Blue Backs On The American?

[Troutsource]

I landed an 18" and 19" fish Saturday on the A high-sticking with a Frenchie. The first (bigger) one jumped 3-4 times, as high as 5 feet in the air, and spooled me three times. Second one hunkered down on the bottom. Arguably my best day ever on the A. No other hookups, only a few other hits over the course of 5 hours. I saw no one else fly-fishing, only a few spincasters.

Are there any defining characteristics of a blue back? These were hatchery fish. One had a chewed up tail and the other a semi-healed slash on the side -- as if they both had some battle scars from being in the ocean. So I doubt they were fresh hatchery releases. If I'm wrong that would be a real bummer.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Great news TS........



In the Spring time, March/April/May, we can get some smaller Half-pounder Steelhead and some nice small adult Spring run Steelhead.

If my memory serves me the Half-pounders are 12" to 15". Spring run adults are 2 to 4 pounds? called Blue Backs by some.

They can feed on caddis, small salmon, crayfish and sculpin.

[DPLee]

The name blueback has been applied to several different salmon and trout species. Blueback was also a local name used by North Coast anglers for small late season steelhead found on rivers such as the Mattole. For several years’ anglers report catching steelhead from the American River during March and April. Most of these fish have been from 12 to 20 inches in length although some anglers report fish as large as 6 pounds. Tom Satterthwaite, a Fisheries Biologist with Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, suggested bluebacks might be a subset of the winter steelhead run. He indicated bluebacks return in February and March after just 10 months in saltwater, and consequently weigh much less, often two to six pounds. If one of the Nimbus Fish Hatchery juvenile fish returned as a blueback it would be adipose fin marked. Unmarked fish might be strays from the Sacramento River. Half-pounders, a late summer/early fall run steelhead, demonstrate a different life history.

Dennis
www.dennisplee.com

[Mark Kranhold]

[QUOTE=DPLee;195543]

The name blueback has been applied to several different salmon and trout species. Blueback was also a local name used by North Coast anglers for small late season steelhead found on rivers such as the Mattole. For several years’ anglers report catching steelhead from the American River during March and April. Most of these fish have been from 12 to 20 inches in length although some anglers report fish as large as 6 pounds.

Tom Satterthwaite, a Fisheries Biologist with Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, suggested bluebacks might be a subset of the winter steelhead run. He indicated bluebacks return in February and March after just 10 months in saltwater, and consequently weigh much less, often two to six pounds. If one of the Nimbus Fish Hatchery juvenile fish returned as a blueback it would be adipose fin marked. Unmarked fish might be strays from the Sacramento River. Half-pounders, a late summer/early fall run steelhead, demonstrate a different life history.

Dennis

www.dennisplee.com[/QUOTE

Thank you Dennis! My favorite steelhead to swing to on the A! Spunky fish with attitude! If you all haven’t read Dennis’s book (The Half Pounder) you should. Full of great steelhead history in the Central Valley and more!

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Someone has been studding the Redds of the Spring run smaller adult Steelhead in the lower American river.

I think it is a couple of guys from Federal Fish & Wildlife in a drift boat.

About 10 years ago when Keith Kaneko was guiding locally he took these two guys down the river and helped them catch some.

[Twowheelsonecamera]

I landed an 18" and 19" fish Saturday on the A high-sticking with a Frenchie. The first (bigger) one jumped 3-4 times, as high as 5 feet in the air, and spooled me three times. Second one hunkered down on the bottom. Arguably my best day ever on the A. No other hookups, only a few other hits over the course of 5 hours. I saw no one else fly-fishing, only a few spincasters.

Are there any defining characteristics of a blue back? These were hatchery fish. One had a chewed up tail and the other a semi-healed slash on the side -- as if they both had some battle scars from being in the ocean. So I doubt they were fresh hatchery releases. If I'm wrong that would be a real bummer.

I was lucky enough to catch my first ever steelhead the last two weekends. I just learned today about this Blue Back variety today sharing photos with a friend.

Blue Back: https://www.instagram.com/p/B-L1CvTFrgR/?igshid=17cmbx3k0tg5i

Winter Chrome: https://www.instagram.com/p/B9x2xYzFHF_/?igshid=1gfs6pkoghsh5

A workweek apart lol. A good start to the year.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Congratulations.......pretty cool.

[STEELIES/26c3]

I believe blue backs exist as a subspecies on the American River and occupy a niche separate from A) hatchery steelhead B) winter Eel R. steelhead C) strays from Coleman River, Feather River and Mokelumne River steelhead and D) Nimbus and Folsom football and other natural origin and planted trout which enter the American River via the Nimbus Dam in high water years.

I have caught many over the years and they seem phenotypically and genetically distinct from the aforementioned strains of O. mykiss.

Fish below are from yesterday's outing. it was overcast so the stark, iridescent blue does not completely show... but when you catch one of these fish, you will see that they nearly GLOW in the water with their perfect, wholly-intact diamond-shaped scales and in sunlight, the blue is a rich and blindingly-saturated sapphire.

15534 15536

These are not to be confused with down-runner, winter, Eel River steelies which CAN and do regain a fully-scaled and chrome-bright body POST-spawn BEFORE emigrating the river... like these fish also caught in late March:


15539 15538


It is rare to practically never that you will catch a blue back on the AR with its adipose fin clipped. It is also rare to catch one over 2lbs much less 6lbs though it has happened...

They come up in March and April and are voracious, mostly piscivorous feeders.

This is because the timing of their limited-window run coincides with the out-migration of 1-2" steelhead and 2.5-3.5" salmon fry.

15532

These fish will kick your ass and surprise you when you land what you thought would be a 4-6lb chromer and it ends up being 18-22 inches.

The run of blue backs on the AR in a given year is very water temperature-dependent. In order for these fish to successfully spawn, they require water temps to remain cold enough into the early summer for their offspring to survive.

Because the AR is so artificially-controlled and water temps are more often than not, lethally-warm by June, it is rare that offspring of these fish survive long enough to emerge as sac fry.

Whether these fish are actually somehow related to the original, native central valley strain of steelhead is unknown but their life cycles are certainly parallel as the pre-dam fish prior to the mid 1950's were summer-run steelhead which could not possibly survive in the Lower AR as we know it today.

Perhaps these spring fish are descended from the summer run CV fish and have divergently evolved to occupy a niche somewhere between the summer run lifestyle they cannot access and an approximation of it which they can accomplish as 'spring steelhead' under optimal conditions.

I say under optimal conditions because the blue backs are so elusive and generally only come up in significant numbers when AR conditions are highly favorable to the viability of their offspring.

This year, we are at only 53% of our Sierra snow pack and the river is at a paltry flow of 1500 cfs compared to the between 5,000 and 16,000 cfs it was in March of last year.

However... the incredible snow-pack of 2019 and subsequent, higher and colder flows of 2019 were EXACTLY what these spring steelhead needed to successfully spawn and provide nursery habitat for their emergent fry to thrive, eat, avoid predation, and make it to the salt so they could return THIS year as 9-10 month old firecrackers.

Nimbus Hatchery closes its fish ladder on March 1st before the majority of these fish arrive so its no surprise that you never catch one with a V-notched tail. This would also be the reason why the fish never have a clipped adipose fin. The parents come up too late to be hatchery-spawned all offspring are of natural origin.

For the record, I know a little because I fish a lot, I think a lot, and I care a lot. I do have a wildlife/science degree but I am not specifically a fisheries biologist. I would love to speak to someone who knows more about and could enlighten me further on this subject.

And for the record... I don't believe that hatchery and wild or even natural-origin fish are genetically the same. I do however, believe it is a moot point specifically, on the American River because it is a dam-controlled, put-and-take fishery with absolutely zero pure-strain, native salmon or steelhead residing in it...

[lee s.]

Steelies,
I LOVE reading your informative and grandly educational posts.
.....lee s.

[ycflyfisher]

The parents come up too late to be hatchery-spawned all offspring are of natural origin.



Mark,

I'm just an angler like you that's totally obsessed with Mykiss that inhabit rivers that run unobstructed to the Pacific. I have had too many discussions to count with well over a dozen fisheries professionals about late run fish and here's my thoughts.

First, I've heard about local anglers catching these late run fish in the single salt range on the A for decades, but have never seen any photos, so thanks for that.

I'd go all in that you're right about the origin of these fish (they're likely the progeny of hatchery fish but benefit from some unintended temporal isolation from hatchery products and are forced to spawn in basin, hence a disproportionately large percentage of stream born fish.,.)

I would guess that these fish would exhibit Eel river genetic markers if tested despite how physiologically different they may seem from the typical multisalt fish on the A. Virtually every where I've ever caught steelhead in the spring from the Feather, to the KMP to the northern coastals seems to feature a late run of predominately 1 salt sized fish. Wendy Jones told me that this is the case with the Eel as well, and I'd guess that's what you're seeing here.

None of the ecology pros I've ever had this discussion with (even Gerstung who had some fairly divergent opinions of CV steelhead) felt that these fish were some kind of vestige of the original AR fish, and that they were likely simply the preservation of the late run Eel fish.

I would also guess that those first two fish were from the 2017 year class not 2019, simply because I can't see any fish from 2019 being mature enough to undergo smoltification. They would have to hit a pretty amazing growth curve inland in the first months of life for that to happen and I'm guessing that these fish would exhibit a predominant 2-1 LH.

I'd also attribute the intermittent nature (you're only seeing lots of these fish every few years) like you to inland conditions on the A. To have abundant amounts of these fish, they're not only going to need to be able to survive emergence, but also at least a season of development if not two seasons inland.

The things I find totally bizarre about these fish is that everywhere I've encountered them ( the Feather, the KMP, Mad, Redwood -huge sample sizes, and the Smith a single fish), they're all fairly strange looking- deep bodied, well developed fish for their respective length, but somehow have smaller, less developed caudals than you'd expect for fish that are so thickly shouldered. And by my experience an insanely huge percentage of the fish are females, way more than 50%. They definitely get extremely violent when you stick 'em.


Just my take.

[Jcolin]

Thanks for all the great info everyone...ive heard/read about bluebacks from older steelhead fisherman and was interested in what they were exactly...theres a guy i know on the russian who grew up in guerneville and knew bill schaadt when he was a kid, he told me about the bluebacks in our river...the past couple years ive seen many 2-4 lb mostly wild fish caught, however theyre usually in december, before many big winter adults are being hooked rather than spring. He made it sound like the bluebacks were very much a thing of the past on the russian.

[STEELIES/26c3]

Ycflyfisher > Mark > Ycflyfisher

I'm just an angler like you that's totally obsessed with Mykiss that inhabit rivers that run unobstructed to the Pacific. I have had too many discussions to count with well over a dozen fisheries professionals about late run fish and here's my thoughts.

Thanks for your reply and your appreciation, knowledge and thoughts on the subject of these absolutely precious, priceless and miraculous creatures. Though many of us on this board may have disagreements, I do believe we are all united in our passion and concern for the fish as well as the sport of angling.

First, I've heard about local anglers catching these late run fish in the single salt range on the A for decades, but have never seen any photos, so thanks for that.

For many reasons, I no longer post fish reports and/or photos on public website forums but I made an exception here because A) I have met Troutsource on the river and he's a good guy and he asked a question I thought I could partially answer and B) I wanted to incite discussion so that I too could be further educated on the subject. You have fulfilled that desire so again, Thank You :)

I'd go all in that you're right about the origin of these fish (they're likely the progeny of hatchery fish but benefit from some unintended temporal isolation from hatchery products and are forced to spawn in basin, hence a disproportionately large percentage of stream born fish.,.)

I would guess that these fish would exhibit Eel river genetic markers if tested despite how physiologically different they may seem from the typical multisalt fish on the A. Virtually every where I've ever caught steelhead in the spring from the Feather, to the KMP to the northern coastals seems to feature a late run of predominately 1 salt sized fish. Wendy Jones told me that this is the case with the Eel as well, and I'd guess that's what you're seeing here.

This makes sense to me. They had to descend from some strain of existing steelhead and though markedly different than the typical, winter Eel R. fish, they certainly more resemble them than say, a Coleman, Feather, Moke or other CV steelhead stock.

None of the ecology pros I've ever had this discussion with (even Gerstung who had some fairly divergent opinions of CV steelhead) felt that these fish were some kind of vestige of the original AR fish, and that they were likely simply the preservation of the late run Eel fish.

I at one time thought they might be 'distant relatives'... I have since changed my thinking. The original strain of OM on the AR were summer runners, not spring fish and there just could not possibly have been enough individuals of the native AR strain in the ocean, after several years of dam construction, to provide future broodstock and keep the strain in existence. Successive, subsequent inbreeding with multiple subsequently-introduced strains of O. mykiss would certainly put a nail in the coffin of the 'remnant of original AR strain theory'. I think that I even entertained that idea was the hopeful, wishful, magical child in me wanting to believe, LOL.

I would also guess that those first two fish were from the 2017 year class not 2019, simply because I can't see any fish from 2019 being mature enough to undergo smoltification. They would have to hit a pretty amazing growth curve inland in the first months of life for that to happen and I'm guessing that these fish would exhibit a predominant 2-1 LH.

Oops, I did say 9-10 months old rather than a firecracker which had spent 9-10 months in the ocean...Yes. that would be some miraculously-fast growth rate... And as for LH-1 (that one was way over my head so I looked it up) you meant luteinizing hormone?

It does make sense that these fish would hatch and grow more quickly than winter-run offspring simply because available food in the spring and summer months is far more abundant than in the winter time. At least egg, embryo, alevin, fry, fingerling development would be much faster.

Is it possible that the smoltification process is hastened in the blue back juveniles because the early and vulnerable stage of their life cycle overlaps with warmer river temperatures and the proliferation of would-be predators? Natural selection surely would favor a faster maturation process and an early exit of the river to a larger body of brackish water. (think Stone Lagoon up north or the Sac Delta here).

Getting to these larger, salty environs would likely reduce mortality by diffusing predation and the salt would better induce smoltification than residing in the river for a year or more as the current strain of hatchery smolts quite often do.

I believe one of the greatest problems our valley steelhead face whether of hatchery or natural origin... is that they do not have abundant and sufficient nursery habitat. And because of this, all of the spawning-gravel enhancement projects in the world will fail to create a healthy, much less self-sustaining population of steelhead or salmon on the AR.

I'd also attribute the intermittent nature (you're only seeing lots of these fish every few years) like you to inland conditions on the A. To have abundant amounts of these fish, they're not only going to need to be able to survive emergence, but also at least a season of development if not two seasons inland.

Agreed... and as we had abundant high flows and cold water through the spring and early to sometimes even mid-summer months in 2016-2017-2018-2019, I believe that we will see decent returns of these fish for at least the next couple of years.

The things I find totally bizarre about these fish is that everywhere I've encountered them ( the Feather, the KMP, Mad, Redwood -huge sample sizes, and the Smith a single fish), they're all fairly strange looking- deep bodied, well developed fish for their respective length, but somehow have smaller, less developed caudals than you'd expect for fish that are so thickly shouldered. And by my experience an insanely huge percentage of the fish are females, way more than 50%. They definitely get extremely violent when you stick 'em.

Well... when your THAT aggro and strong, you neither need to 'sit on your tail' nor to mobilize as quickly as the fish WITHOUT an Atlas body... There will be no sand in these blue backs' faces. *****You will get the joke, youngins likely won't*****

and on another note, I never remove them from the water nor touch their bodies with my hands so there will be no sand on any part of them as far as I am concerned...

Just my take.

THANKS for your take :)

[Troutsource]

Awesome information and discussion. I've been fishing 5-6 hours one day every weekend since August, and the last two weekends the size of fish has spiked. I thought this was because "the blue backs were in." I've caught a 16, 18, 19 and 20-inch fish (2 swinging caddis pupae and 2 high sticking a Frenchie). The fins were clipped on all of them. Two were silvery, two were more colorful. The 20-incher was silvery and had a broad head and shoulders. Another silvery one had a semi-healed gash on its side, and a more colorful one had a tail that looked like it had been chewed on (prey?).

Below is a picture of the silvery one with broad shoulders -- it doesn't look like it but it was probably around 20" (yes I know, likely story). I'm curious why the sudden spike in fish size (maybe I'm just an anomaly?). If they're not blue backs, they seem too small to be exiting winter strain, and the wrong time of year for the normal half-pounders.

Thanks for all this awesome stoke-inducing info.

15542

[STEELIES/26c3]

Awesome information and discussion. I've been fishing 5-6 hours one day every weekend since August, and the last two weekends the size of fish has spiked. I thought this was because "the blue backs were in." I've caught a 16, 18, 19 and 20-inch fish (2 swinging caddis pupae and 2 high sticking a Frenchie). Two were silvery, two were more colorful. The 20-incher was silvery, had a broad head and shoulders -- but had its fin clipped. Another silvery one had a semi-healed gash on its side, and a more colorful one had a tail that looked like it had been chewed on (prey?).

Below is a picture of the silvery one with broad shoulders -- it doesn't look like it but it was probably around 20" (yes I know, likely story). I'm curious why the sudden spike in fish size (maybe I'm just an anomaly?). If they're not blue backs, they seem too small to be exiting winter strain, and the wrong time of year for the normal half-pounders.

Thanks for all this awesome stoke-inducing info.

15542

It's all so complex... the issue of steelhead strains on our river...

There are the dominant, Eel R. strain winter run fish the hatchery currently cranks out, there are other strains they once propagated but have since discontinued (ie, Mad R., Russian R., Washougal R. summer run and most recently, Coleman strain from Battle Creek). There are strays from various rivers. There are Folsom and Rainbow trout of natural and hatchery origin, which spill over Nimbus Dam in high water years. Finally, there are strains derived from interbreeding of various hatchery and natural-origin fish (though I do think the former is no longer practiced by CDFW). This can sometimes make identification difficult.

In between the Eel winter run fish and the 'blue back' run of mid to late March through April, there is also what I call a B-run class of 3-5# class which shows up mostly between Sailor Bar and Nimbus hatchery in late February to early March which are also thick-bodied like the blue backs but even girthier. Their color is more dark slate gray to almost black over a blinding white/silver body with translucent white fins.

And now, to really throw a wrench in things... it is quite possible that what we are calling 'blue backs' are really NOT blue backs at all but merely a color variation which better serves the fish in a saltwater rather than freshwater habitat. The blue back life cycle is, after all, more of a coastal than valley river trait.

The geography and relative conditions these likely Eel R. strain derivatives are forced into is not natural (neither is the Eel R. winter run for that matter...) I think it's safe to say they are more of an approximation of an actual blue back... just as the winter Eel River Steelhead of the AR today are an approximation of the ACTUAL Eel River brood stock from which they descended...

If you don't grasp that, I encourage you to go fish the Eel or the SF Eel or the Van Duzen (or any northern/coastal river) and you will see and FEEL the difference ;)

Similarly, I question the term half-pounder as it is often used to describe smaller steelhead on our river. The Klamath has a magnificent, and TRUE half-pounder run which without exception involves the ocean and a premature return to the Trinity/Klamath Watershed.

I believe (and I am by no means an expert on the subject) that what many call 1/2-lbers on the AR are often strays or hatchery (mostly) and/or natural origin (sometimes) steelhead smolts which either took up residency in the AR for a year or more prior to leaving for the salt or migrated to the Sacramento River and/or the delta and returned to the AR in the summer or fall rather than remaining in the delta or heading to the ocean.

Perhaps D. Lee can chime in here.

From your photo, I would say that fish was released at the Sunrise Boat Ramp in February of 2019 as an 8" hatchery smolt. It grew another 12 inches in the delta/ocean and returned January-February of 2020 to the Nimbus Fish Ladder. You can tell it was received by the hatchery twice because there are two V-shaped notches in its caudal fin.

When steelhead enter the ladder in January, they are often not ripe enough to spawn. They receive the notch in the tail and are returned to the river. If they come up again, whether or not they are ripe, they receive another notch in the tail. This is done to prevent them from being counted twice.

Looking closely at your fish, it appears to have been up the fish ladder twice.

NICE FISH BTW!

[Troutsource]

Mark, That's some serious mykiss forensics. I guess my fish was a horny "repeat offender." I didn't even notice the notch on the tail and would have guessed it was just a natural occurrence. Well, even if my recent quarry hasn't been in the vaunted BB class, they fight like hell and are my latest addiction on the A. I'm going to see if I can fish and do so successfully every month of the year there now for trout/steelhead. The A is starting to feel like an old shoe, at least the small stretch I frequent. PS Your pics were incredible, and now I have a better idea what to look for in terms of a BB.

Dennis, your book on Halfpounders is great (I borrowed it from GB Fly Fishers).

YC, thanks for all your glorious info, too.

I'm glad I had a virtual prenup with my wife whereby she agreed never to block me from fishing (I just try to be reasonable about it).

[DPLee]

STEELIES/26c3 is correct, California steelhead genetics are complex considering the movement of steelhead eggs and fingerling fish from California hatcheries and egg taking stations, and even attempts to establish Washington State summer run steelhead in several California rivers. In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, a number of egg taking stations operated on the upper Klamath River. Late summer/early fall steelhead were trapped, spawned and the hundreds of thousands of eggs transferred to the Sisson Hatchery (later renamed the Mt. Shasta Hatchery) and the fingerling fish stocked in streams all over California. The same can be said for several Eel River egg taking stations although the distribution was somewhat more limited. And it has been shown rainbow trout can demonstrate different resident and anadromous life histories. Many years ago Dr. Graham Gall from UC Davis while working on domesticated rainbow trout suggested fish genes were very "plastic."

In the past, fish size, color and geographical location were often used to discriminate different species. Later studies proved that was not such a good idea. There have been several genetic analysis/studies of California steelhead stocks, and even more on West Coast populations. Most of the information can be found on the internet with a little searching. I also agree the American River does not have a half-pounder steelhead run if you accept the original 1925 description of a half-pounder from the Eel River. In my previous book The Half-Pounder, A Steelhead Trout Life History and Fly Fishing I tried to explain the difference between the life histories of half-pounder steelhead runs from the Rogue, Klamath and Eel rivers and Sacramento River steelhead (NMFS folks like to call them Central Valley Steelhead although there is little hard evidence the San Joaquin River tributaries historically supported steelhead runs, they use the distribution of spring run Chinook salmon to justify steelhead distribution; and the late Dr. Robert Benhke suggested Sacramento River steelhead were an anadromous redband trout). Notwithstanding, most anglers today will still call any silvery trout less than 2 pounds from a California anadromous river a half-pounder.

BTW every genetic analysis/study of winter steelhead trapped at the Nimbus Fish Hatchery (not every fish in from the river) in spite of all the different hatchery strains/stocks introduced and there have been several, the adipose fin marked adult fish continue to genetically resemble Eel River winter steelhead from which the original broodstock was derived.

Dennis
www.dennisplee.com

[ycflyfisher]

Mark,

LH= life history which for steelhead is expressed as freshwater-salt water, ex 2-1. Or for fish that have a legit half-pounder LH phenotype, 2-H-1.

------"It does make sense that these fish would hatch and grow more quickly than winter-run offspring simply because available food in the spring and summer months is far more abundant than in the winter time. At least egg, embryo, alevin, fry, fingerling development would be much faster."

I would agree with that, but on the A I think the progeny of the later arriving stream-born fish you're describing, would still be at a significant disadvantage to the progeny of earlier arriving and potentially earlier spawning hatchery fish, because they'd be smaller. I think it's difficult to apply anything I THINK I might know to a truncated, compromised system where you have things like potential red imposition and all kinds of "lack of habitat" bottlenecks that impact survival to the next life stage. Is it possible potential later emergence would favor these later arriving fish? Definitely. Is it likely? I would not think so but I don't know. The only post emergence, pre-emigration survival data/discussions I've seen that's similar to the A is from the Feather. And the Feather is WAY different because of the two flow intro points. The low flow Feather is a channelized death trap for anything emerging from the gravel very much like the pre project upper T. It's gotten much more favorable and shallower with the gravel placement but it is still far from ideal. The HF Feather is also compromised, but doesn't suffer from the channelization of the LF and there's vastly more feathered edge habitat, and temps in the HF are significantly warmer and the data from the F that I've seen for chinooks shows that fry do develop faster in the HF due to less comp and better conditions for growth and they do close the developmental gap pretty quickly even though spawning happens significantly later in the HF than it does in the LF. Could that apply to the A? I wouldn't think so but I don't know.


"Is it possible that the smoltification process is hastened in the blue back juveniles because the early and vulnerable stage of their life cycle overlaps with warmer river temperatures and the proliferation of would-be predators? Natural selection surely would favor a faster maturation process and an early exit of the river to a larger body of brackish water. (think Stone Lagoon up north or the Sac Delta here)."

I don't think so and I wouldn't expect there to be much difference in emigration timing between the potential progeny of these largely streamborn fish your describing and the progeny of hatchery products on the A. I would think they'd both need a minimum of at least a season of in stream development prior to smoltification/ outmigration. Fish from the same year class I'd think would be subject to the same environmental triggers that spur the process and I'd guess they'd all go over roughly the same window.

----Getting to these larger, salty environs would likely reduce mortality by diffusing predation and the salt would better induce smoltification than residing in the river for a year or more as the current strain of hatchery smolts quite often do. ----

My understanding about smoltification is that the fish must undergo that process and reverse the osmotic salt retention vs salt excretion process prior to hitting the salt or they perish. The data I've seen from the F does show that some of streamborn chinooks do start emigration prior to smoltification. I wouldn't think that necessarily applies to streamborn Mykiss from the F but I'm not certain of that. I have been told that emigration prior to smoltification is common among Mykiss pops in Socal where the fish hedge their bets and express a multitude of LHs. I wouldn't think any strategy that increases dwell time for outgoing Mykiss in the delta would be very successful and I think selection pressure would limit those.

I could very well be be wrong about some, most or all of this.....

[DPLee]

Smoltification in anadromous salmonids has been intensely studied and research indicates it is initiated by water temperatures although there are other factors involved including fish size, photoperiod, etc. Check out my blogs for a more detailed discussion on smoltification and some of the issues with early release of hatchery produced juvenile fish.

The question of the origin and life history of late season, i.e. spring run fish, on the lower American River remains unclear. Steelhead/rainbow trout spawn in the river but the river does not produce large numbers of naturally produced smolt-sized fish. This is support by outmigration trapping studies conducted during the 2013 to 2015 seasons. While hundreds of natural origin steelhead/rainbow trout fry and parr were trapped, obviously from in river spawning, only two smolts were recorded in 2013, 31 in 2014, and only one in 2015.

In addition, if you have ever swung a fly on the Rogue River in the summer, you can catch a small rainbow trout on every other cast. On the Klamath River it might take 10 casts to catch a juvenile fish. You can fish the American River all day and never hook a juvenile or smolt sized fish. I contend the American River does not produce a significant number of steelhead/rainbow trout smolts due to a number of factors including lack of suitable habitat, high summertime water temperatures and predation. The lack of significant numbers of unmarked adult steelhead to the Nimbus Fish Hatchery continue to support this contention. However, returns of marked winter steelhead do not account for the unmarked (presumed naturally produced) spring steelhead/rainbow trout observed in the river.

Over the past several years I have examined the scales from a number of unmarked steelhead/rainbow trout from 14 to 18 inches from the lower American River caught in March and April. The growth rings (circuli) do not demonstrate the classic steelhead closely spaced freshwater and later wider spaced ocean growth. Growth appears to be consistent throughout the fish's life indicating they did not migrate to the ocean.

So where do the springtime American River fish come from? Angler surveys conducted by CDFG personnel in the early 1970’s on the lower American River suggested a large portion of the catch was made up of fish released from Coleman National Fish Hatchery. This was based on the high proportion of marked fish observed. The fall steelhead fishery on the lower American River declined after CNFH stopped releasing juvenile fish at Rio Vista. In addition, it was reported “From September through December a large proportion of the American River steelhead run consists of steelhead probably produced in the upper Sacramento River System. These fish are typically smaller than American River winter run fish.” Similar to observations made in the 1970's, I suspect naturally produced juvenile steelhead/rainbow trout emigrate from the Sacramento River below Keswick Dam. It is possible some fish entered the Delta and some researchers have used the term “weakly anadromous” while others call this a "migratory resident” life history.

Dennis
www.dennisplee.com

[Troutsource]

OK, so in layman's terms: the 18"-20" hatchery fish I caught probably originated from somewhere other than the American -- because (a) summer conditions on the A are very tough for trout survival, and (b) scales for larger spring mykiss on the A indicate that they never went to the ocean -- but rather grew larger upstream on the Sac (and then somehow ended up on the A, perhaps after falling downstream to the Delta, the migrating back up into the A).

Did I get it right?

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

We are very fortunate to have fisheries expert Dennis P Lee posting here because he has a lifetime of actual experience

and knowledge working for the California Fish & Game.


Dennis is also a dedicated two hand /Spey fly fisher as well, with a special connection to our Steelhead rivers.


He is one of the best local fly tiers with a passion for tying classic Steelhead and Atlantic Salmon flies.


Dennis is also an author with his great book on Half-Pounders........"The Half-Pounder, A Steelhead Trout Life History and Fly Fishing".


Dennis P Lee's Blog: https://dennisplee.com/blog/


Thanks Dennis.........

[DPLee]

OK, so in layman's terms: the 18"-20" hatchery fish I caught probably originated from somewhere other than the American -- because (a) summer conditions on the A are very tough for trout survival, and (b) scales for larger spring mykiss on the A indicate that they never went to the ocean -- but rather grew larger upstream on the Sac (and then somehow ended up on the A, perhaps after falling downstream to the Delta, the migrating back up into the A).

Did I get it right?

Sort of, 1) An adipose fin marked trout caught in the American River came from one of the anadromous fish hatcheries, i.e. Nimbus, Feather River or Coleman, however, most likely from Nimbus regardless of size. Hatcheries today release juvenile fish near the facility resulting in much less straying, 2) Unmarked fish, either steelhead or trout caught from the American River most likely did not originate in the American due to the river producing very few wild smolts, 3) The scales from fish I have caught in the spring from the American River, similar to pictures posted on this forum do not demonstrate both freshwater and ocean growth periods, typical of steelhead, indicating they did not migrate to the ocean, where they go is a guess, 4) This does not mean that some unmarked fish caught from the American River could not have migrated to the ocean and returned as steelhead. Physical appearance of the fish is not an indicator of life history.

Dennis

[ycflyfisher]

Thanks Dennis.

That's extremely interesting and completely confounding.

I see several significant take-aways from Dennis' comments:

1- He's not saying that there aren't hatchery steelhead (Mykiss that have a saltwater component in their respective LHs) on the American in the single salt range and his comments apply to the fish on the A that appear to be stream born; no clipped or partially clipped ad fins, or other visual indicators like crooked rays in the dorsal fin that would be obvious indicators for hatchery Mykiss produced at Nimbus (or other hatcheries) that may have been released unclipped.

2- The stream born fish Mark describes in great detail in the approximate one salt size range, 18-22"ish fish, on the A no matter how much they look like steelhead and act like steelhead, the vast majority if not the entirety of the population are not steelhead and are not hitting the salt.

3- They're also not just larger, older resident fish that emerged from the gravel somewhere on the A, and survived to their 3rd+ year of life on the A.

4- The A produces some stream born Mykiss but they do not survive beyond their first year of life in significant numbers. If the A can't produce a significant amount of stream born age 1+ O. Mykiss by default it's not producing fishable numbers of stream born steelhead or larger sized resident fish. I don't fish the A, so that's pretty depressing to hear.

5- These fish have to have origins from elsewhere, both in terms of where they emerged from the gravel and developed and all their growth occurred in freshwater, not a marine/ saltwater environs.

I see this as very significant because although these fish may only show in intermittent years on the A, we get these fish in significant, fishable numbers on the Feather every season. About 40-50% of the fish I landed in March on the Feather were stream born about half were also larger than you'd expect 'single salt' F steelhead to be. That's pretty typical for March on the F for me. I don't have any 1st hand experience but I do know these fish show up regularly on other Sac river tribs as well.

Without going into detail I do know that not some, but all the wild fish I caught on the Feather during one season had completely freshwater LHs, even the larger fish to about 6 lbs. I think that the population of migratory but not anadromous fish that Dennis is describing could potentially be a significantly larger population than it might seem at first glance. IF that is indeed the case I think it would not only be really interesting to determine where these fish are originating and what survival strategies they're employing (are they really emigrating to and developing in the Delta or are they just chasing the schools of emigrating chinook down the mainstem Sac and up the tribs or any combination of a myriad of other possibilities, but you'd need to understand the nature of these to effectively manage in their favor.

[DPLee]

ycflyfisher;

Great discussion and sorry to be confounding, as my wife says "make sure they want the 98 cent story and not just a nickel answer." Sometimes it is hard to put all into a short post which is why I usually refrain from Forum discussions. Nonetheless, regarding the origin of unmarked (non-hatchery produced) O. mykiss (using the technical verbiage) in local rivers, remember, the Sacramento River once supported an excellent steelhead run. Today, due to environmental changes, the river below Keswick now supports a large tailwater population of naturally produced rainbow trout. Studies have shown some rainbow trout retain the genes or whatever abilities to smolt and migrate to a saltwater environment.

Shapovalov and Taft in their Waddel Creek Fish Bulletin No. 98 (1954) wrote about "stream trout" and how some spawned, later migrated to the ocean and then returned as steelhead. With the migratory tendencies of rainbow trout, I cannot imagine every fish produced in the Sacramento River stays in the Sacramento River. I suspect many migrate downstream as "migratory resident" fish while some even smolt and enter saltwater. Many of these unmarked "migrants" eventually end up in our various rivers.

Dennis

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Dennis' second? book is coming out next summer/fall?


It will be "California Winter Steelhead".


https://dennisplee.com/wintersteelheadbook/

[Rossflyguy]

OK, so in layman's terms: the 18"-20" hatchery fish I caught probably originated from somewhere other than the American -- because (a) summer conditions on the A are very tough for trout survival, and (b) scales for larger spring mykiss on the A indicate that they never went to the ocean -- but rather grew larger upstream on the Sac (and then somehow ended up on the A, perhaps after falling downstream to the Delta, the migrating back up into the A).

Did I get it right?

I believe the same goes with Yuba fish. If I remember correctly they tagged some fish and those fish moved around a lot. Some went to the Bay and back. Some went to the Sac and came back. I’ve caught 16” fish on the AR during late summer and wasn’t hatchery. I’ve also seen steelhead spawning much lower in the system on the AR in January/February that weren’t Eel strain size. Even talked to a conventional guide who says those fish are there every year. I’m sure it’s very complex. More than we know.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Trout and Steelhead can swim in and out of dozens of river in this huge drainage.

If we could have control of the water levels in our reservoirs we could have a lot colder water.

[Troutsource]

Trout and Steelhead can swing in and out of dozens of river in this huge drainage.

I think that's why the regulate the Yuba rainbows as steelhead.

Regarding water temps, I'm a little puzzled by the A. There are plenty of caddis and midges to be eaten, and if you look at the attached graph, only once in the last 10 years has it gone over 70 degrees. The last three summers it barely hit 65. So are there more trout than we think there in the summer? I know I experimented fishing in August last year and had some great days. If I'm revealing a dirty little secret about the A, I apologize, but I think there's plenty of room for us all and I'm generally in favor of more transparency instead of less. Give some info, get some info, and be responsible when you fish.
15568

PS Bummer, Sac County parks closed this weekend: https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article241837191.html?

But I sense some wiggle room:

"All 29 county parks will be cordoned off starting Friday night and reopen Monday morning, Casparis said. That includes popular parks along the American River, as well as facilities like Sherman Island and Gibson Ranch.

But multi-use trails and bike paths — such as the Two Rivers Trail and the American River Parkway — will remain open for bicyclists and pedestrians," Casparis said.

[ycflyfisher]

Thanks Dennis. No need to apologize for confounding me. Being confounded is often times the default state of mind for me when trying to understand complex ecological or fisheries concepts or even simple issues that I often times attempt to put in a 'box' of concepts that I feel I do understand. You've got some interesting articles on your blog also.

[ycflyfisher]

I think that's why the regulate the Yuba rainbows as steelhead.

Regarding water temps, I'm a little puzzled by the A. There are plenty of caddis and midges to be eaten, and if you look at the attached graph, only once in the last 10 years has it gone over 70 degrees. The last three summers it barely hit 65. So are there more trout than we think there in the summer? I know I experimented fishing in August last year and had some great days. If I'm revealing a dirty little secret about the A, I apologize, but I think there's plenty of room for us all and I'm generally in favor of more transparency instead of less. Give some info, get some info, and be responsible when you fish.
15568
.

I really don't know the answers to your questions and I'm not sure where that temp gauge is on the A. I'm guessing it's fairly high up. Temperature is definitely an important aspect of habitat but it's definitely not the only one that limits Mykiss abundance. Elevated temps from the prolonged drought of the last decade definitely had a negative impact on Mykiss abundance in CV watersheds where abundance was monitored. In some of the south delta tribs, it really hammered abundance. The A my have temps suitable to support Mykiss, but there's a fairly fine line which can result in a huge difference between supporting some life and supporting high abundance.

There was a time when I went seine net crazy, and I used to set seines for long periods everywhere I fish to capture any incidental and behavioral drift that may be happening, and by my account both the diversity and total biomass captured per unit time on the lower Feather (which like the A is seriously invert impaired) vs someplace like the Yuba was shocking.

The things Ross mentions I THINK is from some discussion of unpublish data (I don't think RB has published this yet) from a telemetry study on the Yuba. The fish from this study were generally larger, they had to be large enough to implant, and I seem to recall all the recorded predation events on implanted fish occurred below Daguerre. Similarly, seasonal predator movement on the upper reaches of the lower Sac up until recently by were restricted by the Red Bluff Diversion Dam (The RBDD was abandoned in place with the gates up around 2013ish). Mykiss on the A would have to develop in a much more predator rich environs. How much of a contributing factor is limited predator movement to development of abundant riverine pops of Mykiss on the Yuba and LS? I don't know, but I think it helps.

But to Dennis' main point, to see even a modest run of late steelhead~100 or so fish that have origins on the A ( or similarly modest older rirverine fish- a few hundred or so), you'd have to have something on the order of at least 10K to 20k age 1 to age 2 (~5" to 9" fish) somewhere in the A every day of the season. With those kinds of densities on a short stub of a river, anglers should be catching a bunch of smaller Mykiss.

Are there more larger Mykiss on the A year round than most would think? Maybe. Possibly, I don't really know, but I'd question if they were all products of the A.

Just some things to think about.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

They installed "Shutters" on Folsom Dam to take water at different levels to control the temperature of the Lower American river:

Folsom Dam was designed to be able to release water from various elevations within the
reservoir simultaneously. Dam operators modify temperature control device (TCD) shutters on
each of the three powerhouse generation penstocks to take water from different depths in the
reservoir and blend outflows in order to meet downstream regulatory temperature
requirements/targets. Operators also adjust the elevation of the Municipal Water Supply Intake
(Municipal Intake) (Vermeyen, T.B. 1997) and operate the low level outlets on the dam to modify
outflow water temperatures and preserve cold water resources in the reservoir. The water
temperature model was developed to automatically determine the best ATSP outflow
temperature schedule possible and utilize cold water in the reservoir most effectively. The model
includes automated TCD and powerhouse flow split operations, a user specified target
temperature for the variable elevation Municipal Intake, and use of the low level outlets in late
fall to access cold water in the reservoir below the powerhouse outlets.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

But they send lots of our water down south so there is no water left to have a thermocline.

We could fight for a "minimum pool" in all our reservoirs in Nor Cal to save our trout, salmon and steelhead.



There are "shutters" on Shasta Dam so they can draw off water from different depth to control the rivers temperature.

Temperatures are controlled this way for agriculture, water quality and fish.


On the lower Feather river they have the shallow Thermalito Forebay and Afterbay to warm the water for agriculture.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oroville%E2%80%93Thermalito_Complex

[STEELIES/26c3]

I think that's why the regulate the Yuba rainbows as steelhead.

Regarding water temps, I'm a little puzzled by the A. There are plenty of caddis and midges to be eaten, and if you look at the attached graph, only once in the last 10 years has it gone over 70 degrees. The last three summers it barely hit 65. So are there more trout than we think there in the summer? I know I experimented fishing in August last year and had some great days. If I'm revealing a dirty little secret about the A, I apologize, but I think there's plenty of room for us all and I'm generally in favor of more transparency instead of less. Give some info, get some info, and be responsible when you fish.
15568

PS Bummer, Sac County parks closed this weekend: https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article241837191.html?

But I sense some wiggle room:

"All 29 county parks will be cordoned off starting Friday night and reopen Monday morning, Casparis said. That includes popular parks along the American River, as well as facilities like Sherman Island and Gibson Ranch.

But multi-use trails and bike paths — such as the Two Rivers Trail and the American River Parkway — will remain open for bicyclists and pedestrians," Casparis said.

I’m one of CDFW’s greatest critics but if I’m being fair, I have to acknowledge that often their hands are tied due to the multi-agency approach to water and resource management and namely that decisions are made or not made by; the Department of Water Resources (in charge of water releases) and the Bureau of Reclamation and US Army Corps of Engineers (responsible for the Nimbus and Folsom Dams and related infrastructure).
Often, the folks at California Department of Fish and Wildlife, who really care about our fisheries (hatchery personnel, biologists, survey crews, etc) don’t have the necessary funding and/or tools to properly manage our salmonid fisheries. For instance, on a recent tour of the Nimbus Hatchery by the Golden Gate Salmon Association, it was revealed that a temperature sensor and control device on the upstream side of Folsom Dam is broken. This apparatus is critical to providing cold water to both the hatchery and the lower American River in the fall when salmon migration and spawning is at its peak. The B.O.R. and Army Corps each task each other with the responsibility for fixing it.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

I don't think we will be able to get anywhere with having "water for fish" (wasted to the ocean) unless we have big money for powerful

lobbyists and/or pass powerful water laws to protect our anadromous species?


Here in Florida we have the "Big Three" destroying our once World famous inshore fisheries with deadly diverse polluting runoff:

Big Sugar, Big Citrus and Big Dairy.

_________________________________________