cosmos eddy in the summer today you can't even launch a boat in Riffe or the upper lake and Mayfield fluctuates about 4' a week. Mayfield in the mid 60's was a great warm water fishery the water level fluctuation kills the eggs of those species...I can remember catfish minnows about 2' all along the shore in the shallows by the trout hatchery....now after memorial day on Friday Saturday and Sunday its pay to launch on both Mayfield and Riffe until after Labor day. I attended meetings prior to Riffe being filled where the talk was never having any fees. Guess some people just live to long and remember too much?

 

[skyrise]

Very good news. I applaud the effort in these days of “do nothing cause we will get sued”. hope to get back down there.

 

[Salmo_g]

Dennis,

You must truly be an old fart if you pre-date Tacoma's dams. Anadromous fish would have been held up at that small falls on the lower Tilton during low flows, so I can imagine sea run cutthroat stacking up in large numbers. The Tilton was excellent coho and cutthroat habitat before the watershed was clear cut. It still is a haven for cutthroat by contemporary standards, coho too. Some of the resident cutts have resumed their sea run tendency since the juvenile fish passage facilities went in, but not as many as I'd hoped. Given time, they may. Coho have been kickstarted by trucking many adults to the park in Morton, and natural production is pretty decent, again by contemporary standards.

The river isn't the same today with the dams having been there for going on 60 years. It wouldn't be the same either if the dams had never been built because like every other river basin, it's been completely logged except in national parks and wilderness areas. None of our rivers produce as many fish these days as they did prior to development. That shouldn't surprise anyone. Riffe doesn't fill to full pool because of some issue at Mossyrock Dam. TP said it would take about 10 years to fix it, and that was about 6 years ago they said that. I don't know what the current status is. I haven't talked with anyone at TP since Covid came along. TP didn't charge for use during its first license. The Federal Power Act does allow utilities to charge reasonable fees for camping, boat launching, etc., so they decided to in the new license. I think it's better PR to offer those amenities to the public at no charge, but that's just my opinion, and I have no say in the matter. I don't think you remember too much. Institutional memory is very valuable IMO.