[ODFW-News] Lookingglass Hatchery stock euthanized to protect environment

[Odfw News]

News Release
Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife


Contact:Brad Wurfel (503) 947-6020        

Internet: www.dfw.state.or.us
<BLOCKED::BLOCKED::http://www.dfw.state.or.us/>   Fax: (503) 947-6009

               


For Immediate Release
Friday, March 4, 2005


Lookingglass Hatchery stock euthanized to protect environment


 

LAGRANDE - Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife Officials today
euthanized 23,600 chinook salmon at Lookingglass Hatchery due to ongoing
disease problems with one production group. 

 

Officials said the spring chinook were scheduled to be released in the
Lostine River within the next two weeks. But fish in one of the raceways
have been battling a major outbreak of Infectious Hematopoietic Necrosis
Virus (IHN) and Bacterial Kidney Disease (BKD) since January, and the
fish were not responding to treatment. 

 

"We were faced with the choice of euthanizing these fish, or releasing
them and potentially exposing the natural environment to two deadly fish
diseases," said ODFW Acting Northeast Region Manager Bruce Eddy. "Our
first priority is protect and manage Oregon's natural resources. It
simply was not worth the risk."

 

Eddy said the lost fish, totaling 1,180 pounds, will not seriously
impact the Lostine River program. Lookingglass Hatchery's 18-raceway
facility annually rears nearly one million salmon. More than 160,000
salmon will be planted in the Lostine this year. 

 

The hatchery is co-managed by ODFW, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service,
NOAA Fisheries, Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation
and the Nez Perce Tribe. Hatchery funding comes from a federal
mitigation program for power dams on the Snake River. Spring Chinook
produced for the Lostine River are jointly managed by ODFW and the Nez
Perce Tribe. The decision to euthanize the Lookingglass Hatchery stock
was shared among the management partners. 

 

Bacterial Kidney Disease and IHN are naturally occurring diseases. BKD
outbreaks usually are treated with antibiotics. Eddy said the
unseasonably warm weather in northeast Oregon this spring was likely why
the fish did not respond to treatment. 

 

The last sport fishery for Lostine River Coho was in 1974. The state is
reviewing a proposal to create a sport fishery in the Wallowa River on
Lostine stock spring Chinook for this year, although the plan is not yet
final. Today's hatchery loss will not impact that decision. 

 

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