Habitat for Fish
Habitat condition is critical to successful spawning, foraging, and avoidance of predators. There is no one-size-fits-all description of ideal fish habitat since fish needs vary substantially among different species and life stages. For instance, chum salmon prefer to spawn in side-channel habitat, which is quite different from the main channel riffle habitat where chinook usually spawn. Adult chinook may “hold” in fresh water for six months or more before spawning, so refuge habitat such as deep pools with woody debris are important to them, while adult chum salmon return to fresh water ready to spawn with little or no delay, and therefore pool habitat for long term holding may be less important to them. Generally, though, to support a wide variety of fish species a stream should have a combination of pools and riffles, woody cover in the stream for refuge from predators and to provide places to rest, stream-side vegetation to shade the stream and keep water cool and clean, and connections between different habitats that allow the fish to move from say, a main channel area to a side channel and back.
Harvest Management
The salmon co-managers, which include federally recognized Indian tribes and the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW), make joint decisions about harvest policies. Each year the salmon co-managers determine harvest amounts and locations as established by the U.S. v. Washington court case that allocates half of the harvestable amount of fish to the treaty Indian tribes and the other half to the state of Washington. All fisheries in Washington, both tribal and non-tribal, are operating under National Marine Fisheries Service permits that are issues in compliance with the Endangered Species Act. In addition to harvests in Washington, the fishery managers also work with Canadian fishery managers on the amount of fish that each country can harvest from the other’s salmon runs.
Hatcheries
A hatchery is a place where fish are bred and raised. In general, salmon hatcheries work by capturing salmon when they return to fresh water to spawn. The hatcheries collect eggs and sperm (called milt), and mix them together. The fertilized eggs are then incubated, and hatched fish are raised in holding ponds. When they are considered mature enough to fend for themselves, the fish are released into a creek or river where they may reside for about a year or swim out to sea. In some situations, the juvenile fish are held for a period of time at a site away from the hatchery to allow them time to imprint to the natural waters. These “acclimation ponds” are intended to increase the number of fish returning to spawn in natural habitats rather than returning to the hatchery. Salmon raised in hatcheries often differ from wild salmon in their genetics and behavior. The negative effects of hatcheries on wild populations are being debated: for example, hatchery fish that originated from a distant river may intebreed with local wild salmon, or compete with them for food and habitat. Various hatchery reforms are underway including the development of hatchery and genetic management plans to guide hatchery operations and prevent negative impacts to ESA listed salmon species.
Hydropower
There are three hydroelectric facilities operating in WRIA 1. Other projects have been proposed, and are in various stages of local and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission permitting. The existing and proposed facilities are “run-of-the river” design, which takes advantage of natural elevation drop by diverting water into a pipeline that is run downhill to increase the head, or the vertical distance that the water falls, which in turn increases the amount of power generated. Typically, the water is then returned to the stream from which it came. When stream flow is diverted into a pipeline, the stretch of the stream between the point of diversion and where the water is returned to the stream is called the bypass reach. WRIA 1 does not have any facilities that use a dam and reservoir to create an artificial change in a river’s elevation, which are known as “high-head” facilities. A 1950s study by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers did not find any sites within WRIA 1 for high-head hydroelectric projects that were financially feasible.