New hatchery management strategies in the Columbia River Basin focus on conservation of naturally spawning populations as an equal priority to providing fish for harvest—a difficult halance to achieve. The Hatchery Scientific Review Group (HSRG) assessed 178 hatchery programs and 351 salmonid populations to determine how to achieve managers’ goals for conservation and sustainable fisheries. Modeling determined the best strategy, using an approach based on best available science, goal identification, scientific defensibility, and adaptive management to refocus from an aquaculture paradigm to a renewable natural resource paradigm. We concluded that hatcheries and natural populations must be managed with the same biological principles. HSRG solutions improved the conservation status of many populations (25% for steelhead trout, more than 70% for Chinook and coho salmons) while also providing increased harvest. Natural‐origin steelhead trout and coho salmon spawners increased by 6,000 to 10,000; Chinook salmon increased by more than 35,000 compared to current numbers. Hatchery juvenile production decreased slightly, and in most cases production shifted from populations of concern. Overall harvest potential increased from 717,000 to 818,000 fish by focusing on selective fishing and by reheating some in‐river harvest closer to where the fish originate. With habitat improvements, often the number of natural‐origin fish nearly doubled.

Hatcheries support nearly all major fisheries for Pacific salmon (Oncorhynchus spp.) and steel‐head (anadromous O. mykiss) in the Pacific Northwest. However, hatcheries have been a major source of controversy for over 30 years. The Hatchery Scientific Review Group (HSRG) was tasked by Congress to identify solutions to well‐known problems so hatcheries could better meet their goals of supporting sustainable fisheries and assisting with the conservation of natural populations. We reviewed over 100 facilities and 200 programs and identified three principles of hatchery reform: (1) goals for each program must be explicitly stated in terms of desired benefits and purposes; (2) programs must be scientifically defensible; and (3) hatchery programs must respond adaptively to new information. We also identified several emerging issues critical to the success of hatcheries. We concluded that hatcheries must operate in new modes with increased scientific oversight and that they cannot meet their goals without healthy habitats and self‐sustaining, naturally‐spawning populations.

We conducted an experiment comparing the age at maturity of hatchery coho salmon Oncorhynchus kisutch sired with 2% or 100% age-2 jacks and released at two smolt sizes. Progeny sired by 100% age-2 males returned significantly more age-2 jacks than did those sired with 2% age-2 males. However, the survival and mean length of age-3 fish was similar for the two groups. Significantly more age-2 returns were produced by releasing larger (34-40 g) smolts rather than smaller (23-28 g) ones, but smolt size did not affect the survival or mean length of age-3 returns.

Test groups of coded‐wire‐tagged yearling coho salmon Oncorhynchus kisutch were either volitionally released or forcibly released for 3 years at two hatcheries. Results for the two release methods showed similar survivals for age‐2 males (jacks) or age‐3 fish. We suggest that volitional release could have benefits in feed savings and allow limited water to be redirected in the hatchery.

The coefficient of variation (CV) in length of steelhead Oncorhynchus mykiss and coho salmon O. kisutch sorted with the AutoFish tagging trailer (AFTT) system (Northwest Marine Technology, Shaw Island, Washington) was compared with that of unsorted fish. At release in April, the mean CV of sorted steelhead was 22% less than that of control fish, and the two values were significantly different. Since fish are only handled once with the AFTT, there are also labor savings relative to traditional hatchery practices in which fish are sorted and later fin‐clipped. In coho salmon, the mean CV of sorted fish was only 7% less than that of control fish (no significant difference), suggesting that there are few added advantages in using the AFTT for coho salmon.