FY07-09 proposal 199000501

Jump to Reviews and Recommendations

Section 1. Administrative

Contacts

Section 2. Locations

Province / subbasin: Columbia Plateau / Umatilla

Section 3. Focal species

Section 4. Past accomplishments

Section 5. Relationships to other projects

Section 6. Biological objectives

Section 7. Work elements (coming back to this)

Section 8. Budgets

Itemized estimated budget

Total estimated FY 2007-2009 budgets

Cost sharing

Section 9. Project future

Future O&M costs: This is the long-term monitoring and evaluation project for the Umatilla FWP

Termination date: None
Comments:

Final deliverables:

Section 10. Narrative and other documents

Reviews and recommendations

ISRP PRELIMINARY REVIEW (Jun 2, 2006)

Recommendation: Response requested

NPCC comments: This project has numerous objectives and multiple tasks. There are well-defined relationships with the subbasin plan and Fish and Wildlife Program, as well as mention of the roles of ODFW and CTUIR. A response should better justify all the various data to be collected and then relate these studies to the evaluation of program goals and the roles and management actions of the agencies. A clear linkage must be demonstrated. The ISRP had reviewed the Umatilla RM&E plan previously (2004) and were pleased with the many improvements therein, but some recommendations and prioritization of RM&E activities still apply. Clear indication of the response to the 2004 ISRP review would benefit the proposal. Project history is explained but past actions are not presented fully, although results have been distributed and communicated at least within the basin. The large amount of information already collected and only partially presented (redds, radio tagging, etc.) has undoubtedly led to adaptive management improvements, but these are not tabled here. The response should indicate more clearly where management decisions have benefited from these data collections. Stock-recruit analysis presented here should be discussed as to its potential significance to the Umatilla program and others in the Fish and Wildlife Program. Steelhead recruitment is below replacement except for two data points, may have been derived from different regimes of productivity, and does not appear to be well-estimated or explained from the figure presented. Some results presented argue for a different approach to salmon recovery (outside the subbasin) then what is proposed here. For example, variation in adult abundance (Fig 13) could be explained by out-of-basin effects, indicating little effect from recent subbasin actions. Please refer to comments related to the statistical design and evaluation of observational data as described in project 200708300 (Grande Ronde RM&E) and the ISRP's programmatic comments on this topic, which apply here. Historical information and background is provided in the same manner but with much more (and questionably necessary detail) as in the ODFW proposal, 198902401, with which this is closely related. The ODFW and CTUIR collaboration remains a major requirement. The presentation of this proposal is lengthy, with rather confusing objective(s) that may include 25 of 44 loosely related objectives of several projects. The connection is not well defined, and a clear design is lacking. The purpose, to "support adaptive management of Umatilla salmonid natural production through pro-active monitoring and evaluation of those resources" is vague. What if only 198902401 were supported (or vice versa), would the monitoring be adequate? A clear definition of the experiment at hand and the evaluation of key response variable(s), of which there should be only a few (e.g., smolts per spawner as a function of spawner density), is required. What is the experiment? What feature of "salmonid population performance" is to be monitored, and why? There is a very long explanation of the relationship with other projects, but rationale that this will be useful is weak. There are several management actions outlined in Table 3, but one is unconvinced that the design will sort these actions, nor control for many other confounding factors. There are too many relationships here. Table 4 lists many monitoring actions but the purpose is not clear, nor coordinated. There are multiple objectives but a clearer explanation of purpose and linkages is necessary. The work should be subdivided according to task. For a project that began six years ago, with the goal of monitoring natural production of salmonids in the basin in detail, very little data to that effect is presented. In the response, indicate how information from this work will be used to evaluate achievement of the vision, goals, and objectives of the subbasin plan.

ISRP FINAL REVIEW (Aug 31, 2006)

Recommendation: Not fundable (Qualified)

NPCC comments: The key question of the proposal evaluation remains: given past and future efforts will this work provide useful and science-based M&E results? In general, the answer seems positive, if correctly focused, but despite a somewhat detailed response, the impression is that tasks are confused. No progress reports were included, although some additional data were provided. Nonetheless, the key recruitment analyses and required basic evaluations of life-stage limiting factors remain unreported, at least in the response. Such analysis would point to the key elements of fisheries science and management, where actions may be derived based on stock status and trends. For example, Chilcote (2003) suggested wild steelhead in the Umatilla had recruits per spawner values that were lowered in the presence of hatchery steelhead. Do results of this project refute or agree with his relationships? The sponsors agreed it is essential that the Council facilitate a targeted review of the Umatilla programs within two years. The investments in this watershed, particularly in flow augmentation, but also hatchery and habitat work, demand a prioritization that this response seems to largely dismiss. The management domains, critical uncertainties, and life history phase relationships presented in Figure 1 all relate to the same subbasin vision and goals, and represent a reasonable starting point for M&E, and from which clear testable hypotheses should be developed. It is difficult to suggest whether there is too much or not enough M&E present here until such review, and until available results are analyzed effectively, and in relation to the good work of the subbasin planning exercise. The ISRP needs to see specific objectives with measurable endpoints to provide a science review. See also related comments on the suite of proposals from this subbasin: 198343600, 198802200, 198902700, 19871001, and 19871002. In summary, there is a need for a Umatilla program review, and within that, a need to define clearly the role of this project in directing management activities within the subbasin. Funding should be qualified on the ability to make that tie. This work is central to the whole effort of fisheries and habitat management in the subbasin. It needs to provide data and inform when to release water, when to truck, etc.