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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, DECEMBER 28, 2018
Revitalized Sea Resources is going swimmingly
Old hatchery gets
new life in Chinook
ing is insuffi cient. “Wild
salmon recovery is not hap-
pening fast enough or in
large enough numbers to
keep up with our grow-
ing population impacts and
needs.”
He said Sea Resources’
location — in the lowest
reaches of the Columbia,
away from any natural or
environmentally protected
salmon runs — could
mean it becoming the most
important salmon hatchery
in the state.
By PATRICK WEBB
Chinook Observer
CHINOOK, Wash. —
Sea Resources is poised for
a major comeback.
Supporters of the old-
est fi sh hatchery in Wash-
ington state have regrouped,
ready for a busy spring and
summer.
“Everybody is saying if
we don’t do something our
fi shing is going to die,” said
Nansen Malin, of Seaview,
the group’s vice president.
Malin, board president
Kenny Osborne and other
supporters are optimistic
that revitalizing the hatchery,
along with continued efforts
to enhance regional salmon
habitat, must be priorities.
“This is a community
legacy that cannot be let go,”
Malin said. “We are going
back into the salmon-pro-
duction business this spring.
“We are in the perfect
place to do it, because we
don’t compete with the nat-
ural runs and we are so close
to the bay — and we have
the infrastructure.”
Coho, chum and Chinook
salmon will be the priority
species for production; some
rainbow trout may be intro-
duced in area lakes.
“Chinook is the ‘holy
grail,’” she said.
The concrete raceways
where the fi sh grow, the egg
room and classroom are all
targeted for a makeover.
Other efforts include replac-
ing signs, many damaged
in the 2007 storm, recruit-
ing board members and vol-
unteers, and liaising with
state agencies on changing
regulations.
The new energy has
Osborne excited. While
a student at Ilwaco High
School in the 1970s, he spent
hours learning hands-on
environmental science at the
hatchery.
“We have been essentially
‘waiting in the wings’ for the
opportunity to again raise
fi sh and hopefully propagate
returning fi sh,” said Osborne,
a longtime Sea Resources
board member who works
in real estate and as an insur-
ance broker. “We have all the
basic tools in place and with
some upgrades we hope to be
getting going.”
Origins
Sea Resources was estab-
lished in 1893 by Alfred E.
Houchen, a former cabin
boy on a British man-of-war
who deserted in Canada and
worked his way south.
Houchen ended up on a
Bear River tideland farm
performing early fi sh culture
Key role
Patrick Webb/Chinook Observer
Nansen Malin, vice president of the board of Sea Resources, points toward the old concrete raceways used for rearing salmon
at the Chinook hatchery.
experiments before moving
to Chinook property owned
by Jasper Prest and working
with John McGowan to cre-
ate a hatchery.
The hatchery was taken
over by the state in 1890.
They and their successors
experimented with trans-
porting fi sh from traps on
Baker Bay to the hatchery
for artifi cial propagation.
“They were really for-
ward thinking — it’s pretty
impressive,” said Malin,
who has been involved with
Sea Resources for a dozen
years.
Traps were banned in
1935, and the state closed
the hatchery.
A revised entity became a
nonprofi t in the early 1960s.
Over the years, its opera-
tions have focused on an
educational component; this
began a collaboration with
Ocean Beach School Dis-
trict in 1969. Students were
trained in salmon propa-
gation, with an eye toward
employment in other Pacifi c
Northwest hatcheries.
Although these voca-
tional programs that Osborne
and others benefi ted from
are no longer in place, tours
and programs have contin-
ued, focusing on the three
areas of salmon propagation,
watershed restoration and
native plants. The hatchery
is a popular fi eld trip desti-
nation for home-schoolers.
Several
collaborations
have taken place with the
Columbia
River
Estu-
ary Study Taskforce, most
designed to enhance habitat.
In recent years, the board
has entered into an agree-
ment with the Washing-
ton Department of Fish
and Wildlife to manage the
Chinook River Tide Gate.
Water fl ow has a signifi cant
impact on the development
of habitat.
It is all part of a strategy
that exploits the fact that
the Chinook River water-
shed does not have a nat-
ural salmon run or any
endangered species in the
immediate vicinity, Malin
said.
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tionists and fi shermen.
Harmond grew up in
Longview, taking trips to the
peninsula in the late 1960s
with his fi sherman father,
crabbing in Ilwaco, surf
casting from the jetty and
clamming on Long Beach.
He later worked as a com-
mercial fi sherman in Alaska,
returning to Washington
when the runs diminished.
“At a time when many
salmon enhancement, edu-
cation and production orga-
nizations were disappear-
ing or shutting down, Sea
Resources has remained
steadfast,” said Harmond,
who is based in Gig Harbor.
He said the number of
healthy adult salmon return-
Impetus
Gov. Jay Inslee has set
Department of Fish and
Wildlife leaders to work with
a task force to save southern
resident killer whales from
extinction. These orcas split
their time between Puget
Sound and the outer coast,
often hunting for Chinook in
the vicinity of the mouth of
the Columbia River. Stud-
ies estimate two out of three
calves are lost because the
orcas have insuffi cient Chi-
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Oregon
nook salmon. Hatcheries
are among partners in this
group’s coordinated cam-
paign to provide more fi sh.
Sea Resources support-
ers want to be part of that
effort and were consider-
ably boosted in May by a
$475,000 bequest from the
late Ella and Virgil Worth-
ington, a peninsula couple
who died at ages 108 and
102, and split their estate
between the hatchery and
the Ocean Beach Educa-
tional Foundation.
The revitalized Sea
Resources is strongly sup-
ported by Wayne Harmond,
president of Northwest
Salmon Research, a group
which combines conserva-
Butch Smith, who has
been acting as an adviser,
agreed that Sea Resources is
positioned to play a key role.
The third-generation fi sher-
man owns Coho Charters,
is president of the Ilwaco
Charter Association and
serves on the Ilwaco Port
Commission.
“We like the work on get-
ting production up for local
commercial and sport fi sh-
ermen — as a port com-
missioner, I want to see all
forms succeed,” he said.
“Having healthy fi sh in
our area means a healthy
community.”
A chance meeting with
Smith, and the discovery of
their shared values, led Jules
Orr, owner of the Salt Hotel
and Pub, to join the Sea
Resources board. His father
worked in salmon enhance-
ment and he interned at a
hatchery during his high
school years. He hopes the
hatchery will rekindle links
with area students to allow
them to embrace lifelong
lessons as he did.
“In the short term, they
will probably remember
their time at the hatchery
as a cold damp day with the
hum of pumps, no cellphone
service and the smell of
fi sh,” Orr said. “In the long
term, I hope and expect they
will not forget their involve-
ment in the salmon life cycle
and make choices that sup-
port salmon and other natu-
ral resources.”
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