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Anglers: Watch step near salmon nests
Thom Gabrukiewicz, Redding Record Searchlight
WATCH YOUR STEP: Katie Heffelfinger and Debbie Cott, both of Sacramento, make their way through a maze of salmon nests, called redds, on the lower Sacramento River near the Posse Grounds. Anglers need to avoid stepping on the redds, most of which are filled with maturing salmon eggs. Photo by Brad Garrison.
October 31, 2002
The tenets of Tread Lightly don't end at the water's edge, especially on the lower Sacramento River during the annual salmon run.
The Tread Lightly organization teaches conservation through minimum-impact recreation, and as the salmon move up the Sacramento River watershed to spawn, people need to limit their effect on the river — especially anglers.
The Sacramento is considered to be one of the top 10 wild rainbow trout rivers in the West. It is also home to prodigious numbers of fall-run salmon, as well as federally protected spring- and winter-runs. And as the ocean-maturing fish return to feeder streams and creeks to spawn, trout know it's time to belly up to the buffet and suck down as many eggs as they can.
And that brings anglers to the north state by the SUV-load, either to fly fish with patterns that mimic a salmon egg, or bait anglers who use the real thing.
A single female chinook salmon will release between 3,000 and 13,000 eggs in a nest, called a redd. One errant step by an angler and thousands of viable eggs can be crushed.
"We tell them to stay out of them," said Todd Alday, a sales associate with The Fly Shop in Redding. "And we tell them, 'Don't walk in the redd itself and generally don't tromp around so much.' "
The nests are easy to spot, according to Phil Warner, senior fish habitat supervisor with the Department of Fish and Game.
"The gravel on the lower Sac is covered with algae and the rocks stirred up by the salmon will be very, very clean," Warner said. "There will be a depression and then a pile of tailings. They're usually at the crest of a riffle."
These are the shallow margins of the riffle where gravel collects at the downstream edge of a pool, often called the tailout.
When ready to spawn, a female chinook builds her redd by rolling onto her side and kicking at the gravel with her tail, Warner said. Salmon pick the tailout area to build redds because the water picks up speed there. This not only makes the gravel easier to kick up, but cleanses it before the female releases her eggs. It also bathes the eggs and just-hatched salmon — called alevin — in clean, well-oxygenated water.
However, trout are naturally drawn to cooler pools in the river — aquatic bugs and errant eggs get funneled in and make for easy meals — which, in turn, attracts the anglers who must traverse the riffles to fish the pools.
"It's not a major problem on the lower Sacramento River, but anything we can do to help the salmon, we should," Warner said.
Silt, simply kicked up from a wading boot or walking stick, will suffocate the eggs and alevin, Warner said.
"You should be able to see the salmon redds fairly easily and avoid them," he said.
Eggs that hatch now (chinook eggs hatch in 50 to 60 days after fertilization), will grow to adults that won't return to freshwater spawning grounds for another four to five years. As the female kicks up the gravel, she'll release eggs in the depression that will be fertilized immediately by the male. She'll then move a little way upstream, kick up more gravel, deposit more eggs, then move on. She'll do this until she is spawned out and has no eggs left to deposit.
"Most of the eggs end up in the tailings," Warner said. "Although, there will be some deposited in the depression."
For about 48 hours, newly fertilized eggs go through a water-hardening stage and are slightly less likely to be damaged by movement around the redd. But as the eggs mature, they move into a tender phase, Warner said.
"For 10 days to two weeks, the eggs are very susceptible to shock," he said. "But once they get to the eye stage, they get pretty tough. It's the tender stage where you can do some pretty good damage."
Reporter Thom Gabrukiewicz can be reached at 225-8230 or at tgabrukiewicz@redding.com.
Thom Gabrukiewicz, Redding Record Searchlight
WATCH YOUR STEP: Katie Heffelfinger and Debbie Cott, both of Sacramento, make their way through a maze of salmon nests, called redds, on the lower Sacramento River near the Posse Grounds. Anglers need to avoid stepping on the redds, most of which are filled with maturing salmon eggs. Photo by Brad Garrison.
October 31, 2002
The tenets of Tread Lightly don't end at the water's edge, especially on the lower Sacramento River during the annual salmon run.
The Tread Lightly organization teaches conservation through minimum-impact recreation, and as the salmon move up the Sacramento River watershed to spawn, people need to limit their effect on the river — especially anglers.
The Sacramento is considered to be one of the top 10 wild rainbow trout rivers in the West. It is also home to prodigious numbers of fall-run salmon, as well as federally protected spring- and winter-runs. And as the ocean-maturing fish return to feeder streams and creeks to spawn, trout know it's time to belly up to the buffet and suck down as many eggs as they can.
And that brings anglers to the north state by the SUV-load, either to fly fish with patterns that mimic a salmon egg, or bait anglers who use the real thing.
A single female chinook salmon will release between 3,000 and 13,000 eggs in a nest, called a redd. One errant step by an angler and thousands of viable eggs can be crushed.
"We tell them to stay out of them," said Todd Alday, a sales associate with The Fly Shop in Redding. "And we tell them, 'Don't walk in the redd itself and generally don't tromp around so much.' "
The nests are easy to spot, according to Phil Warner, senior fish habitat supervisor with the Department of Fish and Game.
"The gravel on the lower Sac is covered with algae and the rocks stirred up by the salmon will be very, very clean," Warner said. "There will be a depression and then a pile of tailings. They're usually at the crest of a riffle."
These are the shallow margins of the riffle where gravel collects at the downstream edge of a pool, often called the tailout.
When ready to spawn, a female chinook builds her redd by rolling onto her side and kicking at the gravel with her tail, Warner said. Salmon pick the tailout area to build redds because the water picks up speed there. This not only makes the gravel easier to kick up, but cleanses it before the female releases her eggs. It also bathes the eggs and just-hatched salmon — called alevin — in clean, well-oxygenated water.
However, trout are naturally drawn to cooler pools in the river — aquatic bugs and errant eggs get funneled in and make for easy meals — which, in turn, attracts the anglers who must traverse the riffles to fish the pools.
"It's not a major problem on the lower Sacramento River, but anything we can do to help the salmon, we should," Warner said.
Silt, simply kicked up from a wading boot or walking stick, will suffocate the eggs and alevin, Warner said.
"You should be able to see the salmon redds fairly easily and avoid them," he said.
Eggs that hatch now (chinook eggs hatch in 50 to 60 days after fertilization), will grow to adults that won't return to freshwater spawning grounds for another four to five years. As the female kicks up the gravel, she'll release eggs in the depression that will be fertilized immediately by the male. She'll then move a little way upstream, kick up more gravel, deposit more eggs, then move on. She'll do this until she is spawned out and has no eggs left to deposit.
"Most of the eggs end up in the tailings," Warner said. "Although, there will be some deposited in the depression."
For about 48 hours, newly fertilized eggs go through a water-hardening stage and are slightly less likely to be damaged by movement around the redd. But as the eggs mature, they move into a tender phase, Warner said.
"For 10 days to two weeks, the eggs are very susceptible to shock," he said. "But once they get to the eye stage, they get pretty tough. It's the tender stage where you can do some pretty good damage."
Reporter Thom Gabrukiewicz can be reached at 225-8230 or at tgabrukiewicz@redding.com.
