Augmentation of Salmon Stocks through Artificial 

 Propagation; Methods and Implications' 



Joe B. Stevens and Bruce W. Mattox^ 

 ABSTRACT 



Eighty-one hatcheries on the Pacific Coast now rear significant numbers of salmon 

 and steelhead for sport and commercial fisheries. Annual operation and maintenance 

 costs amount to $6.6 million. A production function analysis of 15 Oregon Fish Com- 

 mission hatcheries produced tentative conclusions that (a) controlled inputs were com- 

 bined in fixed proportions, (b) constant returns to size were realized, and (c) some 

 degree of factor substitution existed between the controlled "fixed proportion input" 

 and water temperature. The latter relationship may allow hatchery managers to im- 

 prove efficiency at the hatchery level. Uncertainty with respect to downstream en- 

 vironmental conditions, however, must be considered along with returns to size for 

 the hatchery production function when new investments are undertaken. 



Fixed asset theory was used to conceptualize exit and entry of salmon harvesting 

 resources between 1947 and 1966. Net entry followed years of good catches, but net 

 exit did not occur following the bad years. If a major objective of hatchery programs 

 is to augment fishermen's incomes, consideration must be given to increasing the 

 opportunity costs of extant resources as well as to limiting entry of new resources. 



INTRODUCTION 



It is a moot question to ask whether or not 

 the public sector should involve itself exten- 

 sively in hatchery rearing of salmon and steel- 

 head on the Pacific Coast. Eighty-one hatcher- 

 ies, valued at over $56 million with annual oper- 

 ation and maintenance costs of $6.6 million, 

 now rear significant numbers of chinook and 

 coho salmon and steelhead trout for sport and 

 commercial fisheries. It is a relevant question, 

 however, to ask under what conditions con- 

 tinuing investment of this type should be under- 

 taken. Although this is a question which can 

 and should be posed, it is not easily answered; 

 thus we do not attempt to do so, aside from 

 exploring some obvious and not-so-obvious 



' Technical Paper No. 3010, Oregon Agricultural 

 Experiment Station. 



- Associate Professor of Agricultural Economics, 

 Oregon State University, and Assistant Professor of 

 Resource Economics, University of Rhode Island, res- 

 pectively. This publication is supported in part by the 

 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration 

 {maintained by the U.S. Department of Commerce) In- 

 stitutional Sea Grant 2-3.'il87. Nothing stated herein is 

 to be taken as representing the views or policies of the 

 Oregon Fish Commission. 



implications. Our major attention herein is 

 devoted to asking and partially answering 

 the question: "Given the decision to augment 

 resource flows by artificial propagation, what 

 can be gleaned from existing data which will 

 allow the public sector to increase efficiency 

 at the hatchery level?" In exploring this ques- 

 tion, we recognize the dangers of a partial 

 analysis, i.e., divorcing hatchery objectives 

 from higher order objectives. Our defense is 

 pragmatic, i.e., that it is better to start fitting 

 the pieces of the puzzle together, one by one, 

 than to not start at all or to theorize how they 

 might all be fitted simultaneously. 



THE CURRENT SIGNIFICANCE OF 

 SALMON AND STEELHEAD HATCHERIES^ 



The first Pacific Coast salmon hatchery was 

 constructed in Northern California by the 

 U.S. Fish Commission almost a century ago. 

 Since that time, artificial propagation of 

 salmon has alternately been viewed as a 

 panacea and as no solution at all. Improve- 

 ments in propagation methods have allowed. 



^ Data on the nature and contributions of hatchery 

 progi-ams were taken freely and gratefully from Wahle, 

 (1970). 



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