Puget Sound Restoration Fund

Kep monitoring initiative:continued a three-year, comprehensive kelp forest monitoring initiative with a grant from the paul g. allen family foundation. The eyes on kelp initiative establihes underwater monitoring at 14 index sites throughout the southern salish sea, spanning a range of environmental conditions and human use impacts. Program components include: conducting underwater ecological monitoring with scientific divers; deploying sensors on buoys and at depth at all sites to measure environmental parameters; training recreational divers to conduct surveys using the same protocols at additional sites; and piloting new technology at a demonstration site to provide near-real time kelp monitoring capabilities. The initiative is designed to build critical knowledge about Puget sounds kelp forests to support conservation and recovery efforts. *$1,678,000 received in 2021

Bull kelp Restoration - continued developing and advancing a suite of capabilities to respond to declines in our regions kelp forests. With a broad set of partners, we have been testing enhancement techniques, establishing kelp lab facilities, creating a kelp seed bank, and beginning a genetics assessment. 2020-2022, psrf successfully grew canopy kelp each year from seafloor to surface at doe-kag-wats/pt. Jefferson in central Puget Sound in partnership with the suquamish tribe, noaa, Washington state, and other partners. In 2022, we continued equipping our kelp lab to expand Restoration capabilities and support a long-term archive of genetic material from over 20 kelp forests in Puget Sound.

Conservation hatchery - operated a conservation hatchery established with noaa under the auspices of the Washington shellfish initiative. Established in 2013, the kenneth k chew center for shellfish research and Restoration serves as a hub for propagating and restoring native species and developing strategies to mitgate the impacts to marine resources due to ocean acidification. The hatchery is operated by Puget Sound Restoration Fund at the noaas manchester research station in manchester, wa through a cooperative research and development agreement. 2022 hatchery and nursery operations included maintaining microalgae culture, producing and rearing olympia oysters and pinto abalone for Restoration outplants, propagating kelp seed to help re-grow kelp forests, adaptively managing conservation protocols to ensure genetic diversity, and conducting research on ocean acidification and other stressors affecting shellfish populations.

Other small programs

Abalone recovery - continued managing a pinto abalone conservation breeding program in 2022 by producing and rearing genetically diverse abalone in the hatchery and then outplanting juvenile abalone at Restoration sites to help recover severly depressed abalone populations in Washington state. Pinto abalone help maintain healthy subtidal rocky reef habitat and kelp forest ecosystems by grazing and clearing rock surfaces for settlement by other organisms. As of december 2022, 45,000 juvenile abalone have been introduced at Restoration sites in the san juan archipelago (sja) through a long-term partnership with Washington department of fish & wildlife, noaa, tribes, and universities. The goal is to use healthy, genetically diverse hatchery reared juvenile abalone to create aggregations in the wild that develope into sustainably reproducing populations. Outplant data analyzed in 2018 documented a 97% decline in the population at index stations 1994-2017.