producing a product for the market and getting a fee to participate in the fishery. As one state fishery biologist said, we need hatcheries to produce a product that generates funding for the agency. Fish and wildlife agencies complain that revenues are declining as fewer people fish and hunt. Maybe their business model isn’t working.
Anglers have found that hatchery fish are more difficult to catch than wild fish and the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife is spending more money to make hatchery fish bite better. The Oregon Hatchery Research Center said, “The goal of this project is to increase catch rates on hatchery steelhead programs.” (OHRC July 2012)
The Alsea Hatchery, where this research is being conducted, releases 120,000 winter steelhead for anglers to catch at a cost of more than $300,000, producing fish that cost $227 to $636 per harvested fish depending on smolt to adult survival (Radtke letter to the Oregon Legislature 2009).
Over the last 30 years scientific evaluation of hatchery programs show a clear impact on wild fish, reducing reproductive success and causing genetic and competition impacts. (Reisenbichler 1978, Chilcote 2011, Araki 2009, Waples 1999) So the hatchery program, while claiming to be successful in restoring wild salmonids by fishery agencies, has no scientific justification. Consequently, promoting hatcheries for conservation and recovery of wild salmonids has yet to be proven since it was initiated by U.S. Fish Commissioner Spencer Baird 139 years ago.
Public support of hatcheries as a conservation tool is eroding while fishermen are disenchanted with the performance of hatchery fish in the fishery. Is it really a surprise that hatcheries are losing their luster and their public support?
The state along with federal and tribal fishery agencies including those in British Columbia, Oregon, Idaho, and Washington have adopted the premise that enhancement of salmon and steelhead is beneficial and hatchery mitigation can make up for degraded habitats and rebuild wild populations. But the nagging problem is that it lacks scientific support.
provided a review, saying, “The concept of sustainability…describes how biological systems remain diverse, robust, and productive over time.” They are concerned that “artificial propagation is a risky foundation for restoration” of salmonids.
In the Columbia River the fishery agencies have spent over $13 billion in public funding for salmon recovery yet have failed to achieve their goal of 5 million hatchery and wild salmonids since it was adopted in 1982. Releases of hatchery salmonids ranges from 140 to 250 million fish from 70 hatcheries at a cost of $109 million, but have failed to restore runs to historical levels. The wild runs have declined to just 2% of their historic abundance and mitigation hatcheries have failed in their promise to make up for that loss. Yet the fishery agencies and regional planners continue to advocate for more hatcheries and increased spending.
Hatchery advocates have attacked the few conservation organizations that question the use of hatcheries as a mitigation tool for declining salmonid populations. Bill Monroe said, “Shame on the Native Fish Society (again) for its relentless attack on hatcheries.” (The Oregonian, January 14, 2014)
As Molly Ivins once said, “When you find yourself in a hole quit digging.” The hatchery program is expensive and it is not sustainable. The fishery agencies are closing hatcheries because the funding is drying up not because of some latent conservation conviction.
The hatcheries need wild salmonids to improve their performance (survival, cost effectiveness, and catch), but as the years go by, the wild runs are more depleted and the hatchery replacement becomes too ecologically and economically expensive. It is now possible to anticipate a future on the West Coast where wild and hatchery salmonids could be lost. Do we want a repeat the demise of Atlantic salmon on the East Coast?
The fishery agencies enjoy the safe middle ground, free of accountability for failed management, as long as the hatchery and wild fish advocates continue to fight, but it does not solve the problem of an eventual fishery collapse.