Most of the responses to ISRP questions were adequate. Positive responses from the sponsors included summary updates for project results (2009-2011) and a description of expertise and roles of existing project personnel.

The sponsors provided detailed information, including a good diagram, of how this project relates to and coordinates with project #200811600. It has now been made clearer to the ISRP which entities are leading the work in various areas.

The ISRP had requested additional information on criteria for identifying stock rebuilding. However, no additional information was provided. The objective is simply to stock plenty of fish, and if it turns out to be too many, fish can be thinned through harvest. This is one approach, but a more plausible scientifically-based rebuilding schedule needs to be formulated.

The ISRP requested more detailed methods and approaches for several tasks outlined in the proposal, including methods for determining (1) if predation on juvenile sturgeon was cause for recruitment failure and (2) if lack of proper food was the cause of starvation and recruitment failure. These were not included in the response. Instead, the sponsor’s response was "The LRSRP appreciates that the ISRP recognizes the complexity of the recruitment failure issue in the transboundary reach and the difficulties associated with identifying the limiting factors. The LRSRP recognizes the importance of designing detailed study approaches in order to objectively answer recruitment failure questions. The LRSRP plans to retain a subcontractor with appropriate expertise to assist with study design including detailed methods and implementation of the predation and food habits components of this project. The completion of this work is contingent upon funding."

The sponsor stated that it plans to hire a subcontractor when funded to assist with study design and methodology involving predation and food web components of the project. A specific subcontractor was not identified in the proposal. It is highly desirable for a scientific proposal to identify key individuals or groups that would be responsible for such a major contribution to the study, to indicate that that they had been contacted, and for them to perhaps provide some indication of hypotheses and appropriate methodologies used to test the hypotheses.

For the predation and food web components of the project, the sponsor needs to identify and hire the subcontractor, identify qualified staffing additions to conduct the work, and develop detailed methodologies, including the starvation approach. The ISRP should review the specific objectives and methodologies prior to implementation.

The sponsor needs to develop a plausible rebuilding schedule for the stock with production and cohort/age structure goals during contracting. Similar work by other entities, including the Kootenai Tribe, should be reviewed for applicability.

High quality annual reports need to be completed and updated.

1. Results are lacking for 2009-2011. Annual reports are behind schedule. Two or three years of data may change the direction and rationale of the study. The sponsors should provide a summary of recent results to the ISRP for review.
   
   
2. More rigorous and detailed methods and approaches are needed for several of the tasks outlined, specifically describing how the field work will translate into answered questions. Refer to the next paragraph for issues to address in the response.

Despite a reasonably sound and useful overview of sturgeon problems in this portion of the basin, several items in the proposal are in need of clarification. First, although the need for more understanding of the recruitment failure is well articulated and on target, designing studies to address this issue is an extremely difficult process and requires a more detailed, critical approach than is outlined here. The goals of the recruitment failure work are laudable. However, because of a lack of detail provided in the proposal, the ability of the proposed work to answer the key questions and meet those goals is very questionable. For example, it is not enough to answer if some sturgeon are eaten; it must be shown that this is a cause of the recruitment failure. Similarly, it is not enough to look at some fish food habits and invertebrates; it needs to be shown objectively that these factors are a cause for the recruitment failure. These are difficult questions to answer. Detailed study approaches are needed.

1. Information that details how work elements proposed under 200811600 and this project are to be divided up should be provided in the response.
2. A description of the expertise and specific roles of personnel should be provided so responsibility for every project activity is clear.

1. Purpose: Significance to Regional Programs, Technical Background, and Objectives

The Lake Roosevelt Sturgeon Recovery Project (LRSRP) is an ongoing project implemented to monitor population status and conduct recruitment failure research on white sturgeon in the Roosevelt Reach of the upper Columbia River. The primary goal of the project is to conserve and restore white sturgeon in Lake Roosevelt and the upper Columbia River. Their hypothesis is that sturgeon cannot get from the hiding to rearing life stage due to contaminants and predation. This project is closely linked to project 200811600.

The significance of this project is described as responding to many regional plans and programs including: the Lake Roosevelt Guiding Document and Management Plan, the Upper Columbia White Sturgeon Initiative and Recovery Plan (2002), the NPPC Fish and Wildlife Program (2009), the Spokane Subbasin Plan, the MERR Plan, and others.

The technical background is described in the Problem Statement and is extensive, contains many good references, and provides sufficient detail regarding the current status and problems of white sturgeon populations in the Columbia River Basin. Past work is well described.

The objectives are listed as:

OBJ-1: Prevent further reduction in upper Columbia River sturgeon distribution, density and genetic diversity by implementing LRSRP/UCWSRI long-term measures.

OBJ-2: Implement research examining hypotheses to determine the cause of upper Columbia River white sturgeon recruitment failure.

These objectives are too general. The deliverables which follow, however, are the work elements and are at a reasonable level of detail.

Even though the importance of rebuilding white sturgeon in the Upper River is well documented and well-justified in this proposal, some details remain vague. The intent to "rebuild the natural age-class structure lost during the recruitment failures of the last 30 years (UCWSRI 2002, Recovery Plan Measure 5.5.3)" raises the question of whether this historical age structure is well-known, or is it just assumed that recruitment occurred every year or nearly every year? The data in Figure 2 demonstrate the lack of recruitment very clearly but do not necessarily indicate steady recruitment of the past. It is also not separated by sex, so with sexual size dimorphism of sturgeon, it gives little indication of actual yearly recruitment. Care must therefore be used in designing the stock composition target that is part of the rebuilding effort. There seems to be no evidence that recruitment in this section of the river was necessarily a yearly event or even very consistent.

Regarding the goal of 1000 mature individuals in an approximately 1:1 sex ratio at maturity, there will of course not be such a sex ratio at maturity because the males will mature several years before the females so there will be more mature males from a cohort starting at a 50-50 sex ratio.

2. History: Accomplishments, Results, and Adaptive Management (ISRP Review of Results)

Overall, the sponsors did a nice job providing the status of sturgeon populations for this part of the system. Accomplishments are adequately summarized in the proposal. However, there has been a serious lack of reporting since the last ISRP review of this project. Completed reports are lacking for three recent years. Although the ISRP lauded the reporting in the previous review, the major lapse in reporting since then is cause for concern about project direction.

Regarding growth, the authors reported that "the estimate of growth co-efficient, K, was substantially greater in magnitude, and resulting growth trajectories predicted that sturgeon in the Roosevelt Reach attain larger sizes at younger ages than observed in other areas of the Columbia River (Howell and McLellan in prep; Figure 5)." It is confusing as to why the growth of the Lake Roosevelt fish would be faster than others but from Keenleyside slower than the others. This does not appear to make sense. Clarification would be helpful.

ISRP Retrospective Evaluation of Results

The sponsors present a thorough review of sturgeon activities to date and do a reasonable job of focusing in on the knowledge limitations remaining. There does not seem to be a 2009, 2010, or 2011 Annual report, and there does not seem to be much, if any, history of refereed publications resulting from this long project. The ISRP will expand on its retrospective analysis following the response.

3. Project Relationships, Emerging Limiting Factors, and Tailored Questions for Type of Work (hatchery, RME, tagging)

The sponsors provided a good description of how this project relates to and coordinates with many other BPA projects plus state and Canadian programs.

Potential limiting factors are identified in the review section. There is a general description of how the sponsors are aware of emerging limiting factors such as non-natives and predators.

Adequate answers were provided to the tailored questions. Tagging descriptions were provided in good detail. Database development and sharing is described in reasonable detail.

It is not clear exactly who is doing the work. There is no recent annual report to clarify this issue. The sponsors state, "Stock assessment study design, analysis, and implementation will be led by the Spokane Tribe Lake Roosevelt Sturgeon Recovery Project (1995-027-00) in Washington and by BC Hydro in British Columbia. The CCT, under the White Sturgeon Enhancement Project (BPA project 2008-116-00), will provide a support role in population monitoring by providing a field crew, equipment, and technical advice. CCT participation will help increase sampling effort, and sample sizes, to improve precision of capture-recapture abundance and survival estimates, as well as indices of growth and condition to facilitate inferential statistical analysis." The one person mentioned as involved in this study is from neither entity but from WDFW, even though this is a Spokane Tribe proposal. The roles of the participants in achieving each objective are unclear and need to be clarified. Who exactly is doing various portions of this work?

Some duplication appears to occur in 200811600 with regard to database management. Both agencies have sizeable budgetary resources dedicated to this effort, although it is the lead of 2008-116-00. The roles here need to be more clearly defined. We would request a diagram showing how work elements proposed under 200811600 and this project are to be divided up. There seems to be some duplication, and a diagram may show otherwise.

4. Deliverables, Work Elements, Metrics, and Methods

Details of several work elements are not clearly articulated. For example, regarding predation: "Under the recruitment failure hypotheses assessment completed by the UCWSRI, several potential proximate mechanisms have been identified as potentially limiting survival of white sturgeon in the recovery area. The LRSRP proposes to examine predation on white sturgeon early life-history stages (ELS) by conducting diet analyses on predators collected from the transition zone from July through October using a combination of short duration gill net sets and by trawling with sampling being stratified by depth and by time of day." This approach intends to sample fish and look at stomachs, but it is not clear how the presence or absence of sturgeon will be translated into a quantitative assessment of the effect of predation and therefore on recruitment failure. The collection of the data is much more direct than the translation of the results into a predation effect on recruitment failure, and the approach should be described in more detail.

Similarly, with regard to food limitation, the sponsors state, "We also intend to compare histology of post-feeding stages of white sturgeon collected during field surveys with reference specimens to identify starvation effects in wild fish, thus determine the role food availability plays as a limiting factor in sturgeon survival." Has this approach been used successfully elsewhere? Please provide background and references.

Although year class strength has at least tentatively been associated with higher flows, it does not seem that any recommendations have been forwarded to test flow augmentation during late spring early summer to improve natural reproduction and recruitment. Has this topic been adequately investigated? Have recommendations been made?

There may be some value in using otoliths to find hatching dates for larval fish.

More details are needed of the contaminant work to be performed and the protocols and methods. 

4a. Specific comments on protocols and methods described in MonitoringMethods.org

The protocols and methods have been entered in MonitoringMethods.org. The basic protocols and methods were fairly complete and the level of detail for the methods is almost sufficient to be able to replicate the study data collection. Methods outlined in these sections often do not greatly exceed in detail that presented in the proposal. More details of the proposed experimental designs for predation should be provided. What might be the role of sculpins and how might it be evaluated?

Under food resource availability, no details of methods are provided. How can sampling some stomachs clearly lead to conclusions regarding possible "starvation"? Have the sponsors clearly visualized and laid out how the starvation hypothesis can be evaluated?

Modified by Dal Marsters on 4/13/2012 4:39:12 PM.

This is a proposal for white sturgeon rehabilitation in Lake Roosevelt that is reasonable in broad view, but the initial proposal lacked perspective from other white sturgeon research, did not adequately document the status of the population, and did not adequately justify a conservation aquaculture program. The first two of these three deficiencies were amply remedied by an excellent response. The response addressed the ISRP's identified concerns explicitly with an abundance of data, analysis, and intentions for the proposed research. The response provides convincing evidence that sponsors are gaining an understanding of the dynamics of the sturgeon population upstream from Lake Roosevelt and perhaps beginning to determine the mechanisms limiting recruitment to the older age classes. An expanded reference list was provided. The ISRP appreciates the thoughtfulness, thoroughness, and objectivity with which the sponsors provided their response. The reporting of results of the project has been good with Annual Reports to BPA produced for each year of the study.

The relationships of the Lake Roosevelt stock to other components of the Columbia River Basin white sturgeon were described both genetically and geographically. The research and analysis to date on stock status was described quantitatively and appropriate results were presented. As requested, the response demonstrated an understanding of the sturgeon population in the context of other populations and ongoing research and management in the basin and throughout the species' range. The initially unclear relationships among existing projects were appropriately clarified. The response provided evidence that the population assessments conducted to date and those planned for the future are intended to be quantitative and have statistical rigor.

Despite the fine response, the ISRP has some suggestions for sponsors' consideration in the areas of population status and stock assessment. Sponsors conclude with a statement that the historic stock structure is not germane to the current problem of poor recruitment, and that the population will remain isolated for the foreseeable future because of impoundment of this section of the river. This may be true, although the ISRP provides another view for consideration. The ISRP receives proposals from various reaches throughout the Columbia River basin that implicitly treat each impoundment as an isolated unit. It could be, however, that before the hydrosystem was constructed white sturgeon migrated among segments of the Columbia and Snake Rivers (exclusive of the Kootenai, which has been isolated for thousands of years). Coupled with episodic and localized successful recruitment interspersed with many years of failed reproduction, the abundance and geographic distribution of sturgeon may have depended on movement of individuals, young and old, among river reaches. The fragmentation of the system may itself be a causal mechanism in the decline in recruitment in some segments. If this is the case, then efforts to mitigate the mechanisms for recruitment failure may be a necessary but insufficient solution to recover these populations. Any artificial production to support white sturgeon needs to consider this possibility.

Sponsors provided a very helpful summary of their stock assessment efforts, and their conclusions to date. If this proposal is funded and the current round of tasks are accomplished, it would be helpful for reviewers in the next proposal cycle if the sponsors provided a more thorough justification of additional stock assessments. There need to be explicit assessments outlined that will provide convincing abundance and survival estimates. The conclusion that a standardized survey needs to be conducted every three years could to be better justified, also. Future proposals should more thoroughly develop the need for continued population status monitoring and at what time intervals.

The sponsors' justification for the conservation hatchery was still based too much on the UCWSRI (2002) and recovery plan recommendations, plus the citing of supplementation ongoing in the lower Columbia River (The Dalles reservoir) and in the Kootenai River. The ISRP examined the upper Columbia plan and found no compelling evidence that a conservation aquaculture program was well justified other than that the Canadians were successfully rearing and releasing juvenile white sturgeon into the Keenleyside Reach since 2002. All of the supplementation efforts are at such an early stage that it is unknown if supplementation will help or hurt these populations. This is too much like a bandwagon approach. The rationale for trying conservation aquaculture was presented as a temporary response to the longer time frame of likely research and management advances for restoring habitat deficiencies likely responsible for low recruitment. An informative set of projected population trajectories with and without hatchery supplementation was provided. Nonetheless, the ISRP suggests the supplementation approach be more thoroughly developed and justified, which remains a qualification for the fundable recommendation.