COASTAL RIVERS

[Darian]

Yeah,.... Strange but wonderfull....

Was the Little River you mentioned in Mendocino or Humboldt County

[dberry]

Little River in Mendocino County - the one that run through Van Dame State Park.

[Tony Buzolich]

Last year I spent a good amount of time on the Russian fishing steelhead in the area above Cloverdale. Every day on the way home to Redwood Valley I'd stop at the Coyote Hatchery at Lake Mendocino to see how many steelhead had come up and how the run was progressing.

At the hatchery they had several holding ponds full of silver salmon smolt that they had been raising. I was told that the fish came from the Noyo River at Ft. Bragg, would be raised at the hatchery in Ukiah, and then returned to the Noyo.

I was glad to see this happening. Most of the workers at the hatchery were volunteers from the Ukiah Rod & Gun Club and were there every day that the run was going on. Quite impressive.

Hopefully some day there will be viable populations of silvers enough so that we can have a season on them.

Here's another teaser. What about a viable population of pinks? For the last few years another local coastal stream stream has had a small run of pink salmon large enough to make to make the news in Ukiah.

No, not the Russian.
TONY

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

If they could give those rivers some help I am sure some of those runs could come back.

[Darian]

Pinks in our coastal streams Very interesting.... If I recall correctly, Pinks utilize the lower stretches of rivers/streams for spawning. Maybe that would contribute to establishing them in a bunch of places along the coast.

The only problem I see for them is that they seem to spawn during the same period that Kings spawn. Not many rivers/streams along our coats that have enough water to provide access to spawners during August/September.... That's seems to be the limiting factor for Kings along the coast.

Many of the old timers I fished with told me that Kings used to spawn in the Garcia and Noyo Rivers.... Don't think there's too many, if any, in the Garcia any longer.

[Covelo]

There use to be silvers in Strawberry Creek that runs through the UC Berkeley campus. Steelhead used to occur in streams all the way down to northern Baja Calif. A lot has changed. The Eel River used to have a large run of silvers especially up the South Fork. Most fishermen did not know about them because the river was usually high and muddy when they were passing through. Have not heard anything about them lately. Here is a link the the DFG recovery plan for coho.

http://www.dfg.ca.gov/nafwb/CohoReco...yStrategy.html

And here is a link to historical fish counts at Benbow. Anyone have a time machine?

http://www.hits.org/salmon98/history/damrecords2.html

Most king salmon in the in the coastal streams don't come in until Oct-Nov when the rains hit. Occasionally a few fish show in the estuaries in Sept, but the only rivers with fish in Aug are the Sac and Klamath. BTW a friend reported seeing a few kings in the San Lorenzo last year. Supposedly there used to be kings in the Gualala too.

[Darian]

Kings in the Gualala.... Interesting. I fished that river heavily during the late 60's thru the mid 70's and never saw or heard of a king being taken in the Gualala....

Unless there're early, heavy rains, the sandbar at the mouth doesn't blow out until late fall (near mid-November). I wouldn't think King's would be able to maintain a viable population under those conditions....

Oh well,.... wouldn't be the first time I was mistaken

[Covelo]

"Juvenile Chinook (king) salmon specimens were caught prior to 1945, indicating that they were present at that time. " I don't remember where I first heard about kings in the Gualala but I found the above quote at the following web page. Certainly many of the problems with this river are a result of heavy logging so one might presume that there is a lot more gravel in the lower river now (especially after 1964), therefore issues with the mouth closing in the summer may not have been as common way back then.

From http://www.ncwatershed.ca.gov/gualal...ala_river.html

Here is another good web page. I especially like the estimates of 19,000 steelhead in the San Lorenzo and 50,000 steelhead in the Russian River in the 1960s. Wow!

http://www.krisweb.com/biblio/ncc_cd...978_status.pdf

[Cruzin4Metalheads]

Really great site, first time I have posted anything.
Regarding some of the discussion of both silvers and kings south of San Fran. There are still some really good runs of Silvers left, but some year classes are much better than others. There is one year class that is really strong. Silvers are all the way to the Carmel/ Big Sur that I have whitnessed or have caught.
The Kings/Silvers are a result of the Hatchery program on Scott Creek.
http://mbstp.org
More people should be aware of this Hatchery, they are non-profit, and do great work in the area raising awareness.

They pen raise some Moke fish in the Santa Cruz harbor and release them into Monterey Bay. If they don't get caught out on the bay, when returning they look for anything they can find to spawn. Whatever stream/ creek/ drainage ditch opens to the salt first they enter.

[Darian]

I'm not always a fan of hatcheries but, in this case, it sounds like the right place and right time.... Good for them.

I'm really happy to hear about those populations coming back.