Snake River Coho Restoration V

The Nez Perce Tribe’s overall goal is to reintroduce and restore coho salmon to the Snake River Subbasin at levels of abundance and productivity sufficient to support sustainable runs and annual harvest. Nez Perce Tribe believes this program will require a substantial hatchery production component and the establishment of highly productive naturally spawning coho salmon aggregates.

The Nez Perce Tribe developed management objectives aimed at achieving the overall goal of the program. These include:
• Establish a localized Clearwater River subbasin coho salmon hatchery broodstock.
• Establish a localized Grande Ronde subbasin coho salmon hatchery broodstock.
• Establish natural spawning populations of coho salmon in the Clearwater River Subbasin and Grande Ronde River subbasin.
• Utilize hatchery production to achieve optimal production effectiveness while meeting priority management objectives for natural production enhancement, harvest, diversity and minimizing impacts to non-target populations.
• Restore and maintain treaty-reserved tribal and recreational fisheries.
• Monitor and evaluate program activities and communicate program findings to resource managers.
• This project specifically provides fish for tribal treaty rights. It gives the treaty tribes access to Mitchell Act fish that were previously released downstream of Bonneville Dam. It provides fish for harvest in the Columbia River from the mouth up through Zone six. It provides fish for harvest in the tributaries of the Snake River, and it provides fish for natural spawning and reintroduction of extirpated stocks in the Snake River.

This project supports continued activities by the Nez Perce Tribe to restore Coho salmon to the Snake basin during 2022-2023. The proposed description and metrics described here reflect the combined resources that PCSRF and Mitchell Act funding contribute to this effort.

Specific work proposed under this project by worksite is as follows.

WS #1 Dworshak National Fish Hatchery (DNFH): Propose to trap 100 returning coho adults and use as broodstock to provide eggs for the coho hatchery production groups under this project (Oct 2022- Dec 2022). When the smolts reach optimum growth levels they will be transported to Kooskia National Fish Hatchery for acclimation and released (Jan 2023- April 2023). Also under this project the tribe proposes to mark 60,000 of the coho with Coded Wire Tags (Jul 2022). A total of 500,000 Clearwater stock smolts will transferred to Kooskia National Fish Hatchery for final acclimation and will be released in April 2023.

WS #2 Eagle Creek National Fish Hatchery (ECNFH): Eggs from Clearwater River returning adults will be reared until Mar 2023 and transported to Lapwai Creek and Kooskia NFH for acclimation and release. Propose to transport 275,000 Clearwater River smolts to Lapwai Creek and 275,000 to Kooskia NFH for acclimation and release into Clear Creek and Lapwai Creek.

WS #3 Kooskia National Fish Hatchery (KNFH): Propose to trap 800 coho adults and use as broodstock to provide eggs for all of the coho hatchery production groups (Oct 2022- Dec 2022). Propose to incubate and acclimatize the 775,000 coho smolts from DNFH and ECNFH and tag 100,000 of these fish (90,000 with Coded Wire Tags and 10,000 with PIT tags, Feb 2023- April 2023). Propose to release the coho smolts directly into Clear Creek next to KNFH (Apr 2023).

WS #4 Lapwai Creek: Propose to outplant 275,000 smolts from ECNF (Mar 2023).

WS #5 Lostine River: Releasing a smolt group from Cascade Fish Hatchery located near Cascade Locks Oregon. The release group will be 500,000 Tanner Creek stock smolts released into Lostine River (Mar 2023). Propose to mark 60,000 of the coho with coded wire tags.

WS #6 Lower Granite Dam: Propose to trap and transport 500 returning coho adults and use as broodstock to provide eggs for the coho hatchery production group.

The benefit of the program is that coho salmon will be restored to sufficient numbers in the Snake River sub basin to support natural production, as well as tribal and non-tribal harvest. This level of production would provide for a Clearwater broodstock to be naturally, self-sustaining and to provide a run sustaining hatchery supplementation. Our long-term adult return goal for the Snake River is 21,000 coho salmon, breaking it down to 14,000 returning to the Clearwater River in Idaho and 7,000 returning to the Lostine River in Oregon. This program will require a substantial hatchery production component and the establishment of highly productive naturally spawning coho salmon to become self-sustaining.