Sacramento River Fall Chinook Working Group

Pacific Fishery Management Council (Council) and NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) joint workgroup evaluating management measure currently in place for Council-area salmon fisheries on Sacramento River fall Chinook (SRFC) salmon.

The workgroup also includes representatives of the states of Oregon and California, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The public is welcome at all workgroup meetings. The workgroup’s main tasks will be to evaluate the PFMC’s current salmon harvest management measures, consider possible improvements to abundance forecasts methods and harvest models, and consider the effect of environmental variables on the management measures.

Purpose and Goals

The workgroup will evaluate the PFMC’s salmon harvest management measures currently in place for SRFC, which include a conservation objective, reference points, and a harvest control rule. The workgroup will provide to the Council a workplan and timeline required to develop alternative management measures as needed and improvements to forecast methods and harvest models as appropriate. The workgroup’s findings will inform Council consideration of new or updated management measures, abundance forecast methods and harvest models, as appropriate and supported by the available data.

Opportunities for Public Involvement

Every meeting of the workgroup is open to the public and although the meetings are not a public hearing, public comment periods will be scheduled on all the workgroup’s agendas. Additional public comment opportunity will occur in verbal and/or written format at Council meetings when the workgroup is scheduled on the Council’s agenda.

Membership

The workgroup includes representatives from the states of California, Oregon, the PFMC; the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; and NMFS’ West Coast Region, Northwest Fisheries Science Center, and Southwest Fisheries Science Center.

Background

A review of the conservation objectives for Sacramento River fall Chinook (SRFC) and Klamath River fall Chinook (KRFC) was recommended in 2018 when both these stocks were declared ‘overfished’. Since that time, salmon issues beyond the normal preseason process focused resources on other immediate matters including new management frameworks to increase the availability of prey for Southern Resident killer whales and management of Southern Oregon/Northern California coho salmon, and improvements to the abundance forecast methods and harvest models used to manage SRFC and KRFC salmon.

At their April 2023 meeting, the imminent removal of the Klamath River dams and a report from California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) spurred Council discussion on how to address the potential need to identify interim management measures for KRFC. In addition, especially given renewed concern for the SRFC salmon, the Council generally concurred that additional work on the SRFC conservation objective review appeared equally important.

At the June 2023 Council meeting, the Council established ad-hoc technical workgroups for both stocks and adopted terms of reference. The Terms of Reference for the SRFC Workgroup tasked the workgroup to develop potential improvements to SRFC assessment and management for Council consideration by

• evaluating management measures currently in place;
• developing a work plan and timeline to accomplish the work;
• providing the Council with new or updated management measures, abundance forecast methods, and harvest models, as appropriate and supported by the available data.

The workgroup will conduct a review of the management measures and report back with recommendations at future PFMC meetings.

Meeting Schedule

Most workgroup meetings will take place outside of the Council meeting schedule and focus on collecting data and drafting reports for presentation at the Council meeting, typically provided by the workgroup Chair and vice Chair. It is anticipated that most of the workgroup meetings will be held on-line, although in-person workgroup meetings may also occur. The Council website (www.pcouncil.org) will provide meeting agendas, venue information, and on-line participation.

Supporting materials for upcoming meetings will be posted here in advance of each meeting. Presentations from meetings will be posted once they become available.

Past meetings and materials

• January 30-31, 2024
  • See meeting page for more information.
• May 1-2, 2024
  • See meeting page for more information.