Report/Item

Meeting notes for the recent committee meeting:

The WD AFS Bull Trout Committee met on Sept. 14, 2005 during the combined National and Western Division AFS annual meeting in Anchorage. Members and visitors attending were Shelley Spalding, Howard Schaller, Phaedra Budy, Robert Al-Chokhanchy, Craig Bienz, Bill Mavros, Don Martin, Gino Lucchetti, and Steve Yundt.

Committee accomplishments

Shelley Spalding, chair, briefly reviewed the committee's accomplishments during the past year (s) including support of Matt Dare's bull trout radio telemetry synthesis project and helping facilitate the Japanese char researchers' visit to Montana to collaborate with bull trout researchers. Information and presentations regarding that collaboration will be available at the WD AFS 2006 meeting in Bozeman.

Bull trout biologists survey

The committee reviewed information, objectives, and questions from WD AFS EXCOM regarding the Bull Trout Biologists survey requested by MT AFS. It is generally agreed that a professional who designs surveys should be involved. The EXCOM has requested the Bull Trout Committee provide a plan on how it will approach crafting, analyzing , and reporting on the survey as well as the Committee's objectives for the survey. For this purpose a sub-committee is being formed. It is expected that there will be at least one representative on the sub-committee from each of the four main states where bull trout are located as well as a representative from the MT AFS chapter.

Discussion about the survey project included:

The importance of anonymity for respondents how to determine who is qualified to be included in the survey
questions regarding "bull trout persistence" need to have the scale of analysis identified and need to include information about how conclusion were made by the respondent
important to identify key threats and key solutions as well as whether removing threats has resulted in improvements to the populations should elements of the National Heritage Program status assessment (as used in the BullTrout 5-year Review) be used when seeking survey responses regarding reasons for or threats to persistence?

Shelley will contact the WD AFS webmaster to in order to post on the Bull Trout Committee link current information regarding the survey committee's progress.

NOTE: The following Bull Trout Committee members have volunteered to be on the Survey Committee: Wade Fredenberg (MT), Chris Frissell (MT) , Frank Schrier (WA), Don Ratliff (OR), Robert Al-Chokhanchy (ID), and Steve Yontz
(ID).

The Bull Trout Committee received a request to support of a joint U.S.-Japan workshop to provide a published synthesis regarding of white-spotted charr (Salvelinus leucomaenis) and bull trout (S. confluentus), with implications for their conservation and research needs. The proposal is attached. The Japan-US Charr Workshop proposal was approved for the $2,400 you requested. The synthesis that results from the workshop will be presented at the 2006 WD AFS meeting in Bozeman, MT (See attached file: Japan-US_charr_workshop_proposal_10-20-04.pdf - 20k)

At their 2003 annual meeting, the WD AFS Bull Trout Committee endorsed an on-going project whose goal was to synthesize existing data collection on bull trout using radio telemetry. The letter sent by WD AFS Bull Trout Committee (Word doc - 189k) endorsing the project and seeking researchers participation in the project. The Final Report (Word doc - 95 k) for the first phase of the Telemetry Synthesis project - the metadata.

The only Committee activity this year was to help coordinate the peer review of the US Fish and Wildlife Service’s proposed critical habitat rule for the Columbia River and Kalamath DPSs. This peer review was requested by US Fish and Wildlife Service and was conducted during the public comment period. It did not require support or endorsement by the committee or AFS, just providing the peer reviewer’s comments to USFWS. Attached is the cover letter that went to USFWS. The actual peer review comments will be available when the public comment period closes.

At this year’s meeting, we will discuss providing support and assistance for a radio telemetry synthesis project being conducted by Biomark, Inc. Out of Idaho. A letter from Biomark will be available for review at the meeting.

The Protocol for Determining Bull Trout Presence has been completed by the authors. AFS WD EXCOM coordinated an independent peer review of the document.

The Protocol development authors met in La Grande in January 2002 to discuss the next steps. Then following are notes from that meeting.

It may be very difficult and problematic to develop a "presence/absence" protocol for detecting occurrence of migratory bull trout due to the seasonal and spatial variation in their habitat use. However, with information from well designed migratory bull trout studies it might be possible to develop an assessment of habitat suitability for these fish and to determine why or what characteristics cause bull trout to make different movements, i.e. movement to more benign winter environments, to more productive sites, etc. A migratory bull trout habitat assessment could be used to help determine where and when we need to manage for migratory bull trout and to help determine which habitat features need protection.

Several bull trout research papers have been posted on the AFS WD bull trout committee page.

• Background and information regarding the committee's charge along with contact information (HTML document).
• Report of the Policy Review Committee Concerning the Activities and Procedures Used by the Western Division American Fisheries Society (WDAFS) Bull Trout Committee in Facilitating the Development of Assessment Protocols for Bull Trout (HTML document).
• March 2001 draft "Protocol for Determining Bull Trout Presence" (MSWord document in a Zip-file - right-click to download).
• 15 July 2001 Final Report "Models to predict suitable habitat for juvenile bull trout in Washington State" (MSWord document in a Zip-file  - right-click to download).

The Bull Trout Committee has been busy, to say the least.   The primary activity has been coordination and review of the "Interim Protocol for Determining Bull Trout Presence".  The authors of the protocol held one meeting in November, 1999 and communicated via conference call and email in order to complete the draft.

The review draft protocol was released in May 2000 for review by WD AFS Bull Trout Committee members.  Eleven committee members submitted review comments.  These comments are in the process of being summarized for the authors.  The final Interim Protocol will be completed this fall, following field season.  Several agency and Tribal crews are "test driving" the protocol and will offer their data and comments to the authors following the field season.

I am enclosing information on the Pacific Seabird Group=s process for development of the marbled murrelet protocol.  That process was used as a template for the bull trout protocol development because it involved a professional society developing a protocol for an ESA   threatened species and both allowed for committee involvement and scientific rigor by a small group of acknowledged experts in development of the protocol.  I also have included minutes of the committee meeting in Moscow last year, the authors' November meeting minutes and other pertinent emails.  It may be more than you want to see, but it does give a pretty complete picture of the process so far.

The other activity undertaken by the committee was coordination of a peer review for  "The Status of Bull Trout in Nevada".  Two anonymous AFS members submitted comments along with a review by AFS member Jason Dunham for the US Fish and Wildlife Service.