Commission Selects Unsworth as New Director of WDFW
Dr. Jim Unsworth, deputy director of the Idaho Department of Fish and Game, was chosen as the new head of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.
The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission voted to select Unsworth after interviewing eight candidates for the director’s position in December and narrowing the field to four finalists. The commission, a citizen panel appointed by the governor to set policy for WDFW, announced its decision at a public meeting Jan. 9-10 in Tumwater.
Unsworth, who will replace Phil Anderson, formally accepted the job.
Commissioners said they sought a visionary leader with a strong conservation ethic, sound fiscal-management skills and the expertise to work collaboratively with the commission and the department’s constituents.
“After a thorough nationwide search, we’re confident Jim is the right person to guide the department through the many challenges that lie ahead,” said Miranda Wecker, chair of the commission. “His solid understanding of natural resource issues and strong leadership skills will be invaluable in the department’s effort to manage and protect the fish and wildlife resources that are so important to the people of this state.”
As director, Unsworth will report to the commission and manage a department with more than 1,600 employees, and a biennial operating budget of $376 million. His annual salary will be $146,500.
Unsworth, age 57, has spent more than 30 years in wildlife management with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game and has served as deputy director for the agency since 2008. He previously held several management positions for the department, including wildlife bureau chief and state big-game manager.
Unsworth holds a bachelor’s degree in wildlife management from the University of Idaho, a master’s degree in fish and wildlife management from Montana State University and a doctorate in forestry, wildlife and range sciences from the University of Idaho.
“I’m thrilled at this opportunity,” Unsworth said. “I look forward to taking on the many exciting challenges that come with managing fish and wildlife in the State of Washington.”
Unsworth and his wife Michele have four adult children. He is an avid hunter and fisher.
Unsworth will replace Anderson, who announced in August he was resigning from his position at the end of 2014. At the commission’s request, he has since agreed to stay on as the head of the agency until a new director is in place.
“Phil’s enormous dedication to managing Washington’s fish and wildlife will truly be missed,” Wecker said. “As director, he was a tireless worker who successfully guided the department through one of the most difficult times in the history of this state. Under his leadership and with his support, the department made important progress in meeting some very challenging issues. We are extremely grateful for his service and all the contributions he made during his career at WDFW.”
Wecker said a statement of appreciation for Anderson will be posted on the commission’s webpage at http://wdfw.wa.gov/commission/.
JD: Let’s just hope someone that went to Montana State hundreds of miles from the ocean and has his education in forestry will figure out what it’s going to take to keep Washington’s wild salmon and steelhead populations healthy while keeping sport and commercial fishermen in the money. Good luck Mr. Unsworth. We’re rooting for you.
Warm Ocean Temps Impact Salmon Runs
“Right now it’s super warm all the way across the Pacific to Japan,” said Bill Peterson, an oceanographer with NOAA’s Northwest Fisheries Science Center in Newport, Oregon, who has linked certain ocean indicators to salmon returns. “For a scientist it’s a very interesting time because when you see something like this that’s totally new you have opportunities to learn things you were never expecting.”
Not since records began has the region of the North Pacific Ocean been so warm for so long. The warm expanse has been characterized by sea surface temperatures as much as 3°C (about 5.4°F) higher than average, lasting for months, and appears on large-scale temperature maps as a red-orange mass of warm water many hundreds of miles across. Nick Bond of the Joint Institute for the Study of the Atmosphere and Ocean at the University of Washington earlier this summer nicknamed it “the blob.”
Indeed, there are three warm zones, said Nate Mantua, leader of the Southwest Fisheries Science Center Landscape Ecology Team: The big blob dominating the Gulf of Alaska, a more recent expanse of exceptionally warm water in the Bering Sea and one that emerged off Southern California earlier this year. One exception to the warmth is a narrow strip of cold water along the Pacific Northwest Coast fed by upwelling from the deep ocean.
The situation does not match recognized patterns in ocean conditions such as El Niño Southern Oscillation or Pacific Decadal Oscillation, which are known to affect marine food webs.
One possibility is that the PDO, a long-lived El Niño-like pattern, is shifting from an extended cold period dating to the late 1990s to a warm phase, said Toby Garfield, director of the SWFSC Environmental Research Division. Mantua said the PDO may have tipped into a warm state as early as January of this year.
But both scientists noted that the observed warm temperatures are higher and cover more of the northern Pacific than the PDO typically affects. For all but the Gulf of Alaska, the warm waters appear to lie in a relatively shallow layer near the surface. The cold near-shore conditions in the Pacific Northwest also don’t match the typical PDO pattern.
Warm ocean temperatures favor some species but not others. For instance, sardines and albacore tuna often thrive in warmer conditions. Pacific Coast salmon and steelhead rely on cold-water nutrients, which they may have found recently in the narrow margin of cold water along the Northwest coast. But if the warmth continues or expands, Pacific Northwest salmon and steelhead could suffer in coming years.
“If the warming persists for the whole summer and fall, some of the critters that do well in a colder, more productive ocean could suffer reduced growth, poor reproductive success and population declines,” Mantua said. “This has happened to marine mammals, sea birds and Pacific salmon in the past. At the same time, species that do well in warmer conditions may experience increased growth, survival and abundance.”
Peterson recently advised the Northwest Power and Conservation Council that juvenile salmon and steelhead migrating from the Columbia River to the ocean this year and next may experience poor survival.
“The signs for salmon aren’t good based on our experience in the past,” Peterson said, “but we won’t really see the signal from this until those fish return in a few years.”
The warm expanse in the Gulf of Alaska is a kind of climatic “hangover” from the same persistent atmospheric ridge of high pressure believed to have contributed to California’s extreme drought, Bond and Mantua said. The ridge suppressed storms and winds that commonly stir and cool the sea surface.
Other factors created the patch of warm water hugging the Central California Coast south to Baja California. A low-pressure trough between California and Hawaii weakened the winds that typically drive upwelling of deep, cold water along the California Coast. Without those winds, waters off Southern California’s beaches have stayed unusually warm.
NOAA surveys off California in July found jellyfish called “sea nettles” and ocean sunfish, which the warmer waters likely carried closer to shore, Mantua said. Anglers have reported excellent fishing for warm-water species including yellowfin tuna, yellowtail and dorado, also known as mahi-mahi.
Research surveys in the Gulf of Alaska this summer came across species such as pomfret, ocean sunfish, blue shark and thresher shark often associated with warmer water, said Joe Orsi of the Alaska Fisheries Science Center Auke Bay Laboratories in Juneau. He said temperatures in the upper 20 meters of water up to 65 kilometers offshore were 0.8° C (about 1.4° F) above normal in both June and July.
The potential arrival of El Niño later this year would likely reinforce the warming and its effects on marine ecosystems, Bond said. NOAA’s National Weather Service estimates a 65 percent chance El Niño will emerge in fall or early winter.
Mantua noted that fall in California generally brings even weaker winds and weaker upwelling, making it likely that the warm waters off Central California will persist and even expand northward regardless of a tropical El Niño.
JD: I’m certainly not smart enough to understand everything that impacts salmon and steelhead survival while they’re in the ocean, but I hope whatever has impacted the coho and winter steelhead runs last season happens again, because fishing was nothing short of spectacular.
Commission Adopts New Sportfishing Rules
The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission adopted several new sportfishing rules for the mainstem Columbia River, its tributaries and lakes within the basin at a public meeting in Tumwater.
The commission, a citizen panel that sets policy for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW), also voted to select Jim Unsworth as the department’s director. That action was announced in a previous news release, available on WDFW’s website at http://wdfw.wa.gov/news/jan1015a/ .
Thirty-one rules—which cover fishing seasons, daily catch limits and other regulations—were adopted by the commission. The changes include:
Implementing additional conservation measures in the Columbia River Basin, such as fishing closures at numerous small natal streams and selective gear rules in some waters, to provide greater protection for wild salmon and steelhead.
Requiring catch-and-release fishing for trout from the first Saturday in June through Oct. 31 on the Naches River from Rattlesnake Creek upstream.
Prohibiting the retention of sturgeon on the Snake River and its tributaries. Catch-and-release sturgeon fishing would be maintained.
Adjusting size and daily catch limits for kokanee in Cle Elum Lake, while removing daily limits for eastern brook, brown, and lake trout.
JD: Just a few updates for Washington anglers. Take a look at the WDFW website for other new regulations.