Fish Passage above the Dam Title

Sockeye Mitigation

Hatchery Adaptive Management Plan

As with many efforts that involve complex natural systems, learning about the effectiveness and consequences of the project is an ongoing process.

As the results of the sockeye hatchery are analyzed, some questions will be answered while others will require further study or perhaps lead to new questions.

This cycle of production, evaluation, analysis and potential program change is planned to continue for many years.

Adaptive management is an approach that describes a way of managing risks associated with uncertainty and in this case, provides a flexible framework for the identification of key uncertainties and the development of a monitoring and evaluation system to address the uncertainties.

Critical pieces of the adaptive management plan are the descriptions of how the right questions are asked, how research plans are developed, how information is made available, how analyses of the data will be performed and, finally, how this information will be used in reaching decisions about any program changes are needed and how these changes are made. The goal is to establish a process that is transparent and has credibility.

To initiate the adaptive management process, the design team has developed a plan that will be reviewed by the participants in the adaptive management process once it is established. The team has included the following in the plan:

  • A discussion of the key uncertainties associated with the project.
  • How the monitoring plan would be structured to gather data to address the uncertainties.
  • The process by which the adaptive management program would operate, including how decisions about program changes (such as the hatchery's production goal) would be made.
  • How the adaptive management process interfaces with the co-managers as they carry out their roles and responsibilities
  • View the Cedar River Sockeye Hatchery Adaptive Management Plan (pdf)

Landsburg Mitigation Contacts

Rand Little, Senior Fisheries Biologist
Seattle Public Utilities
Phone: (206) 684-5925
Email: rand.little@seattle.gov

Paul Faulds, Senior Environmental Analyst
Seattle Public Utilities
Phone: (206) 615-0021
Email: paul.faulds@seattle.gov