Baby salmon in our flooded rice fields in Nor Cal....

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tIto4Jelsg


Amazing project.....

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uflB29mNiCw

More good info.....

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Wonderful project......

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzOa9Z55DNM

[eastbayed]

Very interesting. I wonder how they will get the salmon back into a river from the rice fields.

[Idadon]

I'm wondering if they will try to go back into the rice paddies to spawn. Brings up a question; at what point is a Smolt imprinted to return to its birth water?

[Sheepdog8404]

I don't think this project actually went further than the test trials... It sure would be nice if they implemented this as a permanent thing.

[STEELIES/26c3]

Not so...

I posted on another thread that the program is alive and well.

It is in its 3rd year this year.

[SeanO]

Not so...

I posted on another thread that the program is alive and well.

It is in its 3rd year this year.

+1. Hopefully we will see 500,000-1,000,000 fall run salmon smolts released next year to study return rates for rice field salmon.

Good things are happening!

[Sheepdog8404]

Not so...

I posted on another thread that the program is alive and well.

It is in its 3rd year this year.

No way!!! I am so glad to hear that it actually was implemented! Hopefully they'll do it with steelhead next!

[Rossflyguy]

The salmon are born in rivers. They need running water to hatch. The rice fields are a feeding ground for the smolts. So they are imprinted in the river they hatched in.

[tascaso]

A fish biologist spoke at our Club meeting and addressed this issue; the smolts look for this kind of habitat after they hatch and as they head down to the ocean. They like to hideout and spread out into the flood plain areas, where there is less predation pressure. This gives them an opportunity to feed and grow as they make their way down to the ocean. This chat was specific to the Stanislaus River salmon below Goodwin Dam. But from the little that I know salmonids require this type of habitat when they make their way down to the ocean. When the adults come back it seems they are on autopilot back to where they were spawned be it hatchery or redd.

[Idadon]

Just wonder if this doesn't look a whole lot better on paper than it will actually turn out. Kind of curious if all that soft living when they are babies won't make for soft adults. Lack of predators when they're smolts won't lead to a juvenile fish that is lacking in stream savvy. Developing in slow water will lead to fish that can't handle the big currents they will encounter later. I know, a lot of stupid questions. Should be good for cutting down on mosquitos and such though.

[John Sv]

Don't the rice fields loosely mimic how the central valley was one giant swamp in the spring before we channelized everything?

[SeanO]

Don't the rice fields loosely mimic how the central valley was one giant swamp in the spring before we channelized everything?

Exactly. The main river channel is pretty poor habitat for rearing juvenile salmon.

[STEELIES/26c3]

https://www.ucdavis.edu/news/nigiri-project-mixes-salmon-and-rice-fields-fifth-year-floodplain/

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

100 years ago our Valley use to flood in the winter like they do in some of the wilds of Africa.

Back then before the dams we had salmon runs like in Alaska.

Then we dammed over 90% of our rivers and channelized everything.

.