FY07-09 proposal 199602000

Jump to Reviews and Recommendations

Section 1. Administrative

Contacts

Section 2. Locations

Province / subbasin: Mainstem/Systemwide / Systemwide

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:

Termination date: None projected
Comments: Long term study

Final deliverables: Annual Status Reports

Section 10. Narrative and other documents

Reviews and recommendations

ISRP PRELIMINARY REVIEW (Jun 2, 2006)

Recommendation: Response requested

NPCC comments: In general, this is a supportable proposal but a response is needed to address issues raised in the ISAB's recent report: Review of the 2005 Comparative Survival Studies’ (CSS) Annual Report and Applicability of Comparative Survival Studies’ Analysis Results. See www.nwcouncil.org/library/isab/isab2006-3.htm. Specifically, the proponents should respond to the following selected recommendations from the ISAB report (which was issued after this proposal was submitted): 1) It has been ten years since the CSS was initiated. The report that the ISAB reviewed was the latest in a series of annual progress reports, and thus lacking a holistic perspective. The ISAB recommends that the CSS produce a ten-year summary report providing an in-depth description of methods and detailed analyses and interpretation of the data in a retrospective style. 2) The CSS needs to more effectively present the methodologies used in their analyses (in this proposal as well as their annual report), so the criticism of complicated and convoluted formulas can be avoided. The scattered explanations in several annual progress reports could be consolidated in the ten-year summary recommended above. 3) The ISAB agrees with critics who express concern that two downriver sites (Carson Hatchery and John Day River) are probably insufficient to give accurate upriver-downriver comparisons of SARs. This concern is bolstered by the variability among upriver hatcheries shown by the CSS data. For this upriver-downriver comparison to be generally accepted, it seems prudent to add more downriver sites in the future. 4) Data on size of all PIT-tagged fish from hatcheries and other release sites should be included in the report in much greater detail. Size at release may be a significant factor in differential SARs. The ISAB recommends including a specific section in the report focusing on the potential effects of size at release on survival of all PIT-tagged fish. 5) Assumptions inherent in the analyses should be specifically tested, with continued vigilance toward avoiding bias. 6) Pre-assigning the intended routes of passage at the time of release into in-river and transport groups would greatly simplify calculation of SARs and eliminate much criticism of current methods that are unnecessarily complex. This modification to the study design is scheduled for implementation in 2007 (according to the 2005 Annual Report but this change in protocol should be indicated in the proposal). 7) Analyses could emphasize more diverse metrics of differential survival, thus avoiding the criticism that the project staff focuses mainly on contentious issues such as the relative survival of transported and in-river migrants (T/C ratios) and differential delayed mortality between transported and in-river migrants (D). Passage routes, numbers of dams bypassed, distance from ocean, different hatchery practices, and other features have been explored beyond the issue of transportation. Other comments: A timeline with years (1996 - current) should be included within the background section to improve the proposal. Details in this section are sparse and references are lacking. The proponents either assume that the reviewers know all the background and justification for this project or decided not to go through the work needed to provide the details. The project history section consists of only a few sentences and is lacking sufficient detail to provide project accomplishments and give adequate justification for continued support. For such a long-running project there have been a number of important accomplishments and completed documents that need to be listed in this section. Please refer to proposal #s 199102900, 199302900, and 198605000 for examples of proposals for long-running projects that have clearly laid out study designs and protocols, project histories with adequate detail, and strong justification for continued support.

ISRP FINAL REVIEW (Aug 31, 2006)

Recommendation: Fundable (Qualified)

NPCC comments: The response by the project sponsors was adequate, and they agreed with all ISRP comments and recommendations that were mostly taken from the recent ISAB review report (ISAB 2006-3). One of the major recommendations in that report was that the 10-year ongoing Comparative Survival Study (CSS) project lacked a holistic perspective and needed a summary report providing an in-depth description of methods and detailed analyses and interpretation of the data in a retrospective style. The CSS project responded that they would produce such a report in 2007. As most of the comments and recommendations in this review will be addressed in that report, it is critical that the ISRP/ISAB be involved in review of that report when it is released. The ISRP agreed with critics who express concern that two downriver sites (Carson Hatchery and John Day River) are probably insufficient to give accurate upriver-downriver comparisons of SARs. This concern is bolstered by the variability among upriver hatcheries shown by the CSS data. For this upriver-downriver comparison to be generally accepted, it seems prudent to add more downriver sites in the future. In response, the CSS will add another downriver site in the Warms Springs River for wild Chinook tagging for 2007 to complement the ongoing tagging in the John Day River. This is a positive action, however, additional downriver hatchery sites are even more important to add because at this time, five upriver hatcheries are being used as tagging sites and only one downriver. There needs to be better hatchery to hatchery comparisons, and adding several lower river hatcheries which show a range in return rates will provide a more realistic comparison in survival rates. If additional downriver tagging sites are to be added to the CSS, the project sponsors indicate that more funding must be made available, and the ISRP agrees that the budget will need to be adjusted accordingly. Reporting of results by the project has been good with Annual Reports to BPA for each year of the project. There is potential for production of peer reviewed papers considering project results and this should be considered in the near future.