Trinity River :Times-Standard newpaper

[Terry Thomas]

The Times-Standard newspaper printed an interesting story of released hatchery steelhead eating wild steelhead in the Trinity River. A pretty good read.
T.

http://www.times-standard.com/localnews/ci_12394255

[Darian]

Interesting article. Predation by Salmonids on each other and themselves has never been in doubt for me. I not sure there's much difference between predation by Hatchery fish and predation by natural fish. The rate mentioned (9% mortality) is consistent with other articles I've read that made no distinction between hathery and natural fish. There must be some other point I'm missing.... :confused: Big fish eat little fish. :nod:

Here's my proposal.... :-k Build a divider down the center of each river where Salmon/Steelhead spawn. One side for natural fish and the other for hatchery fish. Hell, if we can build a reservoir and dig a tunnel to transfer water from the Trinity River to the Sacramento River, a divider seems doable. Of course, we'd all be willing to pay for the cost of this project thru increased license fees or gas taxes. Maybe CalTrans could do it. They seem ready to place those portable concrete dividers everywhere.... :rolleyes:

[Rick J]

Darian,
I like it - this way you can pick if you want to fish to hatchery or wild fish! And if you want to keep a hatchery fish (I can't bring myself to do it) you don't have to worry if that is really a fin clip or not!! Makes it easier to cover the water too.

[Darian]

Rick,.... Your post raised an interesting question. How do we make the fish understand that natural fish must enter these divided waters only on the right and hatchery fish only enter only on the left :question: :-k We could post signs but that would require Salmonids to learn to read and understand English.... Not likely. [-(

We could place a concrete lined channel with windows in the side for viewing. That would allow an observer to check for presence of an adipose fin. Fin present: direct to the right. No adipose present: direct to the left. Now this requires two things more than we do now, in advance. First, we need a gate at the end of the channel and holding ponds for those fish that're being held until the right or left side of the gate is open for passage and this requires an attendant who can net fish and move them into the holding pond and then back into the channel as needed. :nod:

So, fish will move up-river/stream in alternating waves. :cool: When there's a lack of fish in one side of this system a fisherman can simply move to the other side and find some. Thus becoming a switch hitter.... :) (Not that there's anything wrong with that.... ;) ;) )