--STEELHEAD ACOUSTIC TAG PURCHASE

Intent to award sole source The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service intends to tag steelhead with ultrasonic tags to monitor their movements in the Sacramento River. A large and geographically wide-spread array of hydroacoustic receivers is already deployed throughout the Sacramento River System which will receive information from the ultrasonic tags, thus providing information on the migration and distribution pattern of the fish. We also have 14 hydroacoustic receivers which were purchased for a previous study which will be strategically placed for this study. The existing array, which consists of Vemco Limited receivers, has been installed by a variety of researchers to monitor the movements of a variety of fish species. The Vemco Limited receivers were chosen by the researchers due to the products design qualities and low cost. To maintain compatibility with existing hydroacoustic receiver arrays, we, therefore, require ultrasonic tags provided by Vemco Limited. Vemco Limited has proprietary coding technology for their tags and equipment and we are not aware of any other manufacturer that can provide tags compatible with the current receiver array. There will no future updates to this notice. Contracting Officer: Troy Mobley 503-231-6227