Had my best spawner patrol of the year so far on Byrne Creek, with a total of 6 live Coho and 1 live Chum salmon. I also processed (species, sex, length, spawning status) 5 dead Coho and 1 dead Chum.
I also got to watch a pair of Coho spawning. They tend to by shy, and I don’t get to see this that often!
Some photos and a video:
Chum
Coho
Four Coho and a Chum ready for processing
Coho
Coho at the gate in the sediment trap
Video of Coho spawning in the lower ravine:
NOTE: Volunteer Streamkeepers have training and permission to monitor spawning salmon, and to process them after they die. We cut carcasses in half after we’ve gathered the data so that we know they’ve been assessed, and return them to the stream to provide nutrients to the ecosystem.
I did a quick patrol for spawning salmon on Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby, BC today. Unfortunately, I came across two Coho that had died unspawned — a female and a jack (early male).
I also saw a Varied Thrush on my way down the creek, and then a Merlin in Ron McLean Park, both confirmed by iNaturalist. I think it’s only the second time I’ve seen a Merlin.
Three days of fishy meetings near Ladysmith, BC, over the last weekend and early this week.
SEHAB (Salmon Enhancement and Habitat Advisory Board) members representing volunteer stewardship groups from across BC shared info and heard many excellent presentations from the federal Dept. of Fisheries and Oceans, and BC provincial ministries.
What’s a meeting about volunteers working to protect salmon without, er, a home-smoked salmon?
And when you’re dealing with several levels of bureaucracy, the initialisms and acronyms fly thick and fast, eh? We began keeping track of some of them for the benefit of folks newer to the table.
We were happy to finally see a pair of Chum salmon spawning in Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby, BC, today. For decades, Chum would start arriving like clockwork around Oct. 18, depending on rain, but the last few seasons we haven’t seen them until the end of the month.
You can see the pair of Chum just upstream of the redd, or depression in the gravel, that the female has been digging with her tail.
We also found a dead Coho. Unfortunately it was another female that had died without spawning. We see this a lot on Byrne Creek as the water quality is very poor in this urban area. Fingers crossed we’ll eventually find some that have spawned. . .
We went out to the Cariboo Dam, Stoney Creek, and the Brunette River to look for spawning salmon. We saw lots of Chum Salmon, and also a Belted Kingfisher and a couple of Great Blue Herons.
Belted Kingfisher
Shaking the rain off : – )
Female Chum flipping sideways to dig a redd in the gravel/cobble for her eggs
I was happy to see a Coho salmon on a Byrne Creek walk in Burnaby, BC, today.
And I was unhappy that it had died before even colouring up, and that it was a female full of eggs.
We have had problems with Coho pre-spawn mortality on Byrne Creek for many years, and also with released Coho smolts in the spring.
Research in Washington State by Dr. Jenifer McIntyre has linked such Coho deaths to a chemical found in tires that washes off roads and into creeks.
NOTE: Streamkeepers have training and permission to assess salmon after they have spawned and died for species, sex, size, and spawning status. Is is illegal to interfere with spawning salmon.
We had a good spawner-monitoring orientation tour this morning on Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby, BC. We didn’t see any fish aside from a few coho/cutthroat in the smolt-size range.
I hope that with the rains coming this week, the salmon will respond to rising water in the creek and start moving upstream to spawn. Fingers crossed for exciting days ahead.
I hadn’t heard the sound of what woke me this morning in so long that for a moment I was confused.
Ahh. . . Rain!
What a sweet sound and smell.
And not too much rain that would have pounded off the baked ground and gushed into drains and into pipes to blast through the creek, but a nice, gentle, steady drizzle.
Exactly what we need to revive the forest, slowly swell the creeks, recharge groundwater, and welcome the salmon back to spawn in Burnaby, BC, creeks.
I saw another dump of sediment into Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby, BC, on a pre-dinner walk today. Reported it to the City of Burnaby and they asked for photos.
The creek was running clear around 3:30pm, but Griffiths Pond near Edmonds Skytrain Station was murky, there was fresh sediment visible all along the bottom of creek from the bottom of the ravine stairs to the footbridge near Southridge Dr., and both ponds in the artificial spawning habitat were cloudy.
Likely a construction site pumpout in the upper watershed somewhere.
Sigh. . . This was happening repeatedly earlier in the year and the City finally tracked it down and shut it down, and here we go again. . . .
Construction sites are not allowed to pump out into storm drains! All dirty water from construction sites is to be remediated on site.
I had fun leading another tour for the City of Burnaby Parks Dept this morning — “Byrne Creek – A Salmon Oasis in the City.”
Too early to see spawners, but showed folks some good viewing areas, explained viewing etiquette, talked about the salmon life cycle, what streamkeeper volunteers do, etc.
It was a lovely sunny, cool day for stream & forest walk!
