Sean P. Gallagher

• MS
• Researcher at California Department of Fish and Wildlife

Obtaining reliable estimates of marine survival is essential for understanding anadromous salmon population dynamics. Two common approaches to estimating marine survival are (a) dividing abundance of returning adult salmon abundance by abundance of smolts from the same cohort, or (b) tagging a portion of the migrating smolts and estimating the retu...

The lack of monitoring data and a comprehensive monitoring plan for California Coastal (CC) Chinook Salmon have made it difficult to establish population status and trend and slowed the development of direct fishery assessment and abundance-based fishery management (ABM). This report describes the major CC Chinook Salmon monitoring issues, provides...

Across the Pacific Northwest, at least 17 intensively monitored watershed projects have been implemented to test the effectiveness of a broad range of stream restoration actions for increasing the freshwater production of salmon and steelhead and to better understand fish–habitat relationships. We assess the scope and status of these projects and r...

California’s coastal salmon and steelhead populations are currently listed as either threatened or endangered under the federal and state Endangered Species Acts; both require monitoring to provide measures of recovery. Since 2004 the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and NOAA Fisheries have been developing a monitoring plan for California...

Understanding the relationship between fish abundance and stream habitat variables is critical to designing and implementing effective freshwater habitat restoration projects for coho salmon (Oncorhynchus kisutch) and other anadromous salmonids. In this study, we investigated the relationship between summer coho salmon and steelhead trout (O. mykis...

A joint National Marine Fisheries Service and California Department of Fish and Wildlife workshop with the title “California coastal Chinook salmon (CC-Chinook) fishery management: future prospects” convened in Santa Rosa, California, September 3-4, 2014. The goals of the workshop were to identify the level of information necessary to allow for dev...

California's coastal salmon and steelhead populations are currently listed as either threatened or endangered federal or state endangered species acts; both require monitoring to provide measures of recovery. Since 2004 the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (formerly California Department of Fish and Game) and NOAA Fisheries have been deve...

California’s coastal salmon and steelhead populations are listed under California and Federal endangered species acts; both require monitoring to provide measures of recovery. Since 2004 the California Department of Fish and Game and NOAA Fisheries have been developing a monitoring plan for California’s coastal salmonids (the California Coastal Sal...

Understanding the relationship between fish abundance and stream habitat variables is critical to designing and implementing effective freshwater habitat restoration projects for coho salmon (Oncorhynchus kisutch) and other anadromous salmonids. In this study, we investigated the relationship between summer coho salmon and steelhead trout (O. mykis...

California’s coastal salmon and steelhead populations are listed under California and Federal endangered species acts; both require monitoring to provide measures of recovery. Since 2004 the California Department of Fish and Game and NOAA Fisheries have been developing a monitoring plan for California’s coastal salmonids (the California Coastal Sal...

We evaluated an eleven-year (2000 to 2011) coho salmon adult, parr, and smolt abundance data stream from three census watersheds in coastal Mendocino County, California to determine how this information can provide a scientific basis for directing life-stage specific stream restoration activities. The three census watersheds: Caspar Creek, Pudding...

California’s coastal salmon and steelhead populations are listed under California and Federal Endangered Species Acts; both require monitoring to provide measures of recovery. Since 2004 the California Department of Fish and Game and NOAA Fisheries have been developing a monitoring plan for California’s coastal salmonids (the California Coastal Sal...

Since 2005, a life cycle monitoring project in Pudding Creek, California, has utilized a variety of methodologies including an adult trap, spawning surveys, PIT tags, electro-fishing, and a smolt trap to estimate coho salmon adult escapement, juvenile abundance, juvenile growth, winter survival, and marine survival. Adult coho salmon escapement and...

California’s coastal salmon and steelhead populations are listed under California and Federal Endangered Species Acts; both require monitoring to provide measures of recovery. Since 2004 the California Department of Fish and Game and NOAA Fisheries have been developing a monitoring plan for California’s coastal salmonids (the California Coastal Sal...

California’s salmon and steelhead populations have experienced marked declines leading to California Endangered Species Act (CESA) and Federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) listings of almost all of California’s anadromous salmonids. These CESA and ESA listings require recovery plans that call for monitoring to provide some measure of progress towar...

Migratory salmon move nutrients both in and out of fresh waters during the different parts of their life cycle. We used a mass-balance approach to quantify recent changes in phosphorus (P) fluxes in six coastal California, USA, watersheds that have recently experienced dramatic decreases in salmon populations. As adults, semelparous Chinook (Oncorh...

An index of chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) spawning habitat predicted using the physical habitat simulation system (PHABSIM) component of the instream flow incremental methodology was compared with redd densities and locations for sites in the Merced River, California, during 1996 and with redd numbers in sites in the Merced and Lower Am...

This report documents the results of the second year of a multi-year regional salmonid monitoring program implemented as part of the California’s Coastal Salmonid Monitoring Program (CMP). This project was funded by the Fisheries Restoration Grants Program. The purpose of this study was to 1) continue salmon life cycle monitoring (adults in- smolts...

Population monitoring is essential to know whether coastal California's Endangered Species Act–listed Chinook salmon Oncorhynchus tshawytscha, coho salmon O. kisutch, and steelhead O. mykiss stocks are progressing toward recovery. In coastal California, salmonids are at the southern edge of their range, and this one of many reasons they are not abu...

In coastal California, many evolutionarily significant units (ESUs) of Chinook salmon Oncorhynchus tshawytscha, coho salmon O. kisutch, and steelhead O. mykiss are listed under the federal Endangered Species Act (ESA). Monitoring species status at the ESU or ESU subdivision scale requires specialized sampling. The purposes of this study were (1) to...

This report documents the results of the first year of a multi-year regional salmonid monitoring program the first implemented part of the California’s Coastal Salmonid Monitoring Program (CMP), funded by the Fisheries Restoration Grants Program. The scope of the work was to monitor salmonid (Chinook salmon, Coho salmon, and Steelhead) escapement i...

This report documents the results of a three-year pilot study, funded by the Fisheries Restoration Grants Program, to evaluate monitoring methodologies for California’s Coastal Salmonid Monitoring Plan. We treated five coastal Mendocino County streams as a coastal region of California to evaluate the use of life cycle monitoring streams (LCS) and r...

This pilot study treated five coastal Mendocino County streams as a microcosm of the entire coast of California to evaluate the logistics, feasibility, and reliability of Life Cycle Monitoring Streams (LCS) and regional spawning surveys for status and trend monitoring of salmonids throughout coastal California. We examined field logistics, sampling...

The purpose of this protocol is to describe field methods for the consistent collection of salmonid redd abundance and subsequent estimation of adult salmonid breeding population size. We recommend surveys be conducted on predetermined, 3–5-km long stream reaches, using a spatially balanced rotating panel design. We suggest an annual draw of 10% of...

This report documents the second years’ results of a three-year pilot, funded by the Fisheries Restoration Grants Program, to evaluate salmonid monitoring methodologies for California’s Coastal Salmonid Monitoring Plan (CSMP). We considered five coastal Mendocino County streams as a hypothetical region of California to evaluate the use of life cycl...

I estimated escapement from spawning ground surveys in Caspar and Pudding (PC) creeks and the South Fork Noyo (SF) and Little rivers during 2003-04 using redd data and the area-under-the-curve. Coho salmon and steelhead were tagged entering PC and recaptured during spawning surveys to estimate abundance. Known numbers of coho salmon were tagged and...

We developed and evaluated a stratified index redd area method to estimate Chinook salmon Oncorhynchus tshawytscha, coho salmon O. kisutch, and steelhead O. mykiss escapement in several coastal streams in northern California based on the assumption that redd size is related to the number of redds a female builds. Sources of error in redd counts wer...

I developed and evaluated a stratified index redd area method to estimate Chinook (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) and coho salmon (O. kisutch) and steelhead (O. mykiss) escapement in several coastal streams in Northern California based on the assumption that redd size is related to the number of redds a female builds. Sources of error in redd counts wer...

Spawning surveys were conducted in seven coastal Mendocino County streams between December 2001 and April 2002 to quantitatively estimate steelhead (Oncorhynchus mykiss) and coho salmon (O. kisutch) populations. Live adult, carcass, and redd areas were used to estimate adult populations using mark-recapture, area-under-the-curve (AUC), and redd are...

Bank rehabilitation in the Trinity River was conducted by removing the riparian encroached berm at nine sites between 1989 and 1992. This untested approach to river restoration was intended to increase habitat and habitat diversity with increased and variable flows. An intensive comparison of fish use, fish habitat, and habitat diversity between ch...

Observations on distribution, water quality, habitat and avoidance behavior are presented for Eubranchipus bundyi, Eubranchipus oregonus, and Eubranchipus serratus (Chirocephalidae) in California, USA. All three species were previously known within California from single localities. Two new localities for E. oregonus in Tuolumne County and in Humbo...

New information on the life history and habitats of branchiopods in California vernal pools is presented. Pools were sampled biweekly during the 1992-1993 season. Branchinecta lynchi had 3 distinct hatches in 1 season which were dependent on pools drying and refilling with cold temperature water. Linderiella occidentalis and Lepidurus packardi were...

The snail Fossaria sonomaensis inhabits temporary pools in the Northern Sacramento Valley. Snails vary in growth rate, fecundity, size and density depending on pool and catchment basin size, pool-floor soil and seasonal variability of flooding. An intensive study of population dynamics in pools, a reciprocal transfer between pools, a laboratory stu...