Sockeye panel says gains not worth the cost

For more than 15 years, one of the most storied runs of Northwest salmon has teetered on the brink of extinction. Last week, a panel of scientists served notice that the millions of dollars being spent to restore the Snake River sockeye are not getting the job done, and extinction could be inevitable.

The Independent Scientific Review Panel did not tell the Redfish Lake run of sockeye to “drop dead.” But it did say those fish could go extinct, despite current efforts, and suggested that continuing to spend money on the four existing programs can’t be justified as sound science.

“The status quo is not going to get us where we need to be,” Eric Loudenslager, chairman of the panel, said Friday.

Even though “sound science” is among the key criteria for getting money from the panel’s boss, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, funding for the Redfish Lake programs isn’t likely to dry up anytime soon.

The council approved another $1 million for the current budget year and is likely to approve this fall about $17.5 million for those four restoration programs between 2007 and 2009.

It’s a high-risk investment, said Tom Karier, council chairman. It may never pay off in high numbers of fish that make the journey to the Pacific then swim back to Redfish Lake.

“The only other alternative is to pull the plug,” Karier said.

Since 1991, the Redfish Lake run of the Snake River sockeye has been at the center of the debate over Northwest salmon. That was the year it was listed as endangered by the National Marine Fisheries Service; the following year, only one sockeye, later dubbed “Lonesome Larry,” managed to return to the lake in central Idaho.

To get there, Larry and other Snake River sockeye make one of the most amazing journeys in nature. As young fish, or smolts, they travel down the dammed stretches of the Snake and Columbia Rivers, surviving turbines and predators, live and grow for several years in the Pacific, elude the nets of commercial fishing fleets and hooks of sport fishermen, then make the 900-mile journey back, against the current and over the dams, to Redfish Lake about 6,500 feet above sea level, to spawn and die.

If that run of sockeye were allowed to go extinct, environmental and fishing advocates asked, could other runs of Northwest salmon follow?

Some environmental groups began calling for the removal of dams on the lower Snake River, generating a backlash from farmers and other groups who use the waterway below Lewiston to ship grain and goods on barges to Portland. Cries of “Save our Wild Salmon” were countered with “Save Our Dam.”

The listing of Snake River sockeye prompted sharp political debate, because the Endangered Species Act protects distinct species. There are other places in North America where sockeye are plentiful, prompting critics to insist the law was being misused. How could anyone take the endangered status seriously, demanded then-congressional candidate Helen Chenoweth in 1994, “when you can buy a can of salmon off the shelf at Albertsons?”

But a sockeye from a run in one part of the Northwest is not interchangeable with a sockeye from another location, scientists said. Along with the basic “nature” of the DNA, there is also the “nurture” or imprinting that takes place for the fish from their spawning grounds through the migration to the ocean. They are now called an evolutionarily significant unit, or ESU, and a wide range of groups – from the federal and state governments to Native American tribes to business and environmental organizations – are trying to save salmon runs throughout the region, including the Snake River sockeye.

The panel of scientists believes the four programs it reviewed are properly managed, said Loudenslager, who also serves as a fish hatchery manager and adjunct professor at Humboldt State University in Eureka, Calif. Hatchery-produced fish are raised at various places, and some are maintained in Redfish Lake while others are sent on the long journey to the Pacific.

“They’re doing a great job of rearing fish. But the numbers of fish getting back are quite small,” he said.

Although about 257 sockeye returned to Redfish Lake in 2000, the numbers since then have been paltry. In four of the last seven years, including 2003, 2004 and 2005, the numbers of returning sockeye have been in the single digits. In 1956, an estimated 4,000 sockeye returned to Redfish Lake.

If a restoration program for a salmon run that wasn’t on the endangered species list had similar results, there would be “no question” that the funding would be discontinued, said Loudenslager.

At some point, breeding fish almost exclusively from what scientists call the “captive population” in the lake will result in the ESU changing, perhaps losing the ability to make that great migration, Loudenslager said. Whether that will happen in 10 years or 50 years, no one knows, he added.

“At what point do we say, ‘We’ve lost the battle?’ ” he asked. The answer, he added, isn’t for the scientists, but for the region and the people who set its policy.

Karier said the Power Council and other policy setters aren’t likely to reach that decision anytime soon. “The return rates are low, but there are return rates,” he said.

The Redfish Lake sockeye numbers have been declining for 50 years, even before dams went up on the lower Snake River, Karier said. But in recent years, the young fishes’ ability to survive barriers in the river like dams, slack water and predators, has been improved. So it’s possible that more hatchery releases could lead to more returns.

“Keeping this genetic material in the hatchery, and keeping it going, is an important thing to do,” Karier said. Ending the programs and doing nothing “would be a very difficult choice.”