Project 1991-019-003 background and context for the Sekokini Research Facility:

In 1991, Montana Fish Wildlife & Parks (MFWP) and the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes (CSKT) published the Fisheries Mitigation Plan for Losses Attributable to the Construction and Operation of Hungry Horse Dam (MFWP and CSKT 1991).  This Mitigation Plan presented fisheries losses, mitigation options, and recommendations to protect, mitigate, and enhance resident fish and aquatic habitat harmed by the construction and operation of Hungry Horse Dam. The Northwest Power and Conservation Council (Council; formerly the Northwest Power Planning Council) approved the loss statement that included annual losses of juvenile bull trout (Salvelinus confluentus) and juvenile westslope cutthroat trout (WCT; Oncorhynchus clarkii lewisi), as well as the inundation loss of 124 km of critical, low gradient spawning and rearing habitat drowned when Hungry Horse Reservoir was filled. The Council next directed MFWP and CSKT to develop an Implementation Plan, subsequently also adopted for Hungry Horse Dam (MFWP and CSKT 1993). On-the-ground mitigation activities began in 1992. This project is one of a few federally-funded Columbia River mitigation projects carrying out a plan to offset a Council-adopted loss statement. Fisheries losses were to be offset by modifying dam operations, restoring or reconnecting habitat, reducing negative non-native species interactions, and implementing hatchery (native fish conservation) technology and offsite mitigation. Sekokini Springs ultimately developed from this last mitigation strategy.

In 2004, the Council adopted the Flathead Subbasin Plan in 2004 (CSKT and MFWP 2004) that further refined and codified previous approaches to fisheries loss mitigation. The federal action agency's 4-H plan is designed to recover Columbia River fish species listed as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act (Federal Caucus 2000).  Our mitigation program is directed by a similar scientific framework to offset fisheries losses at various spatial scales, descending from basin-wide mitigation requirements to site-specific actions. Mitigation activities are selected and prioritized based on decision pathways described in the Flathead Subbasin Plan (2004), Among those activities is development and implementation of facilities like Sekokini Springs. In 2011, following in the wake of the Council's 3-step process of review, NPCC approved a 17-year experiment to use the capabilities provided by Sekokini Springs to help offset fisheries losses associated with Hungry Horse Dam.

The challenge and response:

The Sekokini Springs Research Facility is designed as a tool to help conserve the remaining genetic diversity of westslope cutthroat trout in the Flathead Subbasin. Sekokini provides a place and opportunity to systematically replicate populations that differ from the state’s M012 broodstock and to create additional sources of WCT for future restoration actions and similar hatchery applications.  Combined with the mountain lakes project, Sekokini can provide unique WCT stocks for use in “common garden” experiments.  That is, we can release more than one genetic strain (each identifiable) into a restored mountain lake and assess their relative performance over time. This post-stocking monitoring will provide information on several experiments simultaneously, thus adding value to our field monitoring  effort.

Restoring westslope cutthroat trout (WCT) throughout their historic range requires developing new methods and facilities.  In northwestern Montana, about half of the remaining wild, genetically pure populations inhabit the South Fork Flathead River, upstream of Hungry Horse Dam.  Surveys throughout northwestern Montana demonstrated that each stream population is genetically distinct, even in adjacent streams, and most differ from Montana’s single captive brood stock held at the Washoe Park State Fish hatchery in Anaconda, MT (called M012).  To protect the remaining genetic diversity in the Flathead Subbasin, we designed an experimental culture facility at Sekokini Springs, located about a mile downstream of Blankenship Bridge at the confluence of the North and Middle Forks of the Flathead River.  Unlike other Montana state hatcheries, wild WCT can be transported to Sekokini Springs and held in isolation until they are certified genetically pure and free of all reportable pathogens.  After certification, juvenile WCT from unique donor populations are reared to maturity and spawned to replicate progeny for WCT restoration. The isolation facility at Sekokini was designed to rear up to four unique strains of WCT simultaneously.  This is not a traditional captive broodstock hatchery. Instead, wild donor WCT will be held only as long as necessary to re-establish self-reproducing populations in restored waters throughout the Flathead Subbasin.  The first two wild stocks being replicated at the site originated in Danaher and Young creeks in the Bob Marshall Wilderness.

Collecting wild WCT from remote wilderness streams requires coolers with ice and oxygen for transport by pack stock to the wilderness boundary, and then road or air transport to Sekokini Springs, with very little mortality.  Wild WCT from each source are collected over a minimum of three years, and we later examine progeny, to assure their genetics resemble the original donor population.  Adapting the wild juveniles to captivity, while preserving wild behavioral traits and avoiding domestication, is another challenge.  Based on experience to date, about half of the wild WCT have had difficulty transitioning to pelletized hatchery food.  To prevent starvation, we supplement feedings with live meal worms, which are dispensed on screens, so that wriggling meal worms drop intermittently into the rearing tanks.  Experiments with natural prey, subsurface food delivery, and enriched rearing environments are ongoing.  So far, and unlike domesticated broodstocks, wild WCT span three year classes and exhibit a wide range of growth rates. Slower growing individuals can be disadvantaged by larger individuals.  To avoid inadvertent hatchery selection, WCT from each genetic strain are separated by size to optimize survival.  Similarly, individuals mature at different rates and times, so the breeding protocol is designed to cross multiple year-classes and optimize parentage. This requires incubating many small lots of embryos and fry, separate from other unique strains held at the facility.

The Sekokini Springs master Plan contains a research component. The Isolation Facility produces WCT and conducts research for the South Fork Flathead Drainage WCT Conservation Project that is removing sources of nonnative trout, and re-establishing native WCT in the most intact metapopulation of WCT in Montana.  Restored lakes offer living laboratories to empirically link genetic differences to measures of fish performance (e.g. survival, growth, fecundity, local adaptations).  We are developing nonlethal sampling methods to reduce impacts on sensitive species.  Experiments using geochemical signatures in fish otoliths and scales are underway to differentiate stocks for comparative analyses, and to determine a fish’ s natal stream of origin. In addition, Sekokini provides controlled indoor and outdoor environments to experimentally assess the expression of observed genetic differences in terms of fish fitness (eg. survival, growth, fecundity, behavior, form).  Previous research began to assess the influence of enriched hatchery environments on survival, growth and physical parameters.  Future experiments will expand on this work to determine if and how hatchery experimental rearing conditions affect post-stocking survival.  

Sekokini provides controlled water sources for experiments on geochemical and isotopic signatures in fish otoliths and scales. This research is timely because we previously demonstrated that isotopic signatures in otoliths (lethal sampling) can be used to track fish movement over their lifetime. All fish are marked by their environments, which is more cost effective than mark and recapture techniques (tags, radio, sonic). We’ve demonstrated that non-lethal sampling using scales (isotopic signatures) and fin clips (genetics) can be used to determine a fish’ s natal stream of origin.  We have yet to determine how long the observed signatures in scales persist over time. Persistence of the geochemical and isotopic signatures in scales can be determined using controlled lab experiments.  

The current contract:

Starting in STATE fiscal year 2018, this project will continue to produce WCT fry for restocking high mountain lakes in the Bob Marshall Wilderness.  Specific activities are explained within this SOW.  Funding for ongoing and continuing efforts beyond state fiscal year 2018 will be arranged on an annual basis during implementation of this this existing contract, and in subsequent years thereafter.