Status and Trend Monitoring in pilot basins

All of ISEMP’s status and trend monitoring (STM) sites are selected using the GRTS design, a spatially balanced sampling regime that stands for (Generalized Random Tessellation Stratified), with about 50 sites in each subbasin sampled annually and about 10% repeat visits per year. Status and trend monitoring takes place in the John Day, Wenatchee, Entiat, and South Fork Salmon Subbasins.

Status and Trend Monitoring usually consists of habitat surveys, juvenile tagging and surveys, adult spawning ground surveys, water temperature and macroinvertebrate sample collections.

John Day: STM began in 2009 and included the use of two habitat protocols, ODFW (Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife) and PiBO (PacFish-Infish Biological Opinion) -based protocols and were employed at 32 GRTS sites used by ODFW for spawning surveys throughout the subbasin. A mark-recapture study was also conducted to determine fish population metrics.

Wenatchee Habitat and Snorkeling Sites Annual Sites

Wenatchee: STM has been ongoing since 2004 at 25 sites that are visited annually. A rotating panel design was used to sample an additional 25 sites from 2005-2008. Additionally, several side studies have taken place simultaneously with STM. For example, day vs. night snorkel comparisons and snorkel and habitat crew variability studies were done in 2005 and 2009, respectively. These side projects are used to inform and improve standard STM methodologies.

South Fork Salmon: STM began in 2009 for the South Fork of the Salmon River and will continue in 2010. 50 GRTS sites will be sampled over 2009 and 2010. Both juvenile tagging and habitat surveys take place at STM locations.