OLYMPIA, Wash. – Usually when a fish population starts its decline there is
an easy and obvious culprit. Dams, various forms of environmental
degradation, pollution and several other factors are usually fairly easy to
point to as the reason.
The problem on the Puyallup River in Washington state is that the
steelhead, commonly thought to be a form of trout but actually a form of
salmon, are disappearing at an alarming rate and no one seems to know why.
Very low steelhead runs are apparently a growing problem in the entire
Puget Sound region, including the steelhead-rich Skagit River as well as
the Georgia Strait of British Columbia and southeastern Alaska. Populations
in Oregon and California seem to have thus far escaped the same problem
though some experts say that the problem appears to be moving southward.
According to literature from the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission,
steelhead were once found from Alaska south to Mexico but now are found no
further south than Ventura County, just north of Los Angeles.
To illustrate the alarming drop on the Puyallup, runs over the last three
years have shown a dramatic decline. According to Puyallup tribal
estimates, in 1999 some 1,700 steelhead were counted in the Puyallup River.
By 2001 that number had fallen off to near 1,000 and last year saw a
drastic drop to 300, which is the worst steelhead count in 60 years.
This year’s figures are even more chilling as only about 150 have been
counted.
“What we are worried about is that the run might be low enough that the
local steelhead population will never recover,” said Emmett O’Connell, the
South Sound Information Officer for the Northwest Indian Fisheries
Commission.
To combat the problem the tribe has instituted what they term “life
support” measures. What this constitutes is essentially an emergency
hatchery program. The tribe has immediate plans to activate an old trout
hatchery they own and convert it into a steelhead hatchery.
The use of hatcheries has been a contentious issue in the Pacific Northwest
and has spawned a three-way debate, in which the role of hatchery raised
fish for overall fish counts has been hotly contested.
On one hand some in the business community have come out in support of the
inclusion of hatchery-raised fish for general fish counts and insist that
they should be included in species counts.
On the other hand, members of the environmental community have insisted
that only wild fish should be counted. They go so far as to claim that
hatchery-raised fish are genetically inferior and ill adapted to wild
conditions and thus pollute the wild gene stock when they interbreed with
their wild brethren.
Tribes and intertribal fishing groups have generally taken a middle road on
the hatchery issue saying that hatcheries are only effective in limited
instances and that hatchery-raised fish should be counted separate from
wild stocks.
In this instance the Puyallups are treading a careful course and insist
that use of the hatchery is only being instituted as an emergency measure.
They are quick to point out that the hatchery will only be used as long as
the steelhead population is at such a dangerously low level.
“Once steelhead are returning in strong enough numbers and can take care of
themselves, we would shut down the hatchery,” said Puyallup tribal
enhancement manager Blake Smith.
Another aspect of the emergency hatchery is that it would only use
steelhead stock from the Puyallup River system. Smith explained the reason
for this is that the local steelhead are already genetically ideally suited
for the Puyallup River ecosystem.
These kinds of emergency measures have been implemented in the past for
other species of salmon and in a press release from the Northwest Indian
Fisheries Commission they describe it as a “common tool” for restoring fish
populations at dangerously low levels.
Though there is a well-established history of using hatcheries to restore
fish populations, locating the source of the problem is an entirely
different matter. Tribal officials said they suspect some as-of-yet-unknown
environmental factor. Compounding the problem is the long and diverse
journey undertaken by steelheads.
Since Puyallup River steelheads go from freshwater spawning grounds out
through Puget Sound to the Pacific Ocean biologists and fishery officials
have a wide area to cover in search of a culprit. Though the tribe said
they will examine all areas of steelhead habitat, Bill Bakke, the director
of the Portland, Ore.-based Native Fish Society, thinks that given the
range of the steelhead problem that it is most likely in the ocean.
Bakke is well known as a critic of fish hatcheries, but in this case he
agrees that the tribes really have no other choice.
“They [Puyallup] really have their backs against the wall and are in the
unenviable position of having to use the hatchery,” Bakke said.
Bakke cautioned that the use of the hatchery may not solve the problem and
advocates for very strict genetic selection of fish to be used in such a
program.
Puyallup tribal Resource Manager Russ Ladley likened the tribal reaction to
the steelhead decline to emergency measures. “When a house is burning down,
you don’t stand around asking why, you grab a hose and start putting it
out,” Ladley said.