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[RalphH]

A new study concludes that after 50 years and 9 billion dollars of public money, no significant improvements have been made in salmon and steelhead numbers in the Upper Columbia River basin. In some cases efforts have made matters worse for wild fish.

The study published July 28 in the journal PLOS One, was lead  by William Jaeger, an economist with Oregon State University and Mark Scheuerell, fisheries biologist with the US Geological Survey & The University of Washington and looked at 50 years of salmon and steelhead passage over Bonneville Dam, the last of 14 dams on the Columbia River before it empties into the Pacific Ocean. The two also reviewed decades of spending on habitat restoration and hatcheries programs in the river basin, meant to save the species from extinction.

Overall while returns of fish raised in hatcheries saw a small increase, wild returns of salmon and steelhead did not. They also found hatchery fish in some cases spread disease, competed for food with wild fish and were also observed to prey on smaller wild fish.

https://www.opb.org/article/2023/08/05/columbia-river-salmon-habitat-spending-study/

"There are about 200 salmon hatchery programs in the Columbia River Basin, and 80% of all salmon and steelhead that return to the Columbia River as adults started their lives in hatcheries, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration fisheries division.

The cost to taxpayers to maintain these hatcheries during the last 40 years has been about $9 billion when adjusted for inflation, according to Jaeger. This does not include any of the money spent by local governments or nonprofits and nongovernment agencies.

“We found no evidence in the data that the restoration spending is associated with a net increase in wild fish abundance,” Jaeger said."

[salmonrook]

I'd be asking questions on what the purpose of the hatchery was.
If it was to preserve the population of salmon in the Columbia river then I'd say that its a useful and worthwhile pursuit .
Of course fisheries enhancement cant be viewed in the same  sense that you'd judge whether a business is successful because this is not the point of the hatchery . The fact that its broken down to a monetary value  based per fish  is not really the point for the enhancement .
Whats not being counted is the millions of fish that either do get consumed by the several fish species, contrbuting to their survival  or the harvest by commercial fishers, or the contribtution to the recreational fishery.
This needs to be considered as a economic benefit , that well could be tabulated as well , if one was looking for some cost recovery .
 Its seems their is a rising tide of opinion on the  usefulness of hatcheries, both from down south and with DFO in Canada .
Some of the latest thoughts being that with no enhancement that the natural wild population would rebound .
I dont believe with all of our encroachments that they would have the slightest chance of survival .
 We started enhancement , it must continue for the survival of the salmon population

[Dave]

Good post

[RalphH]

... and of course neither of you have any bias in the issue.

The larger point is it appears not to matter how much money is spent on hatcheries (which is not enhancement in my view) or enhancement for wild fish, there is little or no way to mitigate the impact of the dams. That's the real point. Even he hatchery returns are a small fraction of the wild return prior to dam construction.

[stsfisher]

on the flip side, it sure has created one hell of a sport fishing, economic benefit. Up and down the Columbia system the fish migrating throughout has allowed sport fishing businesses and small communities to prosper. I would bet the billions spent has put far more dollars back into small businesses, communities, and households that otherwise would not be able to operate or sustain themselves without the influx of fish. We only have to look at small communities up and down the fraser river to see what happens when salmon are not available anymore to those small businesses, communities and households.

Not saying its right, but damns ruined a lot of what used to be, maybe those managing the Columbia know they cant right the wrong but can help both the stocks and communities by dumping money into what should have been. 

[wildmanyeah]

the reality is they could probably compare it to many salmon stocks we have in BC, that are not enhanced and do not have a dam as part of their migration and find similar declines in wild fish populations.

there is also a lot of cheese in the study, like they say hatchery's have not improved wild fish populations, sure that's correct.

But they fail to acknowledge that in the absence of hatchery's, there would of been no way the wild population would of been able to sustain the level of harvest that has occured over the past 50 years thanks to the hatchery production.

IMO they are comparing apples to oranges in many ways in this study.

saying spending 9 billion have not improved wild populations sure correct, but it has provided a fishery that the wild population would of never sustained.

[RalphH]

saying spending 9 billion have not improved wild populations sure correct, but it has provided a fishery that the wild population would of never sustained.

This is what is typically known as a massive government subsidy. Wild fish are free. Much of the hatchery infrastructure in Washington, particularly in the Upper Columbia is basically at the end of it's useful life and needs to be rebuilt or replaced. I think the study will be used for value for money considerations. Sports anglers are completely in favor of such expenditures as long as they don't have to foot the bulk of the bill.

[wildmanyeah]

This is what is typically known as a massive government subsidy. Wild fish are free. Much of the hatchery infrastructure in Washington, particularly in the Upper Columbia is basically at the end of it's useful life and needs to be rebuilt or replaced. I think the study will be used for value for money considerations. Sports anglers are completely in favor of such expenditures as long as they don't have to foot the bulk of the bill.

It’s basically a carbon tax, pay money for destroying the environment. In this case the electricity company’s paying for displacing wild fish.

Also pay for a access hatchery would be the dream for many people.  Like fishing in a trout pond.

Hatcherys I don’t think are going anywhere goverment needs them so First Nations can practice there traditional things

I don’t disagree tho hatchery for harvest are 100% a government subsidy.

I doubt Fred would even have a business without the chilwack hatchery 
 

[RalphH]

the $9 billion  was public expenditure not from private enterprise which the electrical utilities are. Quoted comments from other stake holders made it clear other expenditures were excluded from the figure. Hatchery operations at best offer a band-aide treatment of the major loss of the fisheries resource and can never come close to replacing what's been lost.

A pay for access hatchery? Where do you come up with this stuff? Never mentioned. The sport fishing industry ... and it is an industry, is heavily subsidized and wouldn't exist  as it does today without major injections of government funds. It's a welfare state operation and we are all Hatchery Welfare Bums.

[wildmanyeah]

https://fortune.com/2023/09/26/white-house-biden-200-million-salmon-ancestral-fishing-grounds-washington/


I thought there was a pay for access hatchery ran by first nations down south?

[wildmanyeah]

the $9 billion  was public expenditure not from private enterprise which the electrical utilities are. Quoted comments from other stake holders made it clear other expenditures were excluded from the figure. Hatchery operations at best offer a band-aide treatment of the major loss of the fisheries resource and can never come close to replacing what's been lost.

A pay for access hatchery? Where do you come up with this stuff? Never mentioned. The sport fishing industry ... and it is an industry, is heavily subsidized and wouldn't exist  as it does today without major injections of government funds. It's a welfare state operation and we are all Hatchery Welfare Bums.

Thought the 9 billion also included restoration projects

[wildmanyeah]

the $9 billion  was public expenditure not from private enterprise which the electrical utilities are. Quoted comments from other stake holders made it clear other expenditures were excluded from the figure. Hatchery operations at best offer a band-aide treatment of the major loss of the fisheries resource and can never come close to replacing what's been lost.

A pay for access hatchery? Where do you come up with this stuff? Never mentioned. The sport fishing industry ... and it is an industry, is heavily subsidized and wouldn't exist  as it does today without major injections of government funds. It's a welfare state operation and we are all Hatchery Welfare Bums.

Is the government subsidising sports fishing or are they subsidising all the corporations for their environmental impacts?

[coastangler]

Is the government subsidising sports fishing or are they subsidising all the corporations for their environmental impacts?

Agreed - I don't think it's even fair call sports fishing "heavily" subsidized - if we talk about subsidized industries: clean energy, oil, tech and the list goes on all come to mind. In a way all those subsidies impact fish ecosystem so makes sense to ensure there is also some gvt money pumped into that.

Good points in this post though!

[RalphH]

virtually all the recreational fisheries in the US and Southern BC rely on government hatcheries and stocking. I don't known what you can call that other other than subsidized. You can make an argument to support the subsidies but you can't deny what they are.

[wildmanyeah]

Most sports are subsidized with tax payer money

Soccer fields, hockey rinks, swimming pools ect ect ect

Maybe Alberta should enact its sovereignty act

So they don’t have to pay for our hatcheries

BC needs to pay its fare share lol