419 



summer, and fall chinook salmon because hatchery ar.d wild 

 Chinook smelts were indistinguishable when they were marked at 

 the dair-s. 



3) The 1986 and 1989 spring/summer chinook transponation studies 

 at Lower Granite Dam are weighted hea\a!y to the earlier 

 migrating hatchery fish. Due to this situation and the high 

 abundance of hatchery fish in the inigration, T/C ratios at Lower 

 Granite Dam prim.arily reflect how well hatchery fish responded 

 to transportation and in-river migration (combined with short haul 

 transpon). Tne recoveries from the spring chinook studies at 

 McNaiy Dam also are heaviiy weighted to hatchery rerams. 



4) T/C ratios based on rerura rates of marked fish at raainstem 

 dams do not measure the effect of transportation on fish survival 

 back to the spav-Tung grounds. The only information available 

 from the spring/summer chinook and sockeye salmon studies on 

 the effea of transportation to the spawning grounds and 

 hatcheries is the upsceam coded wire tag data. 



5) None of the transportaaon sradies have provided esdmates of the 

 potential error associated with reading the brands on adult fish 

 sampled at the dams. In response to a request from the Review 

 Group, N\£FS examined their raw data to determine brand 

 reading errors for the 1986 and 1989 spring/summer chinook 

 studies at Lower Granite Dam. Five of 22 branded fish jaw 

 tagged at Lower Granite Dam from the 1986 study and sampled 

 upstream for the coded wire tag were either assigned to the 

 wrong release group, the wrong treatment group, or not recorded 

 ai,a brand recovery at Lower Granite. For the 1989 smdy one of 

 the 11 jaw tagged fish recovered upsceam was a control fish 

 assigned to the wrong release group, ^^"hile the sample sizes are 

 <maH the magnitude of the errors indicate that brand reading 

 error should be assessed for all of the transportation studies. 



6) T/C rados based on upstream coded wire ug recoveries for the 

 sockeve salmon sradies at Priest Rapids Dam and the spring 

 chinook salmon studies at Priest Rapids and Lower Granite dams 

 in most cases are much lower than the T/Cs based on brand 

 recoveries at the dams. 



7) None of the upsfea.Ti tributary recovery informanon for a.ny of 

 the spring and summer chinook transponation studies indicates 

 that transportation was beneficial to the su.'vival of wild fish back 

 to the spawning grounds. Rapid River Hatcheo' was the only 



