The newly devised Adaptive Management Implementation Plan's triggering system got a test drive this fall and winter with an evaluation of whether the endangered Upper Columbia River spring chinook salmon stock had dipped to levels that require revival actions beyond those already taking place.

They had not, according to a Jan. 22 memo from federal "action" agencies to the NOAA Fisheries Service.

"As you can see from the enclosed analysis, the assumptions that must be made to trip an abundance and trend-based trigger in 2011 are such that it is reasonable to conclude that tripping this trigger in 2010 or 2011 is unlikely," according to the letter signed by Bonneville Power Administration CEO Steve Wright for his agency, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Bureau of Reclamation. The Corps and Bureau operate dams in the Federal Columbia River Power System and BPA markets power generated at the dams.

"Therefore we conclude that rapid response actions aimed at improving the near-term status of this ESU are not necessary at this time," the memo said.

"We also point out that the Action Agencies are implementing a very aggressive habitat program in the upper Columbia region, based on RPA actions 34 and 34, focused specifically on improvements for Upper Columbia spring chinook and steelhead."

The "reasonable and prudent alternative" actions are outlined in NOAA Fisheries' May 2008 FCRPS biological opinion, a 10-year plan for assuring the federal action – the dams' existence and operation" -- avoids jeopardizing any of 13 Columbia-Snake river basin salmon and steelhead stocks that are listed under the Endangered Species Act.

Over this past summer -- during an Obama Administration review of the BiOp -- the AMIP was developed to, among other things, shore up the plan's contingency planning processes. Additional "triggers" were developed as responses to unexpected declines in adult abundance and/or environmental disasters or environmental degradation (either biological or environmental) in combination with preliminary abundance indicators.

The AMIP was made public Sept. 15, and on Sept. 25 a NOAA Fisheries memo was sent to the action agencies saying that, "had the Early Warning Indicator been in place prior to September 2009, it would have been tripped in 2008 for the upper Columbia River (UCR) evolutionarily significant unit."

That trigger is tripped if the four-year mean abundance of naturally produced UCR spring chinook in any year falls below 1,125 fish. It did in 2008 with a mean abundance of 1,100, a four-year average dragged down by poor returns in 2006 (962 fish) and 2007 (722). The wild spring chinook escapement above Rock Island Dam on the mid-Columbia in central Washington was much better in 2008 at 1,312 adults.

But with an early warning trigger tripped, the AMIP calls for an evaluation of the likelihood of triggering the "Significant Decline Trigger" in one of the next two years and if additional actions are warranted to further protect the species.

If tripping the Significant Decline Trigger (a 4-year abundance mean below 450 fish for UCR spring chinook) seems likely, a review of potential "Rapid Response Actions" would be initiated. Rapid Response Actions to improve fish survival could include additional hydro operations, increased predator controls, certain harvest controls and safety-net hatcheries.

But the near-term future looks improved for the Upper Columbia stock, according to the action agencies' response. The 2009 return of natural-origin adults rose to 1,861 and lifted the 4-year mean abundance to 1,214.

The AMIP trigger "dry run" also involved a look into the future, as would have been required had the triggers been in effect in 2008.

The action agency memo noted that the 2009 return included 6,003 "jack" salmon counted at Rock Island, a total that is nearly six times higher than the most recent 10-year average. Jacks are 3-year-olds that return after only one year in the Pacific. The strength of the jack return is considered a signal of the potential strength of the future return of their broodmates as 4- and 5-year-olds.

The action agency memo also noted that the U.S. v Oregon Technical Advisory Committee recently released 2010 spring chinook return forecasts that predict the biggest "upriver" spring chinook return on record. The predicted Upper Columbia wild spring chinook return is 5,700 fish.

Additionally, NOAA Fisheries' own Northwest Fisheries Science Center said that 2008 ocean conditions encountered by juvenile outmigrants were the best since 1998. That's the year this year's 4-year-old returns would have left freshwater. The NWFSC predicted 2010 and 2011 upriver spring chinook returns would rival those of 2001 and 2002, the two best returns on a record dating back to 1938.

"Given those indicators, we conclude that it is unlikely that this ESU will drop below the abundance-based Significant Decline threshold in 2010 or 2011," the action agencies' memo says.

The Upper Columbia River spring chinook returns slumped severely in the mid-to-late 1990s, ranging from an all-time low of 89 wild fish in 1995 to 604 in 1997. The return totaled 216 natural origin returns to Rock Island in 1999, the year the stock was listed as endangered. That designation was reaffirmed in 2005. The salmonid stock is one of only two in Columbia River basin with the endangered -- in danger of extinction – designation. The other is Snake River sockeye salmon.

"Those are the numbers we want to avoid going back to," NOAA Fisheries' Ritchie Graves of the 1990s returns. The AMIP's specific numerical thresholds are intended to head off such steep population slumps through increased mitigation efforts.

The triggers are established at points where fish numbers fall below the 20th percentile (early warning) and 10th percentile (significant decline) of historic abundance data.

"We thought those were fairly sensitive," said Graves, FCRPS branch chief for NOAA Fisheries Hydropower Division.

There are 11 other salmon and steelhead stocks in the basin listed as threatened -- "likely to become an endangered species within the foreseeable future…."

The upper Columbia spring chinook ESU includes all naturally spawned populations in all river reaches accessible to salmon in Columbia River tributaries upstream of the Rock Island Dam and downstream of Chief Joseph Dam in central Washington, excluding the Okanogan River. Six artificial propagation programs are considered to be part of the ESU because they have been determined to be no more divergent relative to the local natural populations than what would be expected between closely related natural populations within the ESU, according to NOAA Fisheries.

For more information go to:

http://www.salmonrecovery.gov/homepage.aspx