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Eric Beamer (ebeamer@skagitcoop.org) is the Director of the Research Program for the Skagit System Cooperative, where he has worked examining salmon freshwater and estuarine ecology since 1984. Mr. Beamer is the principle investigator on several Skagit projects in the following fields of research: landscape processes influencing habitat conditions, identification of juvenile chinook life history patterns, and factors influencing wild chinook production. Mr. Beamer has an undergraduate degree in Marine Biology, with a minor in Chemistry from Western Washington University 1983.

Mr. Beamer is the primary author and architect of the Skagit Watershed Council's Habitat Restoration and Protection Strategy (Skagit Watershed Council 1998) and the Application of Skagit Watershed Council's Strategy (Beamer et al. 1999)

Chip (Willis E.) McConnaha (CMcConnaha@nwppc.org) is a fish biologist with the Northwest Power Planning Council in Portland, Oregon. He is a graduate of Indiana University and the University of Washington where he earned an M.S. in fisheries. He has worked in fish and habitat related issues in the Columbia River for over 20 years. He has been responsible for the Council's technical analysis on fish issues including mainstem passage modeling. He is now involved with the application of habitat based modeling to the identification and prioritization of restoration actions at a subbasin level. This includes development of assessment techniques for application in the Council's upcoming subbasin planning effort. He also serves as co-Scientific Coordinator for the Independent Scientific Advisory Board sponsored by the Council and the National Marine Fisheries Service.

Chip is presently on loan from the Council to the City of Portland. He is helping the city develop a watershed restoration plan for urban streams and the lower Willamette River. This based on the application of the Ecosystem Diagnosis and Treatment to an urban setting.

Eric Beamer

Many local "salmonid-benefiting" restoration projects consist solely of removing non-native vegetation and planting native vegetation on stream or river banks. Would you call this restoration? In the last five years, have you seen any positive effects to salmon (numbers and location) from this long-term type of activity?

Are restoration actions at a subbasin level prioritized based on long term "sustainability" versus immediate population recovery or should these factors be lumped?

Essential fish habitat (EFH) is defined as the aquatic habitat necessary to allow for salmon production needed to support a long-term sustainable salmon fishery and salmon contributions to a healthy ecosystem. NMFS and others spent a great deal of effort in the late 1990’s defining EFH for the different salmon species. Have we gained additional insight into what defines EFH for different species (and how accurately we can define EFH) over the past few years since that time? Do available models seem to predict the consequences of habitat on salmon populations?

Chip McConnaha

It seems that a model needs to be testable in order to be defensible in court and needs to be simplifiable in order to be understood by the decision rendering public. How can these concerns best be addressed during the foundation stages of designing an effective, dynamic model? Is this a legitimate concern?

Can you identify limitations in EDT assumptions or output that should be considered when applying the model results? Has the model been validated?

How do you generate useful model outputs in the short term, when many of the processes we are hoping to model take place over decades? How do you ensure some sort of reliability with the model outputs?