Imperfect detection and misidentification affect inferences from data informing water operation decisions

Abstract

Managers can modify river flow regimes using fish monitoring data to minimize impacts from water management infrastructure. For example, operation of the gate-controlled Delta Cross Channel (DCC) in California can negatively affect the endangered Sacramento River Winter-run Chinook Salmon Oncorhynchus tshawytscha. Although guidelines have been developed for DCC operations using real-time juvenile fish sampling count data, there is uncertainty about how environmental conditions influence fish occupancy and to what extent those relationships are affected by sampling and identification error.