Winter Factsheet #3 & Compact Action
February 18th, 2010
The Columbia River Compact convened on February 18, 2010 for a face-to face meeting to outline stock status and Joint Management Staff recommendations for winter and spring seasons for spring Chinook, white sturgeon, and shad. Pre-season forecasts for both upriver and some of the lower river tributary components of the spring Chinook run for 2010 are markedly higher than in recent years. But the unusually large return of spring Chinook jacks in 2009 has added a considerable element of uncertainty to the forecasts for this year. The Technical Advisory Committee for the US v. Oregon catch-balancing negotiations studied a wide range of predictive models for this year’s spring season forecast. The spring season forecast has been overly optimistic in recent years, with upriver run-size forecasts in the range of 45% too high. The result has been that the four Columbia River Treaty Tribes have not gotten their proper share of the total catch of upriver spring Chinook. Because of that, this year’s seasons will be managed much differently than in recent years. All non-Indian fisheries will be managed with a 40% buffer before the run-size update, which typically occurs around May 10. No more that one-half the non-treaty harvest is expected to occur before the run-size update.
Due to concerns over declining abundance of the white sturgeon population, a 40% reduction in the harvest guideline has been instituted for 2010. The non-treaty allocation between sport and commercial fisheries will continue to be 80/20 sport vs. commercial, as in previous years. The sturgeon broodstock sanctuary below Bonneville dam will be expanded downstream to the upper end of Skamania Island from May 1 to August 31. A separate catch guideline for the Willamette River has been instituted; and a spawning sanctuary from Willamette Falls to the I-205 bridge adopted.
Mainstem commercial fisheries for spring Chinook will take place in Zones 1-5 due to improved abundance of Willamette spring Chinook, which is welcome news for lower river commercial fishermen. Constraints caused by the Willamette FMEP, due to the Willamette River spring forecast being below 40,000 during 2008 and 2009, have restricted the commercial fishery to the area upstream of the Hayden Island powerlines near the I-5 bridge during the last two years. The mainstem commercial fishing plan, with test-fishing on Sundays, Compacts held by teleconference on Mondays, and fishing on Tuesdays, is similar to that employed in recent years.
Select Area seasons will be similar to recent years. The Tongue Point/South Channel Select Area fishery will be conducted under continuing test-fishery status, with mandatory catch sampling by ODFW staff, and transportation outside the fishing area restricted. The Youngs Bay fishery once again will be constrained upstream of the Old Youngs Bay bridge between mid March and April 5, with a ten-day hiatus before reopening the fishery on the entire Bay beginning April 15.
The full 20-page Joint Management Staff Fact Sheet is appended as a PDF file. Compact Action Notices as issued by WDFW are listed for each of the Select Areas.
