Our History
LLTK was founded in 1986 by a group of salmon enthusiasts alarmed by declines in wild salmon runs.
Convinced of the long-term need for habitat protection and restoration, LLTK's founders were also intrigued by the potential for an ideal hatchery operation to address salmon recovery in the near term.
Could hatcheries, they wondered, be reimagined as part of the solution rather than part of the problem? Could hatcheries, working in concert with habitat restoration, help restore wild salmon populations and support sustainable fisheries?
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Hands-On Experience:LLTK's three conservation hatcheries serve as emergency rooms for imperiled salmon populations, innovative fish-rearing workshops, and venues for community involvement and research.
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LLTK's first project was to transform a traditional hatchery on the Wishkah River near Grays Harbor into a workshop for multiple fish-rearing strategies. The pioneering work at Wishkah, focused on refining natural rearing techniques and on creating and restoring habitat, supports recovery of wild salmon and a popular Grays Harbor fishery. LLTK managed and operated the Wishkah hatchery, in partnership with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, the Quinault Indian Nation, the Chehalis Basin Fisheries Task Force, and others, until 2007, when we officially returned management responsibility to the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.
After establishing 501(c)3 nonprofit status in 1986, LLTK created two more fish-rearing facilities, both built entirely with private funds. One is at Glenwood Springs on Orcas Island, where LLTK brought salmon and a natural rearing program to an Orcas Island stream, creating a salmon run where none existed before. Along with research and conservation opportunities, this new fishery diverts pressure from wild runs and provides salmon for sport and commercial fishers from Washington to Alaska.
Visit our Glenwood Springs hatchery
The other is along Lilliwaup Creek on Hood Canal. The Lilliwaup hatchery is the central rearing place for the innovative Hood Canal Steelhead Project, a basin-wide partnership between eight state and federal agencies, Tribes, and non-profit organizations to test a basin-wide approach for using hatcheries to rebuild wild steelhead populations. Lilliwaup also serves as an emergency room for other imperiled fish populations, providing off-channel, protected rearing environments for mid-Hood Canal chinook and Hood Canal summer chum to increase their survival as juveniles, in turn returning more fish to their native streams as adults.
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A Broadening Mandate:Increasing ESA listings lead LLTK to expand our scope of work, becoming a workshop facilitator, a recovery project collaborator, and a valued convener of divergent stakeholders.
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In the late 1990s, when the threat to wild salmon was underscored by multiple listings under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), the scope of our work expanded. LLTK began facilitating workshops for local and tribal leaders to build support for salmon recovery in the Hood Canal watershed. In 1998 we helped form the Skagit Watershed Council. In 1999 LLTK was appointed to the executive committee for the Snohomish/King/Pierce tri-county salmon recovery effort.
LLTK also developed the ESA Handbook for local governments in Western Washington, the first handbook of its kind to help local governments respond proactively to the listing of salmon as threatened under the ESA.
LLTK served on the Development Committee of the Shared Strategy for Puget Sound, a collaborative effort to build a practical, cost-effective salmon recovery plan endorsed by the people living and working in the watersheds of Puget Sound. NOAA Fisheries adopted the Shared Strategy plan for the recovery of ESA-listed Puget Sound Chinook. LLTK continues to serve on the Salmon Recovery Council of the Puget Sound Partnership. The Council's purpose is to coordinate implementation of the Shared Strategy's Chinook recovery plan at the watershed scale.
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Hatchery Reform:LLTK facilitated two regional reviews of the Northwest's extensive hatchery system, scientifically rethinking how these hatcheries might be used to recover wild salmon and support sustainable fisheries.
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With our own fish-rearing facilities showing considerable promise, in 1999 LLTK's board charged staff with seeing our innovative hatchery work scientifically tested and replicated on a broader scale. In May of that year, a group of leading scientists issued a report to Congress saying hatcheries had the potential to make a major positive impact on the recovery of wild salmon, in just a few years and at relatively small costs.
The Puget Sound and Coastal Washington Hatchery Reform Project
In response, Congress created and funded the Puget Sound and Coastal Washington Hatchery Reform Project, a groundbreaking, science-driven effort to rethink how hatcheries can be managed to help conserve naturally spawning populations and to support sustainable fisheries. Congress mandated the project be led by scientists and established the Hatchery Scientific Review Group (HSRG), an independent panel of nine highly regarded scientists. Congress also designated LLTK as the project's independent, third-party facilitator.
Read more about Puget Sound and Coastal Washington Hatchery Reform Project.
US Fish and Wildlife Service Hatchery Review
The Puget Sound and Coastal Washington Hatchery Reform Project ended in 2005. Upon its conclusion, LLTK was asked by the US Fish and Wildlife Service to help apply the principles, framework, and review tools developed during the Puget Sound and Coastal Washington Hatchery Reform Project to a review of all federally owned and operated hatchery facilities in the Columbia River Basin.
A new science team, comprised of Service and other federal scientists (NOAA & USGS), and with facilitation provided by LLTK, has since been conducting field tours with hatchery managers and staff, reviewing hatchery operations, and meeting with the co-managing agencies and tribes to get a clear understanding of the goals for each wild and hatchery population, as well as associated habitat and management strategies.
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Integrated All-H Salmon Management:Responding to a call from scientists, salmon managers, and community leaders, LLTK partnered with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife to reframe the ways decisions are made about salmon and steelhead.
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One of the central recommendations to emerge from both the Hatchery Reform and Shared Strategy for Puget Sound processes was that there needed to be a way for salmon managers to integrate their decision-making at all scales about hatcheries, harvest, and habitat, in the interest of recovering wild populations and supporting sustainable fisheries.
In 2006, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW), in response to the call for integrated All-H management, asked LLTK to partner with the agency to develop a new framework that would enable All-H decision-making at multiple scales.
LLTK worked closely with the WDFW senior “Planning Team” appointed by then-Director Jeff Koenings to create the new management framework and institutionalize its use. The Planning Team was led by Deputy Director for Resource Policy Phil Anderson, and represented expertise in habitat, harvest, hatcheries, science, as well as legislative and public affairs. The effort was facilitated by LLTK staff, who, together with the WDFW Planning Team members, invested more than 7,500 hours, and worked with over 100 additional WDFW staff to develop the framework, which was complete in 2008.
The new framework coordinates decisions about hatcheries, harvest, and habitat for the purpose of recovering naturally-spawning salmon and steelhead populations while supporting sustainable fisheries. The framework sets out what is necessary, across multiple disciplines, to meet this goal; it assesses where WDFW is today in relation to that goal; and it identifies benchmarks over the next 50 years against which to measure progress.
Read more about the 21st Century Salmon and Steelhead Project.
