Tribes Want to Move Bonneville Sturgeon Upstream

By ALLEN THOMAS

Tribal officials want to capture young sturgeon from the huge population in Bonneville pool of the Columbia River and transfer them upstream into the suffering reservoirs behind The Dalles and John Day dams.

“Bonneville pool has this puzzling sturgeon problem of enormous abundance in the 2- to 3-foot size range that’s not growing at high enough rates to move into the legal size at a reasonable rate,” Stuart Ellis, a biologist for the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, told the Columbia River Compact last week. “For whatever reason, they don’t grow. The sport and tribal fishermen have trouble reaching harvest guidelines.”

So, the tribes plus the states of Washington and Oregon expect to ask the Northwest Power and Conservation Council for money to resume sturgeon restoration efforts in the mid-Columbia.

In the mid-1990s, the states started capturing with a trawl net 2- to 3-foot sturgeon from the Rooster Rock-Cape Horn area and moving them into The Dalles or John Day pools, said Brad James, a biologist for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.

By the time money for the “trawl-and-haul” effort ran out in 2005, about 42,500 young sturgeon were moved from the lower Columbia to The Dalles and John Day.

Construction of the dams on the Columbia have taken a toll on sturgeon populations by smoothing out high spring streamflows and reducing the fast-water areas used for spawning.

“The Bonneville pool gets much more consistent production than The Dalles or John Day,” James said. “The narrow slot below The Dalles Dam mimics the natural river and better distributes eggs and larvae.”

Streamflows in the Columbia River were very good in the springs of 1996 and 1997.

That high water resulted in good spawning and a spike in the population fueled by those year classes.

The population of 2- to 3-foot sturgeon in the Bonneville pool has jumped from around 30,000 in estimates done in 1989 and 1994 to more than 175,000 in the the 2006 assessment, James said.

Yet the population of sturgeon ranging from 48 to 60 inches in Bonneville pool has gone down from an estimated 2,500 in 1999 to 434 in 2006, he said.

“It’s unique of all the pools we deal with,” James added.

When the trawl-and-haul program started in the mid-1990s, Bonneville pool did not have the huge abundance of small sturgeon, thus the fish to help the upper two pools came from downstream of Bonneville Dam.

Bruce Jim of the Warm Springs tribe told the compact a comprehensive package of mid-Columbia sturgeon restoration efforts should include re-starting the trawl-and-haul, a sturgeon hatchery and improvements to the hydroelectric system.

Liz Hamilton, executive director of the Northwest Sportfishing Industry Association, cautioned the compact that taking fish from the lower Columbia to fix sturgeon woes in the mid-Columbia lets the Bonneville Power Administration and others who benefit from the dams off the hook from mitigation requirements.

Pool__ Tribal__ Sport__ Total

Bonneville__ 400__ 700__ 1,100

The Dalles__ 550__ 100__ 650

John Day__ 335__ 165__ 500

Total__ 1,285__ 965__ 2,250

Note: Sport sturgeon fishing in the mid-Columbia pools is open daily from Jan. 1 until catch quotas are filled. In 2007, Bonneville pool closed on July 30, The Dalles pool on March 29 and John Day pool on June 11.

Source: Washington Department of Fish and WildlifeMid-Columbia White

Sturgeon Catch Guidelines

Originally published by ALLEN THOMAS Columbian staff writer.

(c) 2008 Columbian. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.